BEYOND BARBED WIRE
Beyond Barbed Wire
Welcome to this free archival resource designed to help families of Japanese ancestry find information about loved ones imprisoned in internment camps in the United States during WWII.
Heart Mountain Japanese American Internment Camp, October 1943.
Photo: Courtesy Alan Yamamoto. Left to right: Bobbie Lue Meigh and Terry Yuriko Higa on the corral fence at Meigh Ranch, 1943. Lovey Meigh is believed to have taken this photo.
Meigh Ranch
A History Beyond Barbed Wire in Casper, Wyoming
Terry Higa, an 18 year-old Japanese American girl imprisoned in the camp, slips through bureaucratic red tape and is granted leave to work as a "domestic," 200 miles outside camp. She spends a year and a half living with a prominent Wyoming ranch family where rare friendships blossom.
Terry Higa lived in the main house at Meigh Ranch from October, 1942 until December, 1943 before returning to Heart Mountain Relocation Camp.
The Main House
Courtesy of William H. McGuill
The Barn at Meigh Ranch
Courtesy of William H. McGuill
Terry Higa and Bobbie Lue Meigh were photographed on the corral fence outside the barn.
Recent Blog Posts
Visit our blog and tell us about your family. We live in a global world, but blogs give us a way to connect to people in all communities. One connection can open doors.
About Me
Moya McGuill. The "Beyond Barbed Wire," project is a work in progress and my final portfolio for graduate school. I am the daughter of Bobbie Lue Meigh and granddaughter of Robert and Lovey Meigh.
Share Your Story!
Many of the people imprisoned in Japanese American internment camps are no longer with us. By sharing stories and resources, I hope we can help families find important stories lost in history.
Albuquerque, New Mexico
Together we can help each other recover lost family stories. Many of the people imprisoned in the Japanese internment camps are no longer with us. If you have research material, links to archives, pictures, or family stories, please share them with us on our blog.
If you are not of Japanese ancestry, but your family has a shadow story, I encourage you to tell that story. We can't change the past, but we can try to help families heal from the trauma of this period in history. In my experience, opening up about my family's shadow story helped another family and I hope you'll consider doing the same.
We will regularly post events on this page that we think you might find interesting. If you know of an event in your community, please contact us and we'll post it here.