Archives West Finding Aid

The documents in this collection are arranged in four series: Biographical Materials, Incarceration, Washington State College, and Published Materials.

Series 1: Biographical Materials, 1925-2012. This series contains materials on Tom Hide. It includes an obituary, his funeral program, and photographs of the Hide family prior to and after the camps.

Series 2: Incarceration, 1942-2012. This series consists of materials about the Hides' incarceration at Heart Mountain Relocation Center, Wyoming and efforts to memorialize their experiences in the incarceration camps. This series is divided into 4 subseries. Materials in each subseries are arranged in chronological order.

Subseries 1: Documents from the Detention Camps and Assembly Centers, 1942-1965. This subseries consists mainly of ephemera from the camps, including pamphlets on resettlement, directories, ration books, programs from Heart Mountain High School, and photocopies of the school newspaper. This subseries also includes a scrapbook containing articles from the Rocky Shimpo during World War II and articles from Japanese language newspapers from Los Angeles after the war.

Subseries 2: Documents on the Preservation and Memory of the Camps, 1942-2012. This subseries consists primarily of materials related to the preservation and memory of Heart Mountain Relocation Center. This includes public programming about the camp, efforts to restore or transport barracks from the site, planning for the interpretive center built on the site in 2011, and reunions for those incarcerated at Heart Mountain. This subseries also includes articles reflecting on the significance of the camps and articles about redress.

Subseries 3: Photographs and Audio-Visual Materials, 1944-2001. This subseries consists of a series of photographs from the Hide family's time at Heart Mountain and on their work assignment in Nebraska during the incarceration. It also contains photographs of Makio (Mike) Hide in military uniform, video cassette recordings of Heart Mountain events and television shows, a DVD recording featuring an interview with Gail Nomura and Steve Sumida, audio cassette recordings of events about incarceration and music played by Japanese American musicians during World War II.

Subseries 4: Realia, 1942-1995. This subseries consists of artifacts from Heart Mountain and memorabilia from Heart Mountain reunions. This includes autograph books created at Heart Mountain, a bag used by Tom Hide during the incarceration, and several souvenirs from Heart Mountain reunions such as a rice paddle and baseball cap.

Series 3: Washington State College, 1944-1947. This series consists of memorabilia from Washington State College, including Tom Hide’s sweater, a pennant, photographic materials, an Reserve Officers' Training Corps (ROTC) patch and pin, and a suitcase with a WSC decal on the lid.

Series 4: Printed Materials, 1926-circa 1988. This series consists of several volumes related either to Japanese Americans prior to World War II or life in the detention camps in the United States and Canada. Of particular note are two volumes, one specific to the Japanese American community in the Yakima Valley and the other about Japanese Americans in Washington State. This series also contains materials about the Japanese American community of which Hide was a part following World War II in the South Bay city of Gardena in Los Angeles County and a series of Kokugo readers, which were printed to instruct readers on the official national dialect of Japan. Some of the volumes in this series are in Japanese.