Cow Creek (detention facility)

A former CCC camp in Death Valley National Monument that was used to segregate sixty-six Manzanar inmates removed for their own protection from that camp after the riot/uprising of December 6, 1942. The camp remained open a little more than two months, with the inmates released to points east once they had secured jobs and housing.

In the aftermath of the disturbance, dozens of inmates—including Fred Tayama , whose beating precipitated it—sought shelter from the camp administration, fearful that they would be targeted for physical attacks by dissidents. The group stayed in MP barracks or an infirmary by day and slept in administration buildings under armed guard while the authorities debated what to do with them. At a meeting convened by Manzanar Director Ralph Merritt on December 9 attended by WRA Regional Director E. R. Fryer and WRA Assistant Solicitor Lewis Sigler in addition to key Manzanar staffers, the group decided to send them to an abandoned CCC camp called Cow Creek, located in Death Valley National Monument about a hundred miles away. The following morning, Fryer told WRA Director Dillon Myer and shadow Western Defense Command head Karl Bendetsen of the plan and both disapproved, citing concerns that such a move was tantamount to declaring the dissidents victorious. Nonetheless, neither blocked the move, and Manzanar Assistant Director Ned Campbell told the assembled "refugees" about the plan after breakfast. After getting approval to use the camp, Campbell led a caravan of cars carrying the sixty-six inmates—thirty-four of whom had themselves been targeted and thirty-two who were relatives—along with ten WRA staffers and twelve guards that left for Cow Creek at about 1:20 pm. ^[1]

The Cow Creek camp operated as a CCC camp from 1933 to 1938 and included thirty-five buildings, of which ten were used by the WRA. "It was even more primitive than when we went to Manzanar," recalled journalist Togo Tanaka , and the inmates set to work renovating the camp, organizing groups to do carpentry work, fix utilities, and take care of day-to-day tasks such as cooking. Inmates lived in six barracks, each divided into two sections. There was only one shower room, so women took showers from morning to 3 pm and men took showers in the afternoon and evenings. Though inmates later built a partition to divide the showers into men's and women's sections, Ruth Kurata Yamazaki recalled nail holes that invited peeping toms. The ten or so MPs slept in a former tool house, while the WRA staffer in charge of the camp, Albert Chamberlain, and other WRA staff stayed in a house located across the dry creek along with their families. WRA staff, MPs and inmates initially ate together, but Chamberlain later made sure they ate separately to prevent any stories about fraternization between inmates and guards getting out. Showers and toilets continued to be shared by all. Despite the primitive conditions, Tanaka described a sense of relief at getting out of Manzanar and described the time at Cow Creek as "the last step before something good was to happen, just to get out." ^[2]

National Park Service (NPS) personnel—who managed the Death Valley National Monument of which the camp was a small part—were also part of the camp community, throwing a Christmas party for the inmates. Later, many of the inmates volunteered to assist the NPS staff with maintenance tasks throughout Death Valley. Tad Uyeno recalled that NPS staff would show the inmates scenic sites at the park on the way back from work. "We led a life of Riley at Death Valley.... we were really pampered if any group of evacuees could claim that distinction," recalled George Kurata. Kurata noted that their "ideal life" didn't last long as quarrels broke out between the two main factions of the inmate group, those associated with the Japanese American Citizens League and an anti-JACL leftist group, many of whom had been associated with the Manzanar Free Press . Tanaka wrote of the two groups that "there seems to exist mutual distrust and suspicion—and dislike personally." Aside from the volunteer labor, there was little to do at the camp, so boredom set in for many while they waited for clearance to leave. ^[3]

After about a month, inmates at Cow Creek began to receive clearances to leave for jobs in other parts of the country, often with the help of the American Friends Service Committee . Several ended up going to Chicago , and half a dozen became Japanese language instructors at the Navy Language School in Boulder Colorado. The last inmates left Cow Creek by February 16, 1943, and the camp was returned to the park service by the end of the month. ^[4]

Cow Creek remains a part of what is now Death Valley National Park. Two buildings believed to have been used by the WRA still stand. ^[5]