Cover Page

Table of Contents

Abstract

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Essay

Brief History

Gila River

Granada

Heart Mountain

Jerome

Manzanar

Minidoka

Poston

Rohwer

Topaz

Tule Lake

Isolation Centers

Add'l Facilities

Assembly Centers

DoJ and US Army Facilities

Prisons

References

Appendix A

Appendix B

Appendix C

Confinement and Ethnicity: An Overview of World War II Japanese American Relocation Sites by J. Burton, M. Farrell, F. Lord, and R. Lord

Chapter 7 (continued)
Jerome Relocation Center

Central Area

Currently the former administration and barracks area is delimited by U.S. Highway 165 on the west and rows of windbreak trees on the north and south. The central portion is owned by John Ellington; the area that once housed over 8,000 people is now occupied and farmed by one extended family. John Ellington lived on a farm east of the relocation center in the 1940s and has lived in the vicinity since 1932. He met numerous Japanese Americans when they were working on surrounding farms and also when he visited the center.

There are currently several residences and farm buildings in the central area (Figure 7.14). Remains from the relocation center include a large brick smokestack, a concrete water reservoir, two "relocated houses," and several concrete slab foundations. Only an occasional artifact possibly associated with the relocation center was seen in the central area. These include fragments of clear and amber glass, hotel ware ceramics, concrete, and bricks.

Figure 7.14. Site of the Jerome Relocation Center today.

Figure 7.15. "Relocated House" at Jerome today.

Figure 7.16. Fire hydrant at Jerome.

The relocated houses (Figure 7.15) were originally built by the Farm Security Administration and moved to the relocation center by the WRA (John Ellington, personal communication, 1994). Near one there is a fire hydrant with a 1942 date (Figure 7.16).

The most salient feature remaining at the site is the 100-foot-tall yellow brick hospital boiler house smokestack (Figures 7.17 and 7.18). The smokestack is in poor condition; a portion of the top has already fallen.

The massive concrete reservoir, located in what once was the central area, now stands unused amongst the farm fields (Figures 7.19 and 7.20). Nearby, concrete pads and machinery from the two deep wells that supplied the relocation center also remain (Figure 7.21). According to John Ellington's son, a previous owner had cleared the immediate area, dug ditches, and reused the deep water wells in an attempt to grow rice.

Several of the concrete slabs for buildings in the administration area are still in existence and serve as foundations for farm buildings. Seven concrete slabs and asphalt paving in the warehouse area are used as foundations for grain silos and to store farm equipment (Figure 7.22).

Most of the residential area has been cleared and leveled and is under cultivation for rice and soybeans (Figure 7.23). But some of the raised gravel roads are still used (Figure 7.24). There are no variations in soil or vegetative growth to indicate the original slab or pier foundations in the fields, and it is not known if they lie buried or were removed. Within the central area a low-lying flooded area (possibly a recent borrow pit) had abundant concrete debris, likely from relocation center building foundations, along its banks.

Photo Album

Continued

Last Modified: Fri, Sep 1 2000 07:08:48 pm PDT
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