Pilgrimage to Bismarck, ND Snow Country Prison Memorial Ground Blessing

Pilgrimage to Bismarck, ND Snow Country Prison Memorial Ground Blessing

By Tamiko Nimura
NAP Contributor

Join us at the inaugural Japanese American community pilgrimage to Bismarck, North Dakota, on September 5 at 1 p.m. and help celebrate completion of the Snow Country Prison Japanese American Internment Memorial.

Former Snow Country Prison, Bismarck, North Dakota. Photo courtesy: Satsuki Ina collection.

Aerial view of the future memorial at the former incarceration camp, Bismarck, North Dakota. Digital drawing credit: MASS Design Group.

The memorial honors the Japanese Americans incarcerated in the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Fort Lincoln camp in Bismarck, who were demonized as “enemy aliens” during World War II (WWII). This project is located at one of the oldest Native American colleges, the United Tribes Technical College (UTTC). It was designed by the social-justice, non-profit architectural firm MASS (Model of Architecture Serving Society) Design Group. Members of the public and descendants of those incarcerated are welcome to participate.
In the months after Pearl Harbor (Hawaii) was bombed in 1941, the Alien Enemies Act was enacted to incarcerate approximately 1,200 Issei (first generation Japanese American) immigrants at the Bismarck site. In the final months of WWII, 750 Bismarck Nisei (second generation Japanese Americans) and Kibei (Nisei born in the U.S. and educated in Japan) dissidents were in the Tule Lake incarceration camp in California. They were the ones who renounced their U.S. citizenship and continued to be incarcerated as they awaited deportation as “enemy aliens.”

The commemoration event is scheduled in the courtyard of the historic barracks building where Japanese Americans were incarcerated. Opening with a Native American ground blessing of the site, the program will include descendants of the incarcerates. Tribal and local officials will speak about the significance of the site and honor those who were impacted. Following the program, Dr. Satsuki Ina will discuss her new book “The Poet and the Silk Girl,” which is about the Japanese incarceration at Bismarck. There will also be a showing of “Defiant to the Last,” a film about Tule Lake’s renunciants.

To commemorate the dedication program, the Irei Project developed by Reverend Duncan Williams is offering appointments on September 5-6 to stamp the Ireichō. This is the book monument naming 125,284 individuals of Japanese ancestry who were unjustly incarcerated during World War II. Stamping is by appointment only. Please go to https://ireizo.org/tour/ and click on the North Dakota, Fort Lincoln site to request an appointment. Pilgrimage attendees who RSVP have a special opportunity to join the annual International Powwow being held on the UTTC campus the weekend of September 5-7.

Make plans to join us at this remarkable cross-cultural event. To RSVP or request more information, send an email to snowcountrypilgrimage@gmail.com