The Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation (HMWF) was formed in 1996 as a public nonprofit corporation and obtained its federal 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status in 1997. Since then, the organization has worked to preserve the site that represents a period in U.S. history following the bombing of Pearl Harbor, when 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry—two-thirds of them American-born citizens—were deprived of due process and forced to leave their homes and livelihoods to be incarcerated in "Relocation Centers." The mission of the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation is to: • Preserve and memorialize the Heart Mountain World War II Japanese American Confinement Site and the stories that symbolize the fragility of democracy; • Educate the public about the history of the illegal imprisonment of Japanese Americans at Heart Mountain during World War II and its impact on the Big Horn Basin; and • Support inquiry, research, and outreach to highlight the lessons of the Japanese American confinement and their relevance to the preservation of liberty and civil rights for all Americans today. The HMWF oversees the Heart Mountain World War II Japanese American Confinement Site, located between Cody and Powell, in Northwest Wyoming on the original location of the “Heart Mountain Relocation Camp” built by the War Relocation Authority in 1942. It is a National Historic Landmark Site of which the Foundation owns 53 acres. In addition, the Foundation staff serves as caretakers of an addition 70 acres of the original site currently owned by the Bureau of Reclamation. The HMWF is overseen by a 17-member Board of Directors. The Board includes former incarcerees, descendants, scholars and other local and national professionals from across the country.
Scheduling by Setmore