The ''Hawaii Hochi'' (

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

: ''ハワイ報知'') is a six-day-a-week Japanese-language newspaper published and sold in

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

. The newspaper was founded in 1912 to serve the Japanese immigrant community in Hawaii. Founder Frederick Kinzaburo Makino had recently been released from a ten-month prison sentence for his role in organizing a 1909 labor strike among

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of (often hybrid) tall, Perennial plant, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar Sugar industry, production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with ...

plantation A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...

workers. Disappointed by existing newspapers' coverage of continuing labor disputes, Makino established the ''Hochi'' to present a "non-party and independent" perspective on the issues then facing Japanese Americans in Hawaii. After some initial financial struggles, the ''Hochi'' became one of the primary sources for news related to political issues important to the island's Japanese community, publicly supporting legislation to extend Asian American citizenship rights and ease restrictions on Japanese language schools, as well as another strike in 1920. The paper was one of only a few to discuss racial inequality in the islands during the highly publicized

Massie Trial The Massie Trial, for what was known as the Massie Affair, was a 1932 criminal trial that took place in Honolulu, Hawaii Territory. Socialite Grace Fortescue, along with several accomplices, was charged with the murder of the well-known local prizef ...

of 1932. An English section, called "the Bee" for its sting, was introduced in 1925 in order to appeal to

Nisei is a Japanese-language term used in countries in North America and South America to specify the ethnically Japanese children born in the new country to Japanese-born immigrants (who are called ). The are considered the second generation, ...

who were not fluent in Japanese. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the paper was renamed the ''Hawaii Herald'' in response to anti-Japanese sentiment. Unlike other prominent Japanese-language newspaper editors, like the ''

Nippu Jiji The , later published as the ''Hawaii Times'', was a Japanese-English language newspaper based in Honolulu, Hawai'i. Established as the ''Yamato Shimbun'' by Shintaro Anno in 1895, the paper began as a six-page semi-weekly printed on a lithograph ...

s Yasutaro Soga, Makino managed to avoid incarceration, and in 1952 the ''Hochi'' returned to its original title. Makino died in 1953, and in 1962 the paper was purchased by Japanese newspaperman Konosuke Oishi. In 1969, Oishi created an English-only sister paper under the name ''Hawaii Herald''. The ''Herald'' was discontinued after four years, but was brought back in 1980 and continues to run alongside the ''Hochi'' today. At its peak in the early 1990s, the ''Hawaii Hochi'' had a circulation of 9,000. The number has since dwindled to around 3,000, but the paper is still delivered by mail today, the only remaining Japanese-language semi-daily in the islands. The newspaper's publishing company also operates a commercial printing business.

References

External links

The Hawaii Herald
Mass media in Honolulu Newspapers published in Hawaii Newspapers established in 1912 Japanese-American culture in Honolulu Japanese-language newspapers published in the United States 1912 establishments in Hawaii {{Hawaii-stub

See also

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External links