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Description
Sign reads: "Site of Topaz, a World War II Internment Center. In the never ending struggle for human dignity, there was enacted on this spot an event of historic significance for a nation and its people. During World War II this was the site of an internment camp, complete with barbed wire fence and armed sentries, for 8,000 of the 110,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry, who for no justifiable reason, were uprooted from their homes and interned by their own government. They were the victims of wartime hysteria, racial animosity, and a serious aberration of American jurisprudence. That a nation dedicated to the principle of individual freedom and justice through law would, under the stress of war, allow this to happen - and then recognizing the injustice of this action, hastened to soften the effect of this action and make restitution. And that a whole generation of a people, whose life and spirit was shattered and marred, would with courage and hope and perseverance, fight back to re-establish themselves in the American stream of life and were successful - are facts of sufficient historic importance to be remembered forever. So in this Bicentennial Year 1976, we dedicate this site as a reminder that the lessons of history need always be heeded in forging a more perfect form of human relationship."
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