In the summer of 1942, the Federal government built a prison camp in Wyoming. Located between Cody and Powell, the Heart Mountain Relocation Center, erected in 60 hectic days, was designed to incarcerate 11,000 people.
The prisoners began arriving on July 12, 1942 on a train leaving from Pomona, CA. four days earlier. In the wee hours of the morning, 292 exhausted, confused and apprehensive prisoners got off that train, an advanced contingent of the 11,000 people who followed on 20 similar trains arriving every other day for the next two months. These prisoners were all people of Japanese heritage living along the West Coast. Because of the Pearl Harbor attack, the military suspected that these Japanese people, most of whom were U.S. citizens, were under the control of Tokyo and thus a threat to America’s interests. They were not welcome in Wyoming.
At a conference held in Salt Lake City, on April 7,1942, attended by the governors of the Western states, War Relocation Authority Director Milton Eisenhower and Col. Karl Bendetsen representing the military, it was announced that Wyoming had been selected as the site for one of the ten relocation centers to be built to imprison all persons of Japanese descent for the duration of the war.
Governor Nels Smith of Wyoming, upon learning that thousands of Japanese people would be sent to his state, walked up to Eisenhower, shook his fist in Eisenhower’s face and growled through clenched teeth, “If you bring Japanese into my state, I promise you they will be hanging from every tree”.
When mayor Ora Bever of Powell was informed by Wyoming senator Joseph C. O’Mahoney that a prison camp was to be built in his area, he opposed it. Mayor Paul Stock of Cody said he had no objection to its construction, but did not want any Japanese allowed in his town.
Governor Smith declared he would not accept Japanese aliens in his state without Federal control and maintenance.
The Wyoming legislature ensured that Japanese people were not qualified to obtain a hunting or fishing license, and that it was illegal for a Japanese person to vote in Wyoming.
The Heart Mountain camp’s primary and secondary education systems, which the Japanese people created from scratch, hired Caucasian teachers recruited mostly from Wyoming and Nebraska, but a few Japanese prisoners had teaching credentials and were also hired.
All teachers received “War Emergency Certificate” to teach in Wyoming from the Wyoming Board of education. Japanese teachers’ certificates had, written, by hand, on the back, “Valid at Heart Mountain Only”.
When Wyoming became a state on July 10, 1890 as the 44th state of the Union, it selected as its motto – Equal Rights.
