University of Wyoming
As a teenager, Bill Manbo Sr. was a Japanese American internee in the Heart Mountain Relocation Center in Wyoming during World War II. During Manbo's internment, he surreptitiously took photographs of everyday life and events in the camp, including children at play, events, and buildings. He attended the Heart Mountain High School and graduated in 1947. This class has maintained an alumni group, one of whose members, Bacon Sakatani, wrote a description of the collection after the death of Manbo.
The collection contains 30 color slides of scenes from the Heart Mountain Relocation Center, dated 1942-1944, two photos from a Cody, Wyoming studio, and a letter from Bacon Sakatani, 7-6-1993 which gives an inventory of the slides, numbered order, and content identified and described.
There are no access restrictions on the materials for research purposes, and the collection is open to the public.
The researcher assumes full responsibility for observing all copyright, property, and libel laws as they apply. Donor maintains copyright.
There are no known other archival collections created by Bill Manbo at the date of processing.
The collection was received from Bill Manbo Jr. in 1994.
The collection was processed by Mary Kenney in August 2006. Digital links were added by Ben Goldman in March 2010.
Item Description, Box Number, Bill Manbo Papers, Collection Number 09982, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming.
Digital reproductions of this entire collection are available at
Most of the Japanese kimonos were probably sent to the camp from storage on the West Coast after internees were settled in the camp.
Rinks were made all over the camp. Skates were ordered through the mail order catalogs of Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward.
Bill Manbo is at far right.
Because of the presence of the Military Police and the newly erected fence, the U. S. Supreme Court declared, on December 18, 1944, that Heart Mountain was a concentration camp and that it was illegal to prohibit the movements of loyal American citizens who had not committed any crime. Bill Manbo is pictured on the fence. Cameras were allowed since internees were out of the West Coast.
Fires were common because of the tar paper-covered barracks.
Big hole dug and filled with irrigation water.
Slide 25. There were nine guard towers with armed guards and searchlights. Young people went outside the fence on the pictured hill to go sledding in the snow. Then the MPs were ordered to arrest all outside the fence. On December 3, 1942, thirty-two persons were arrested and taken in. The oldest was eleven. Bill Manbo thought cameras were forbidden, so at first he took pictures when no one was around. He had a Caucasian friend on the West Coast who sent him film and had the film developed.
There was a coal-burning hot water boiler.
Blake's Studio, Cody, Wyoming