History
In the 1800s, many emigrants from Japan crossed the Pacific Ocean to seek economic opportunity in America. The pioneers (Issei) and their American-born children (Nisei) encountered various forms of racial prejudice in the United States.
More than two-thirds of internees at the ten Relocation Centers were American citizens by birth. Those who came to the Minidoka Relocation Center, also known as the Hunt Camp, found a hastily constructed facility ill-suited for the extreme climate of south central Idaho. The camp consisted of administration and warehouse buildings, 44 residential blocks, schools, fire stations, hospital, post office and an assortment of shops and stores, and a cemetery. The hastily-built barracks had no insulation to combat winter temperatures as low as -21 degrees. Spring, with its ankle-deep mud and blinding dust storms, was followed by scorching summertime heat, with temperatures soaring well over 100 degrees.
Despite their internment, most Japanese Americans remained intensely loyal to the United States, and many volunteered for military service. Of the ten relocation centers, Minidoka had the highest number of volunteers, about 1,000 internees - nearly ten percent of the camp's peak population. Many fought with the famed 442nd Regimental Combat Unit, which saw extensive action in France and Italy and was the most decorated unit of its size and length of service in American military history. Seventy-three soldiers from Minidoka died while fighting for their country and two received the Medal of Honor, the highest military honor awarded in the United States.
Threat
Minidoka Internment Camp faces a number of threats. Although the camp was disassembled after the war, the National Monument and adjoining properties include a broad collection of buildings and structures from the internment camp period. The Monument contains remnants of the Military Police guard house, the visitor reception building, a rock garden constructed by internees for display of the camp honor roll, and a large, hand-dug root cellar constructed by internees to store the crops grown at the camp. Unfortunately, while the National Monument was designated over seven years ago, limited funds and staff mean that there are no visitor services at the site, and most interpretation takes place many miles away through a temporary exhibit at Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument. Furthermore, many significant resources lie outside of the current National Monument boundary. Nearby properties include camp supply warehouses, numerous barracks reused as farm buildings, an intact camp fire station, foundations and footprints of staff housing areas, and hundreds of archaeological features related to the camp.
An additional significant threat is posed by the 13,000-head dairy heifer replacement facility proposed just upwind of the site. Industrial agriculture at this scale has enormous environmental consequences, yet when this animal production facility was initially proposed last year, county land use regulations did not permit the National Park Service, the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), the non-profit Friends of Minidoka, Idaho Concerned Area Residents for the Environment (ICARE), the former internees and their families, or anyone else that lived more than one mile from the proposed CAFO to comment on the plan. The first application for this CAFO was withdrawn, but it has since been resubmitted. It is still unclear whether anyone whose primary residence is outside a one-mile radius from the proposed facility will be allowed to testify at public hearings or submit written comments.
Solutions
The National Park Service conducted a comprehensive, highly inclusive, five-year process to create a General Management Plan for the Minidoka Internment National Monument.When implemented, the Plan would develop interpretive and educational programming at the Minidoka site. In addition, legislation is currently pending before Congress that would expand the boundaries of the National Monument in Idaho and add an important related site on Bainbridge Island, Washington, thus bringing more resources under protection and enhancing interpretive opportunities. This legislation complements legislation recently signed into law by President Bush (supported by the National Trust) that authorizes the creation of a $38 million grant program to ensure the protection of all ten Japanese Internment Camps. Unfortunately, funds for the program have yet to be appropriated.
Funding alone will not eliminate the immediate threat posed by the development of a 13,000-head concentrated animal feeding operation approximately 1.25 miles upwind of the Minidoka Internment National Monument. The impacts of CAFOs on air and water quality are both well documented and significant. In Idaho, the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate CAFOs through National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permits as potential point sources for industrial wastewater pollution. Minidoka Internment National Monument and other historic sites and communities could be better protected through the enactment and enforcement of local, state and federal permitting processes that are required to consider the impact these industrial facilities have on communities and historic resources.
Update
The Jerome County Commissioners voted on October 9, 2007 to deny the application for the factory farming facility threatening Minidoka, moving the site one step closer to being saved. Read more on the PreservationNation blog.
