Poignant visit to Topaz is depressing, uplifting

TOPAZ INTERNMENT CAMP, Millard County — A brilliant white coating of thick frost covers every leaf, stalk and tendril of the desert brush, forming a white puffy ocean that stretches to the horizon.

It is a beguiling setting for a shameful episode of homefront World War II, a story of race prejudice and war hysteria. Yet, because of what this place tells about the human spirit and about the patriotism of those interned, the story is oddly uplifting.

Topaz was one of 10 "relocation centers" set up in nearly inaccessible areas during World War II. There, American residents of Japanese descent were forcibly concentrated.

Most of the 120,000 internees were U.S. citizens. Most lost property or possessions or businesses. All lost freedom until they were allowed to leave toward the end of the war.

Not until 1988 did the country apologize to survivors, and some reparations were paid. By that time many internees had died.

This month, President Bush signed legislation that sets aside $38 million to identify, research, evaluate, interpret and protect the country's 10 internment camps, like Topaz, where Japanese-Americans were confined during World War II.

Still desolate

Topaz is 16 miles west and north from Delta, about half the distance on graded dirt roads. During a visit in December, the air is piercingly cold and the sky an intense blue, while the thick hoarfrost seems magical. Except for talk by visitors and the far-off squawk of a raven, the camp is silent.

A jackrabbit springs around bushes and across snow. Among the artifacts scattered amid the white bushes are bits of wood and nails, cracked concrete flooring of major buildings, broken sewer pipes, glass fragments.

After the camp began filling in September 1942, Topaz rapidly became one of Utah's biggest cities. Trucks and buses loaded with internees and bundles of their possessions rolled past a barbed wire fence and into the square-mile compound. Eventually, that single square mile housed more than 8,000 people while administrative facilities and guard towers also took up space.

"Somebody told me once that the population density in Salt Lake City is about 1,700 per (square) mile. And this is not even a full mile, and it's 8,100," said Jane Beckwith, teacher and librarian at Delta High School and also the president of the board of the Topaz Museum, which owns most of the 640-acre site.

Beckwith, who guided a reporter around the site, is fascinated by Japanese culture. A native of Delta, she lived in Japan for a year, teaching public school.