Historical Tidbits
Reprinted with permission of the Greeley Tribune

Colorado's Enemy Aliens

The December 7, 1941 attack on the American naval base at Pearl Harbor launched America into World War II.  By January, 1942  anything potentially detrimental to National Defense and held by “enemy aliens” was to be confiscated.  Complying with National Defense orders, Sheriff Gus Anderson and Greeley Police Chief C.G. Hunter oversaw the surrender of enemy aliens’ firearms, explosives, cameras, and short wave receiving sets.  All short wave radio receiving sets were taken to authorized repair shops and “disabled.”  Sending short wave radio messages by amateur operators was also banned, and “enemy aliens” were banned from purchasing fishing and hunting licenses.   They were also required to register at the Post Office.

The 1940 Federal Census for Weld County listed 6,028 as foreign born.  “Enemy aliens” included the Japanese, Germans, and Italians.    

Weld County’s Japanese quickly complied, and by Jan. 7^th had surrendered 20 shot guns, six cameras, and 85 guns, 30 of those being turned in at Platteville, but no Germans or Italians had responded to the order.   Many Japanese arrived in Weld County beginning in 1903 where they found ready employment as agricultural laborers, eventually becoming prominent farmers and businessmen.    In 1942, to prove their allegiance to America, many of Weld County’s Japanese and Japanese-Americans met at the Evans town hall on Jan. 11^th and organized the Japanese-American Association to cooperate with federal, state, and county authorities in support of the war effort.  The Lupton Japanese Association was dissolved in February and the Northern Colorado Japanese Grammar School at Ft. Lupton was closed.

President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066, issued on Feb. 19, 1942 and the War Relocation Authority called for the resettlement of about 120,000 Japanese, primarily from the West Coast, which was classified as a military zone vital for national security.  As a precaution, ten internment camps, were constructed, including the smallest, Camp Amache (ca. 7,500 people) at Granada, CO. 

Throughout Colorado, anti-Japanese sentiment was high.  The Greeley Jaycees and a large contingent of local farmers issued a moratorium against accepting the Japanese from the West Coast as farm workers.  A voter-sponsored ballot initiative to prevent aliens from owing land was introduced, but defeated. 

Governor Ralph L. Carr was the only U.S. governor to graciously extend an invitation for the Japanese evacuees to come to Colorado. Carr, a Republican, served as governor from 1939 – 1943 and was a humanitarian and a champion of civil rights.  He was aware that two-thirds of the Japanese being uprooted from their West Coast homes, farms, and businesses were not first generation Japanese (Issei) but Nisei and Sansei---second and third generation American-born citizens.  Carr noted that they were “loyal Americans, sharing only race with the enemy.”  Carr didn’t believe they were a security threat, and didn’t require military security at Camp Amache.  In a speech, Carr said,  “If you harm them, you harm me.  I was brought up in a small town where I knew the shame and dishonor of race hatred.  I grew to despise it because it threatened the happiness of you, and you, and you.”   

Carr, a principled politician, took the high road and sidestepped hysteria and racism in the opening years of World War II.  A monument recognizing his contributions to Colorado’s Japanese was dedicated in 1976 at Sakura Square in Denver.