Temporary Detention Camp for Japanese Americans, Pomona

The Army confined 5,514 people of Japanese ancestry at the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds between May 7 and August 24, 1942, most of them American citizens, most from Los Angeles, San Francisco and Santa Clara counties. Each person had about 73 square feet. Nearly all were sent on to Heart Mountain in Wyoming. The bronze here went up in 2016 and softens nothing: it names hysteria and racism, and says the confinement came without charges or trial. The ground is a Fairplex parking lot now.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Mission San Gabriel Arcangel — 20 mi
  The fourth Alta California mission, built on Tongva land with Tongva labor, rebuilt after arson and now telling that story straight.
• Colorado Street Bridge — 23 mi
  Beaux-Arts concrete arches curving 150 feet above the Arroyo Seco, opened in 1913 and later a link in Route 66.
• Wigwam Motel — 24 mi
  Nineteen concrete teepees on Foothill Boulevard, the last of Frank Redford's Wigwam Villages and still renting rooms.
• Cajon Pass — 26 mi
  The gap the San Andreas tore between two mountain ranges, and the doorway every westbound traveler has used for two centuries.

More markers nearby

• Adobe de Palomares — 1.5 mi
• First Home of Pomona College — 1.9 mi
• Madonna of the Trail — 6.8 mi
• Site of the Rancho Chino Adobe of Isaac Williams — 6.9 mi