AMACHE DIGITAL COLLECTIONS WEBSITE
The
Archives and Special Collections Department of the Auraria Library and the Stephen
H. Hart Library of the Colorado Historical Society (CHS) are happy to announce
their “Amache Digital Collections” website. The URL for this site is
http://library.auraria.edu/archives/adc.html. This website, which
displays images, paper based documents and other information about the Granada
Relocation Center, is the result of a joint project funded through a grant from
the Colorado Digitization Project. The aim of this website is to provide easy
online access to materials from the collections at both the CHS and Auraria
relating to the Japanese-American relocation camp located at Amache in
South-Eastern Colorado during World War II.
We
consider these materials worthy of digitization because of their importance in
understanding a unique and troubling event in Colorado’s history. Shortly after the beginning of World War II,
the U.S. War Relocation Authority established a series of camps throughout the
Western United States to house Japanese-American citizens under the auspices of
Executive Order No. 9066. The Granada
Relocation Center was one of these camps. From it’s opening on August 27, 1942,
until its closure on October 15, 1945, this camp was home to a total of some
10,295 Japanese-American citizens from exclusion areas on the West Coast of the
United States. These U. S. citizens were forcefully evacuated and relocated
inland from their homes, primarily in California. They were interned at Amache
because they were seen as a threat to national security after the Japanese
attack on Pearl Harbor. Most lost all of their possessions, their businesses
and their homes as a result. The papers and photographs we have digitized for
our website will help to provide a unique record of the daily life in these
camps which in total housed over 120,000 Japanese-American citizens during the
Second World War. We believe that the photographs, documents, publications and
correspondence held by both of our institutions represent valuable primary
resource materials of interest to students, researchers, scholars and the
general public.
Seventy-five
photographic images, which were created by the War Relocation Authority to show
the day-to-day living conditions within the camp, are included on the
website. These images all show happy,
smiling internees going about their daily routines. A more realistic perspective on life in the Granada Relocation
Center can be gleaned by reading the camp newspaper, “The Granada
Pioneer”. The first fifty issues of the
newspaper are included as Adobe PDF files on the website. (The Colorado
Historical Society has the entire run of the “Granada Pioneer” available on
microfilm at the Stephen H. Hart Library
for those who are interested.) The “Pioneer”, which was published every
Wednesday and Saturday, like most small town newspapers, published all of the
camp gossip fit to print… the good, the bad and the ugly. Many War Relocation
Authority reports from the collections at Auraria and the Colorado Historical
Society regarding the camp are also available on the website. Notable among these reports is a 171-page
directory in both English and Japanese listing all of the internees who were
detained at Amache. All of the print
materials presented on this website are presented in Adobe PDF format. While these files might take a little time
to load, they provide a good facsimile copy of the paper-based documents. We
hope they will help give users the “feel” of the sometimes fragile
originals.
The
Amache Digital Collections website also contains additional information which
will help students and others interested in this period of U. S and Colorado
history gain a better understanding about why the camps were built and what
life was like there. For example, there is an internet search guide for help in
locating online resources pertaining to the Amache camp; as well as general
information about Japanese-American internment during World War II. A directory of non-internet based Amache
collections from throughout Colorado is also included. A brief overview and
history of the Granada Relocation Center is available on the website for anyone
who would like to learn more about this unique facility. For those wishing to do in-depth research on
the Amache camp, the finding aids for the entire manuscript collections both
Auraria and the Colorado Historical Society are presented on the web site.
Our
goal in creating this website has been to produce an online learning resource
that anyone can use to easily access information about the Granada Relocation
Center. Primary and secondary school age children can use the site in writing
reports and papers. College students and other interested researchers can
access a great deal of material from our manuscript collections at home without
having to visit to library or archive. This is especially handy for them
because our hours are somewhat limited.
It is beneficial for us as a conservation strategy as well; many of our
delicate paper-based documents will receive much less handling and physical
damage as a result of being available online. Please pass on the URL for our
site to anyone you know who might be interested.
We
would like to thank those who helped in the production of this website. Without
a grant from the Colorado Digitization project this site would not exist. We
own a debt to Liz Bishoff and Sue Kriegsman of the Colorado Digitization
Project who were tireless in their efforts to help Shepard this project to
completion. Ellen Greenblatt, Associate Director for Technical Services for the
Auraria Library lent guidance and assistance whenever we needed it. Allen Reddy
of the Auraria Library acted as our unflagging web designer with assistance
from Gayle Bradbeer, Distance Librarian at the Auraria Library. Spyder Wren of
the Colorado Historical Society was instrumental in scanning the images and
documents from the Stephen H. Hart Library.
For
more information about the Amache Digital Collections website, or about the
paper-based collections at the Auraria Library and the Colorado Historical
Society please contact:
Frank Tapp/Auraria Library Archives and Special
Collections
And
Rebecca Lintz/Director – Stephen H. Hart Library – CHS