Author

Tara Rowe
Tara Rowe is an independent historian and scholar who frequently writes commentary for the Idaho State Journal. Her historical research includes contributing to the anthology "Idaho’s Place: A New History of the Gem State," the forthcoming anthology "Ezra Pound: A Century Later" and a forthcoming work on women in Idaho coinciding with the centennial of women’s suffrage. She is writing a biography of former Idaho congressman Richard Stallings. She was born and raised in southern Idaho, is an Idaho State University alumna and resides Twin Falls.
As Minidoka lands on most endangered historic places list, we must continue to tell its story
By: Tara Rowe - May 17, 2022
The late Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta arrived at the Heart Mountain, Wyoming, barracks where he and his family were incarcerated during World War II and had his baseball bat confiscated. Baseball for Mineta, like many young Japanese-Americans unconstitutionally incarcerated during the war, was a lifeline. On the dusty, makeshift ball fields of the camps, Mineta […]
80 years later, there are still lessons to learn from Idaho’s incarceration of Japanese Americans
By: Tara Rowe - February 21, 2022
History is uncomfortable. Never is that truer than with the dark anniversary that the U.S. marked on Feb. 19. That anniversary is of the signing of Executive Order 9066 80 years ago by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in response to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, an order that unconstitutionally evacuated Japanese Americans from military […]
Idaho failed disabled community in vaccination prioritization
By: Tara Rowe - April 2, 2021
I put my life on hold. Projects, personal milestones, planned events and goals were all halted. This is our reality — mine and those in the disabled community. Many of us have been homebound for a year. We went into lockdown two weeks before the state of Idaho officially did. The governor’s stay-at-home order lasted […]