Join us at the March Herrett Forum Lecture Series for a screening of Minidoka: An American Concentration Camp, produced by North Shore Productions for the National Park Service. Updates on Minidoka National Historic Site and a Q&A with Hanako Wakatsuki from the National Park Service and Mia Russell from Friends of Minidoka will follow the screening.
Minidoka tells the story of Japanese Americans, most of them American citizens, who were forcibly removed from their Pacific Northwest homes during World War II. They were held in squalid conditions in temporary detention centers, and then put on trains to a concentration camp in the desert of southern Idaho. Innocent of any crime, many of them would remain imprisoned at Minidoka for over three years. In the compelling voices of survivors of the camp, the film explores the unconstitutional suspension of the civil rights of these Americans and the long-lasting impact of the incarceration on their community. Minidoka examines what happens when a group of Americans are imprisoned solely on the basis of race and the relevance of this story today.