In late January of 1942, 32 Japanese residents of Clovis, New Mexico, were uprooted from their homes and sent to an isolated, little-known confinement camp near Fort Stanton, called the Old Raton Ranch. The Clovis residents included the families of ten Japanese who were employed by the Santa Fe Railroad (primarily as machinists with top […]

In February 1942, the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) acquired an 80 acre tract of land from the New Mexico State Penitentiary (1 1⁄2 miles from the center of Santa Fe). The tract held an abandoned CCC camp that was constructed in 1933 to house 450 men. In less than 2 months, the camp […]

Plans for Camp Lordsburg began in January of 1942, and the camp operated as an Internment and Prisoner of War Camp from June 1942 to June 1945. The camp was constructed under the jurisdiction of the Department of Justice (DOJ), run by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and administered by the U.S. Army under the […]