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Jerome Farm

Jerome Relocation Camp, Farm, 1995, panoramic photo collage, 22"x 59".

Jerome Sewer

Jerome Relocation Camp, Sewer, 1995, panoramic photo collage, 23"x 56".

Research: Jerome Relocation Camp

small U.S. Map

Location: Drew and Chicot Counties, southeastern Arkansas.

Land: Farm Security Administration land.

Size: 10,000 acres.

Climate: Swamp Land; green and tropical; humid.

Population origins:

Los Angeles County(3,147)
Fresno County (2,013)
Sacremento County (993)
Honolulu County, Hawaii (445)

The population was about an even split between rural and urban.

Peak population: 8,497.

Date of peak: February 11, 1943.

Opening Date: October 6, 1942.

Closing Date: June 30, 1944; Jerome was in operation only 634 days, the shortest of any camp.

Project director(s): Paul Taylor and W.O. "Doc" Melton.

Community Analysts: Edgar C. McVoy and Rachel R. Sady.

Newpaper(s): Communique (October 23, 1942 to February 26, 1943);
Denson Tribune (March 2, 1943 to June 6, 1944).

% who answered question 28 of the loyalty questionnaire positively: 75.0%
Jerome had the highest percentage of persons answering negatively, giving a qualified answer, or refusing to answer.

Number and percentage of eligible citizen males inducted directly into armed forces: 52 (0.9%)
Jerome had the lowest percentage of eligible male citizens inducted into the armed forces besides Tule Lake.

Industry: Jerome had a sawmill that produced goods for internal consumption.

History: There were no guard towers at Jerome and the fences were low; this was the camp was surrounded by swamps inhabited by four species of the most deadly snakes in America. Farming here was difficult, but the completion in Novermber 1942 of a canal that drained off excess water resulted in some agricultural success.

General Histories of Jerome include:

Russell Bearden, "The False Rumor of Tuesday: Arkansas's Internment of Japanese Americans." (Arkansas Historical Quarterly, 41.4 (1982), pp. 327-39 and

"Life Inside Arkansas's Japanese American Relocation Centers." (Arkansas Historical Quarterly, 68 (Summer 1989); pp.169-96.)

Carole Katsuko Yumiba, "An Educational History of the War Relocation Centers at Jerome and Rohwer, Arkansas, 1942-1945.", Dissertation, University of Southern California, 1979.

Source: Japanese American History: An A to Z Reference, 1868 to the Present, by Brian Niiya. New York: Facts on File, 1993. This information is provided with the permission from the Japanese American National Museum and Brian Niiya, 1997.

Camp Links
Gila Relocation Camp
Granada Relocation Camp
Heart Mountain Relocation Camp
Jerome Relocation Camp
Manzanar Relocation Camp
Minidoka Relocation Camp
Poston Relocation Camp
Rohwer Relocation Camp
Topaz Relocation Camp
Tule Lake Relocation Camp

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