The Tule Lake Segregation Center tells a story of the resilience of thousands of Japanese Americans who exercised their rights to protest and resist discrimination, incarceration, family separation, and direct attacks on their citizenship and human rights.
During World War II, the Tule Lake Segregation Center served as a maximum-security prison for Japanese Americans who protested race-based incarceration by refusing to answer or answering “no” to a government issued “loyalty” questionnaire.
For those incarcerated at Tule Lake, their questionnaire responses served as a form of peaceful resistance against a federal government that had violated their right to due process.
Later, over 5,000 U.S. citizens incarcerated at Tule Lake renounced their citizenship under duress, and more than 1,000 people, including children, were deported to Japan.
Many deportees eventually sought restoration of their U.S. citizenship, which was only granted after a long legal battle.
Today, a 37-acre portion of the Tule Lake Segregation Center has been designated as a National Historic Landmark and subsequently a National Monument overseen by the National Park Service, but most of the original 1,100-acre site is unprotected.
For the survivors and descendants of those incarcerated at Tule Lake, the entire site is sacred ground, a site of conscience, and a place for regular pilgrimages to remember the 331 prisoners who died during incarceration.
A rural airfield now occupies 359 acres at the heart of the former incarceration camp site.
The Federal Aviation Authority and Modoc County are seeking to expand the airfield runway, including the construction of a 3-mile long, 8 to 10-foot-high security fence, which could permanently alter the setting, viewshed, and archaeological integrity of Tule Lake.
Tule Lake Segregation Center has been included on the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s 2026 list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places.
Survivors and descendants believe the proposed fence would desecrate this sacred site.