National Trust for Historic Preservation
includes TL in its ‘11 Most Endangered’ list.
By P.C. Staff
The Japanese American Citizens League issued a statement in support of the nonprofit National Trust for Historic Preservation’s most recent annual 11 Most Endangered Historic Places List that included the Tule Lake Segregation Center.
In its May 27 statement, JACL said that it “applauds the inclusion of the Tule Lake Segregation Center on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places List” and that the recognition “ … serves as an important reminder that sites that preserve our community’s history of trauma, resilience, and resistance are under immediate threat.”
In its May 20 statement on its website, the National Trust for Historic Preservation wrote: “Today, a token 37-acre portion of the Tule Lake Segregation Center has been designated as a National Monument, but the primary 1,100-acre site is unprotected,” also noting that “staffing and public access is limited” and that a “rural airfield now occupies 359 acres at the heart of the former incarceration camp site.”
Tule Lake was one of 10 World War II-era federally run concentration camps operated by the War Relocation Authority built to incarcerate ethnic Japanese, most of whom were U.S. citizens forcibly removed from homes and businesses along the U.S. West Coast after Imperial Japan’s December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor in the then-U.S. territory of Hawaii.
On Dec. 8, 1941, the U.S. declared war on Japan. On Feb. 19, 1942, President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, which would authorize the forced removal and incarceration of America’s Japanese populace into the WRA 10 camps in remote areas of the nation. All told, more than 125,000 ethnic Japanese were incarcerated in a variety of remotely located WRA and non-WRA sites across several different states.
In 1943, Tule Lake became a segregation center that housed incarcerees from the other camps deemed disloyal for, among other things, not answering “yes” to two specific queries on a government-issued loyalty questionnaire. At its peak, it housed more than 18,700 people. All 10 of the WRA camps were closed after the war ended. In 2006, the Tule Lake Segregation Center gained National Historic Landmark status.
JACL also stated “We encourage our community to urge their members of Congress to take action to save Tule Lake today” by visiting this link. It also shared a link from March on the 80th anniversary of the closure of the Tule Lake site.
