Amache/Sand Creek Educational Trip

Published: April 17, 2023
Students on trip smiling while sitting at the table for a meal

On March 21st, Professor Basim Mahmood led a small group of dedicated political science scholars to see the former Granada Relocation Center, also known as "Camp Amache", where over 7,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned after F.D.R. signed Executive Order 9066. While walking through the ruins of the site, these scholars engaged discussions of the moral, physical, economic, and racial injuries endured by this community, and the reverberating impact it has had on all immigrant and communities of color. The group also retraced the historical route taken by U.S. Colonel John Chivington and his volunteer cavalry in 1864 from Bent's Fort to Sand Creek, which culminated in the murderous rampage of Cheyenne and Arapahoe Indians known as the "Sand Creek Massacre." One of the scholars, Joe Vahle, reflected that, "We walked in the footsteps of our ancestors, there...and it's quite a bloody history. And as residents of Colorado, we're the direct beneficiaries of that history."