Poston War Relocation Center

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Painting of the Poston War Relocation Center painted by Japanese American, Tom Tanaka while interned

The Poston Relocation Center, located in Yuma County (now in La Paz County) of Arizona, was the largest of the internment camps operated by the War Relocation Authority during World War II.

The camp was composed of three separate camps arranged in a chain from north to south at a distance of three miles from each other. Internees names the camps Roasten, Toastin, and Dustin based on their desert locations. The Colorado River was approximately 3 miles to the west, outside of the camp perimeter.

Poston was built on the Colorado River Indian Reservation, over the objections of the Tribal Council, who refused to be a part of doing to others what had been done to their tribe. However, officials of the Bureau of Indian Affairs overrode the Council, seeing the opportunity to bring in improvements and develop agricultural land, on the War Department budget and with thousands of "volunteers," which would remain after the war and aid the Reservation's permanent population.

The combined peak population of the Poston camps was over 17,000, mostly from Southern California. At the time Poston was the third largest "city" in Arizona. It was built by Del Webb who would later become famous building Sun City, Arizona, and other retirement communities.

A single fence surrounded all three camps, though Poston II and III did not have gatehouses. The thousands of internees and staff passed through the barbed-wire perimeter at Poston I, which was where the main administration center was located.

Poston was a subject of a sociological research by Alexander H. Leighton, published in his 1945 book "The Governing of Men". As Time Magazine wrote: After 15 months at Arizona's vast Poston Relocation Center as a social analyst, Commander Leighton concluded that many an American simply fails to remember that U.S. Japanese are human beings.^[1]

1 Life at Poston
2 Poston today
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Life at Poston

Perhaps the frustration felt in the internment camps was best expressed by this anonymous poem, which was written by an internee at Poston:

THAT DAMNED FENCE

They've sunk the posts deep into the ground

They've strung out wires all the way around.

With machine gun nests just over there

And sentries and soldiers everywhere.

We're trapped like rats in a wired cage,

To fret and fume with impotent rage;

Yonder whispers the lure of the night,

But that DAMNED FENCE assails our sight.

We seek the softness of the midnight air,

But that DAMNED FENCE in the floodlight glare

Awakens unrest in our nocturnal quest,

And mockingly laughs with vicious jest.

With nowhere to go and nothing to do,

We feel terrible, lonesome, and blue:

That DAMNED FENCE is driving us crazy,

Destroying our youth and making us lazy.

Imprisoned in here for a long, long time,

We know we're punished--though we've committed no crime,

Our thoughts are gloomy and enthusiasm damp,

To be locked up in a concentration camp.

Loyalty we know, and patriotism we feel,

To sacrifice our utmost was our ideal,

To fight for our country, and die, perhaps;

But we're here because we happen to be Japs.

We all love life, and our country best,

Our misfortune to be here in the west,

To keep us penned behind that DAMNED FENCE,

Is someone's notion of NATIONAL DEFENSE!

Unlike other internment camps, the agricultural and animal-husbandry areas of Poston were within the perimeter fenceline.

Schools and a number of other buildings were constructed by the internees. A shortage of available lumber led them to build using adobe.

Many of the inhabitants particpated and created their own recreational activities, such as the boys scouts, sports teams, and various jobs. Poston also contained poor sanitary conditions

[edit] Poston today

A number of buildings built for the internment camps are still in use today. Others, while still existing, are seriously deteriorated and in desperate need of maintenance. The majority were removed after the camp closed, and many are still in use as utility buildings in surrounding areas. The residential areas have been largely converted to agricultural use.

Visitors to sites at Poston (or any other internment camp) are warned to watch for and avoid rattlesnakes, scorpions, spiders, wasps and other dangerous wildlife which may be present in the remote, back country areas selected for the internment camps. If planning to explore on foot at any time of year, visitors should bring plenty of drinking water due to the desert location.

On December 21, 2006 President Bush signed H.R. 1492 into law guaranteeing $38,000,000 in federal money to restore the Poston relocation center along with nine other former Japanese internment camps. ^[2]