Federal Grants Benefit Heart Mountain

Federal funding will help the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation preserve more of the story of the Japanese Americans interred at the Relocation Camp between Cody and Powell during World War II.

Earlier this month, the Foundation received two sizeable federal grants to advance its objectives in Wyoming. The first grant, from the National Park Service, will provide almost $425 thousand dollars to continue the restoration of an original root cellar.

The cellar, which was built by the incarcerees at Heart Mountain, measures over 300 feet long and held produce grown by the camp’s agriculture department. Executive Director Dakota Russell says that the grant will help them to stabilize the damage being done by time and exposure to elements.

A second grant for $170,000, this one from the National Endowment for the Humanities, will help bring teachers from around the country to Wyoming for workshops on teaching about Japanese American incarceration in the classroom.

The Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation preserves the site where some 14,000 Japanese Americans were unjustly incarcerated in Wyoming from 1942 through 1945. Their stories are told within the foundation’s museum, Heart Mountain Interpretive Center, located between Cody and Powell.