Heart Mountain Relocation Camp documents
Overview
Records from the Heart Mountain Relocation Camp, a site of imprisonment of Japanese-Americans.
Dates
- Creation: 1944-1945
Language of Materials
In English and Japanese.
Condition Description
Most pages are acidic and fragile.
Conditions Governing Access
Collection is open for research.
Extent
.04 linear feet (1 volume)Collection includes three issues in Japanese of the War Relocation Authority Washington Daily News Digest, Heart Mountain Relocation Project Community Council session reports, notes from the first session of the Study Committee for the Opening of the West Coast, a job description for a Block Coordinator, a chart of all committee members as of May 1945, and the camp's criminal code. (description from dealer)
Biographical / Historical
Heart Mountain was one of ten government camps used for the internment of Japanese Americans evicted from the West Coast Exclusion Zone during World War II. The internment camp was located in Wyoming between the towns of Cody and Powell. Construction of the military-style barracks and guard towers began in June of 1942, and the camp opened on August 11, when the first Japanese Americans arrived by train from the Pomona, Santa Anita, and Portland assembly centers. Over the next three years, the camp would hold a total of 13,997 Japanese Americans before closing on November 10, 1945. Heart Mountain had the highest rate of draft resistance of all ten camps; at the same time, 649 Japanese American men, volunteers and draftees, joined the American military from the camp. In 1988 and 1992, the U.S. Congress passed laws to apologize to Japanese Americans for this and other war-time actions committed by the United States. (Source: Wikipedia contributors, "Heart Mountain Relocation Center," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Heart_Mountain_Relocation_Center&oldid=1033112771 (accessed July 31, 2021).
Arrangement
Arranged as received.
Custodial History
Ownership prior to this acquisition is unknown.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
2021M-44. Purchased from Bennett Penka Rare Books 2021 with the Sidney J. Watts Fund, 2021 May 20.
Processing Information
This collection was processed to a basic level with minimal rehousing, organization, and preservation. (Melanie Wisner, 2021)
Subject
- Heart Mountain Relocation Center (Wyo.) (Organization)
- Title
- Heart Mountain Relocation Center (Wyo.). Heart Mountain Relocation Center documents, 1944-1945 (MS Am 3370): Guide
- Status
- completed
- Date
- 31 July 2021
- Description rules
- dacs
- Language of description
- eng
- EAD ID
- hou03395
Repository Details
Part of the Houghton Library Repository
Houghton Library is Harvard College's principal repository for rare books and manuscripts, archives, and more. Houghton Library's collections represent the scope of human experience from ancient Egypt to twenty-first century Cambridge. With strengths primarily in North American and European history, literature, and culture, collections range in media from printed books and handwritten manuscripts to maps, drawings and paintings, prints, posters, photographs, film and audio recordings, and digital media, as well as costumes, theater props, and a wide range of other objects. Houghton Library has historically focused on collecting the written record of European and Eurocentric North American culture, yet it holds a large and diverse number of primary sources valuable for research on the languages, culture and history of indigenous peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania.
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