Minidoka NHS

Explore Minidoka National Historic Site with this app. Use it on your visit to this WWII Japanese American incarceration site to discover the stories and memories of daily life at Minidoka.

In February 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an executive order that forcibly relocated nearly 120,000 Japanese American citizens and legal resident aliens into ten isolated incarceration centers in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Idaho, Utah, and Wyoming. These temporary, tar paper-covered barracks, the guard towers, and most of the barbed-wire fences are gone now, but the people who spent years of their lives in the centers will never forget them. This is the story of one of those centers.

The app follows Minidoka National Historic Site's 1.6 mile walking trail, enhancing interpretation of both current and historic structures and landscape with information about the daily operations and living conditions of the Minidoka War Relocation Center, known to locals as "Hunt Camp." The app offers historic photographs as well as videos of former incarcerees sharing heir memories associated with different areas of the camp.

For best results visitors may wish to download the app over a wireless internet connection prior to their park visit, though park mobile connectivity and the small size of the app will accommodate on-site downloads as well.

Features

Map: Navigate your way around the Minidoka National Historic Site with the GPS-enabled map of twenty points of interest.

Sites: At each stop along the trail, learn the history behind the current landscape with text details of camp life, scroll through historic photographs, and view engaging oral history videos of people that experienced life at Minidoka first hand.

Tour: Pull up each site on your own under the Sites tab, or take the park's suggested tour route for easily accessible navigation and interpretation of the park.

More: Need directions to the site? The More tab provides information and guidelines for planning your visit, access to road conditions, contact information to reach National Park Service staff, and information on the satellite unit on Bainbridge Island, Washington. Read the Background section to set the context for your visit to Minidoka National Historic Site.

Glossary: Click on any word in blue to view a definition or explanation.

Accessibility: Enjoy full text transcriptions of all eighteen oral history videos included in the app.