The JANM conference that starts today in Denver has a whole bunch of interesting and important panels, workshops and discussions. I’m moderating one on Saturday, about Hapas — mixed-race Asian Americans. But some of the most powerful parts of the conference will be the ones that bring people together with their past.
Today and Sunday, caravans of buses will be taking conference attendees to southeast Colorado, to the Amache concentration camp near the town of Granada (the official name of the camp was Granada Relocation Center) where more than 7,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned during World War II.
Erin and I will be hosting one of the buses on Sunday. The day will begin at 6am and we’ll return in the evening — the drive to the camp takes about 3 1/2 hours through desolate eastern plains terrain.
I’ll blog about the trip afterwards, but I wanted to share a couple of links about Amache:
The Pacific Citizen, my favorite APA news source (I recently retired from my position as Editorial Board Chair for the newspaper, which is published by the Japanese American Citizens League), ran an article about the University of Denver’s archeological dig at the Amache site.
The Rocky Mountain News ran a story today about a former internee visiting Amache.
The Colorado Springs Gazette also wrote an article about the DU project at Amache.
And here’s a link to an article I wrote back in 2003 about Amache for the Denver Post.
One of the best pieces on Amache is in Denver’s weekly alternative newspaper, Westword, which focuses on John Hopper, the heroic Granada High School teacher who’s made the preservation of Amache a cause celebre for many students over the years.
And here’s a 1998 article I wrote after riding down to Amache with the annual bus pilgrimage from Denver.
one day I’ll visit Amache! It’s funny that as much as I’ve read about the Internment and the JA experience, I’ve never actually visited one of the camps..almost inexcusable when one is in Colorado..but I’m the king of procrastinating