Minidoka Memories:
Stories that Connect and Heal
Every Story Holds the Power to Heal
The memories of Minidoka live on through the stories we carry, the photographs we save, and the experiences passed from one generation to the next.
Whether your connection to Minidoka is personal, generational, professional, or through your community, your story is an important part of a larger journey of
remembrance, understanding, and healing.
Friends of Minidoka invites you to share your family stories through oral histories, photos, and documents before they are lost.
Contact us: minidokamemories@minidoka.org
Our Goal with this Project
To encourage the sharing of oral histories so we can listen and honor all stories of this complex and multi-layered history and to overcome the destructive nature of silence by creating an opportunity to share, heal, and learn from the lessons of the past. This is particularly important as the remaining community members who were alive during the incarceration years are aging. The oral histories that result from this project will contribute to primary source information that will allow Friends of Minidoka to produce additional humanities projects in the future and open dialogue and the telling of all Minidoka stories with the hope of healing for our entire community and collective humanity.
This Project will Include:
Kleinkopf Diary Publication
Publication of Freedom and Education at Minidoka: The Diary of the Superintendent Arthur Kleinkopf. This is a significant primary source of information about life at Minidoka and a perspective of a white employee in a leadership position. Copies will be distributed to the 150 public libraries and universities in Idaho. The publication was released in February 2026, and is available in our bookstore.
Day of Remembrance Programming
Friends of Minidoka held public programming in February and March 2026 for the Day of Remembrance that focused on the Kleinkopf diary, the importance of sharing family stories, and the community healing from sharing oral histories. Programming coincided with the publication of Freedom and Education at Minidoka: The Diary of the Superintendent Arthur Kleinkopf as well as the oral history campaign.
Oral Histories
Ongoing: Collecting oral histories from local citizens and their descendents who had ties to the historic Minidoka War Relocation Center.
Thank you
Friends of Minidoka is grateful to our funders for this project:
Idaho Humanities Council, Jones Family Fund of National Philanthropic Trust, Duane Minoru Yamamoto Memorial Fund of Friends of Minidoka, and Minidoka National Historic Site.
Friends of Minidoka and Minidoka National Historic Site thank our community partners for this project:
Twin Falls Public Library
Albertsons Library, Special Archives, Boise State University
Museum of Idaho and Idaho Falls Japanese American Citizens League
College of Southern Idaho
The Community Library