Schoenbar Middle School students wrapped the school year with a project designed to commemorate the World War II Aleut relocation camp that once operated at Ward Lake.
To understand the history of relocation camps in Southeast Alaska â including the Ketchikan area â more than 200 seventh- and eighth-graders across three English classes at Schoenbar read the book Aleutian Sparrow by Karen Hesse, a historical fiction novel written in verse about the Ward Lake camp that was opened in the early 1940s for the relocation of Aleut individuals.
According to archives from the National Park Service, Aleut individuals were evacuated from the Aleutian Islands chain as U.S. and Japanese militaries continued to clash during WWII, following the attack on Dutch Harbor and other sites in the Aleutian Chain in summer 1942.