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 9 (continued)
Minidoka Relocation Center

Interpretation

Figure 9.24. VFW hall in Jerome, Idaho.

In Jerome, the County Historical Museum has a small but apparently very popular display on the relocation center. One of the volunteers there lamented that "people are more interested in [the relocation center] than the rest of the exhibits." Also of interest, the Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) building adjacent to the Museum was a mess hall moved from the relocation center (Figure 9.24).

East of Jerome on State Highway 25 at the turnoff to the relocation center site there is a large state historical marker (Figure 9.25). Within the relocation center itself, at the stone guard house and waiting room at the Hunt Bridge, there is a small gravel parking area, paths, and interpretative signs about the internment (Figures 9.26-9.29). Also commemorated here are the Japanese Americans from the relocation center who died serving in the military during World War II. Nearly 1,000 from Minidoka served in the army; Minidoka had the largest casualty list of the ten relocation centers.

A public ceremony was held at the site in 1979 when it was added to National Register of Historic Places (Conley 1982:198). The parking lot, paths, and interpretative signs were completed a few years after the ceremony (Turner 1989).

Recently, the Jerome County Historical Society has acquired two original Minidoka barracks and moved them to their in-progress "Idaho Farm and Ranch Museum" located 18 miles west of the relocation center site at the junction of Interstate 84 and U.S. Highway 93. One of the barracks will be used to interpret the relocation center and the other will be renovated for other uses (Asian American Comparative Collection Newsletter 16:2).

Photo Album

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