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Kokoro Kara Magazine

Kokoro Kara (“From Our Heart”) is our quarterly magazine (formerly the newsletter). The publication includes original feature articles on Heart Mountain history, contributions by former incarcerees and their descendants, updates on the Foundation’s work, and news related to the Japanese American incarceration. Digital copies of past issues of the Kokoro Kara magazine can be viewed below.

A subscription to the high-quality print version of Kokoro Kara is included with membership to the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation, along with several other benefits. Learn more about membership HERE.

Do you have questions about the magazine or would you like to submit an article proposal for a future issue? Contact the editor and designer, Kate Wilson, at katew@heartmountain.org.


Ujifusa family farming up close

Japanese American Pioneers of the Bighorn Basin


Read about the stories of Wyoming’s Japanese American pioneers who settled in the state before World War II. Though they were never incarcerated in Heart Mountain, nearly every Japanese American living in northwestern Wyoming was affected by the camp’s existence. Their lives—both personal and professional—intertwined with the lives of the people imprisoned at Heart Mountain. Many of these early pioneers are still remembered well by Bighorn Basin locals and former incarcerees alike.

Yokoto family in front of their barrack at Heart Mountain

Father Luke Yokota


Reverend Luke Tadazumi Yokota dedicated his life to the Episcopal Church. Father Luke established a thriving congregation that reached beyond the barbed wire while he and his family were incarcerated at Heart Mountain. After the war, Yokota settled in Wyoming, eventually being ordained a priest in the Episcopal Church, serving his parish and the Diocese of Wyoming. Read about this remarkable man.

Recreating a Taste of “Home”: The Challenge of Finding Good Food While Incarcerated


Food is never just about sustenance or survival; it is also about comfort, cultural adaptation and resilience, and even power. The first meals at Heart Mountain and the other incarceration camps, as recalled later by former incarcerees, were inedible. Read about the efforts of those confined behind barbed wire to bring healthier, more varied, and more familiar foods to their tables by importing from afar and making local discoveries.

What’s in a Name?


Each of the over 14,000 individuals who were incarcerated in Heart Mountain had a name. But in their forced removal from their homes into concentration camps, they were treated by the U.S. government as an undifferentiated and inscrutable mass. Read about the important role names play in human identity and details about the Irei Names Monument project.


Volume 12, Issue 1 – 2023
Volume 12 Issue 2 Magazine
Volume 12, Issue 3 Magazine
Volume 12, Issue 4 Magazine
Volume 11, Issue 1 – 2022
Volume 11-Issue 2, 2022
Winter/Spring 2021 Issue
Summer 2021 Issue
Autumn 2021 Issue

Expanded article from the Winter/Spring 2021 Issue:

Dorothy Itsuko Tsuruda…Not Forgotten


Cathy Dumont pays tribute to her mother, Dorothy Itsuko Tsuruda, a former Heart Mountain incarceree.

Winter 2020 Issue
Spring/Summer 2020 Issue
Autumn 2020 Issue
Winter 2019 Issue
Spring 2019 Issue
Summer/Autumn 2019 Issue
©2013-2023 Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation