Expedition: Retirement

The Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve was the final stop that was firmly in our itinerary for the trip. From there, the plan was to allow our pace to be dictated by how we felt. If we were ready to just go home, then we would head east with that goal in mind, working to get home as soon as possible. However, I had tentatively identified a couple of other potential stops along the way in case we were feeling up to doing more.The first of these was Amache National Historic Site, in eastern Colorado. This is the newest NPS site we've ever visited. Established as a National Historic Site on February 15, 2024, this site encompasses one of the ten "War Relocation Centers", camps where resident and citizens of Japanese descent were interred during the Second World War. We previously visited another of these camps at the Manzanar National Historic Site in California, and found that to be both educational and moving. Because this site was so newly established as a NPS site, I didn't expect there to be much to see on the actual site, as there hasn't been much time for the Park Service to do a lot of restoration work. However, the Amache Preservation Society, founded by a local high school history teacher and largely staffed by student volunteers from the high school, has been working to preserve the site for many years, and has created an online audio tour of the site. All of which meant we spent far more time here than I had anticipated. In addition to listening to the stories taken from oral histories shared by former internees, we also saw the reconstructed water tower, guard tower, and barracks buildings, as well as the camp cemetery, which has been beautifully cared for by the Preservation Society and other groups. Located in the cemetery is a Memorial to the internees from Amache who died in the camp, as well as those who joined the US Army from the camp and died fighting for a country that felt the need to confine them in this remote camp. The Memorial is a dignified stone monument, standing next to a lovely cherry tree that was fully in bloom when we visited.After we finished the tour at the camp, we drove into the nearby town of Granada to visit the Amache Museum, maintained by the Amache Preservation Society, which houses an impressive collection of memorabilia from and about the camp. I found myself in awe of the work put in my the students who volunteered for the Preservation Society and were, in large part, responsible for this collection. Visiting sites like this one and Manzanar National Historic Site are important reminders of the horrific cruelty that can be inflicted upon innocent people when we give into fear and prejudice and fail to ensure that everyone's civil liberties are protected. But as disturbing as that history can be, and as worried as I might be about the current events in our nation, I found this site to be a source of great hope because of the incredible work done by the students here to remember and preserve this piece of our history.