Minidoka Internment National Monument

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Minidoka Internment National Monument
IUCN Category V (Protected Landscape/Seascape)

Location:	Idaho, USA
Nearest city:	Eden, ID
Coordinates:	42°37′73″N, 114°13′56″W
Area:	73 acres (0.29 km²)
Established:	January 17, 2001
Governing body:	National Park Service

Minidoka Internment National Monument is a U.S. National Monument located 17 miles (27 km) northeast of Twin Falls, Idaho and just north of Eden, Idaho. The area is known as Hunt. Minidoka is the name of a reclamation project which gives its name to Minidoka County.

The monument is administered by the National Park Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior. It is the site of the World War II-era Minidoka Internment Camp, one of ten camps at which Japanese Americans, both citizens and resident aliens, were detained as a precautionary measure during World War II under provisions of President Roosevelt's Executive Order 9066. Minidoka housed about 7,000 Japanese Americans, predominantly from Oregon, Washington, and Alaska.

Japanese-American internees at the Minidoka War Relocation Center

The national monument was established in 2001, and as one of the newest units of the National Park System, it does not have any visitor facilities or services available. Currently, visitors see the remains of the entry guard station, waiting room, and rock garden and can visit the Relocation Center display at the Jerome County Museum in nearby Jerome and the restored barracks building at the Idaho Farm and Ranch Museum southeast of town.

The National Park Service began a three-year public planning process in the fall of 2002 to develop a General Management Plan (GMP) and Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). The General Management Plan sets forth the basic management philosophy for the Monument and provides the strategies for addressing issues and achieving identified management objectives that will guide management of the site for the next 15 - 20 years.

The Friends of Minidoka sponsor an annual, multi-day pilgrimage of camp survivors and the public to the site every June.

On December 21, 2006 President Bush signed H.R. 1492 into law guaranteeing $38,000,000 in federal money to restore the Minidoka relocation center along with nine other former Japanese internment camps. "H.R. 1492".

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

Official Park Service site
Friends of Minidoka
University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections – Social Issues Photographs 500 historical images from Western United States and the Pacific Northwest region covering political and social topics such as women's issues, labor and government, and ethnic groups with special emphasis on the Japanese internment camps (including the Minidoka Relocation Center and the Puyallup Assembly center known as Camp Harmony) in the Northwest during World War II.