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Fresno Army Air Forces Training Center
(Fresno Assembly Center, Fresno Ground Training Center, Army Air Forces Basic Training Center No. 8)
 
The Fresno Assembly Center was located at the Fresno County Fairgrounds. Occupied from May 6 to October 30, 1942, it was the last assembly center to close. It held a total of 5,344 evacuees (with a maximum of 5,120 at a time) from the central San Joaquin Valley and Amador County. Over 100 barracks served by six sets of communal buildings were located within the infield of the fairgrounds racetrack, and four contiguous blocks with 20 barracks each were located adjacent to the fairgrounds
 
At this center accommodations were crude tar paper barracks with cots, out houses and overhead water pipes with holes drilled in them to serve as showers.
 
There are no assembly center remains or any historical marker at the site. Most of the fairgrounds has been changed so extensively from its 1942 appearance that it is difficult to determine whether any fair buildings present during the assembly center use still remain Most of those processed at the Fresno center went to the Relocation Center at Jerome, Arkansas.
 
The Fresno Assembly Center ceased operations on October 30, 1942 when the last group of ethnic Japanese departed. The center was then turned over to the 4th Air Force which converted it into non-flying training facility called the Fresno Ground Training Center. Signalmen, camouflage specialists, chemical warfare specialists, ordnance technicians, clerks, truck drivers and cooks trained here. The 1945 Army Inventory of Installations lists this activity as the Fresno Army Air Forces Training Center.
 
There is an historical marker with information on the site located near the Chance Avenue gate of the fairgrounds.
 
 
Known Units at Fresno Army Army Air Forces Training Center
 
California Replacement Depot #3
893d Signal Company
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