Hosokawa, 92; Chronicler of Nisei Experience
By GWEN MURANAKA
RAFU ENGLISH EDITOR IN CHIEF
Saturday, Nov. 24, 2007

Journalist wrote history of Japanese Americans through books, newspaper columns.

GWEN MURANAKA/Rafu Shimpo
Hosokawa greets Sen. Daniel Inouye in 2004 after giving a speech at a conference in Arkansas sponsored by the Japanese American National Museum.

Photo courtesy of Christie Harveson
A family portrait of Hosokawa with his children, from left, Christie, Susan,
Michael and Peter.

Photo courtesy of George Yoshinaga
Hosokawa, then editor of the Heart
Mountain Sentinel, walks with Vaughn
Mechau, Heart Mountain reports officer,
in this photo taken in 1943.

Bill Hosokawa, the Nisei journalist who sought to tell the story of Japanese Americans through numerous books and newspaper columns, died on Friday. He was 92.

Hosokawa, who until recently wrote the column “Anything That Comes to Mind”  for The Rafu Shimpo, broke his hip in a fall in September and never recovered fully. He passed away at his daughter Christie Harveson’s home in Sequim, Wash., where he had moved this year. Although his health was failing, his daughter said his mind remained sharp and active.

“It was a coming home for him, since he was from Seattle,” Harveson said.

Hosokawa continued to write, sharing observations about life in the Pacific Northwest, his infirmities and, most poignantly, about the loss earlier this year of his youngest son Pete to cancer.

“The Japanese are very good about expressing their sympathy in this manner. They have a word for it—koden—and I have no idea what characters are used. But I was moved that even among strangers, an ancient custom from an ancient land is practiced among our people as a silent expression of understanding and condolences. Arigato,” wrote Hosokawa.

Hosokawa in his seminal 1969 book “Nisei: The Quiet American” defined for many generations what it meant to be a second generation Japanese American: quiet, humble, hardworking and loyal.

“He was thus a creature of two worlds. He approached manhood with an American heart and mind and a Japanese face,” wrote Hosokawa in the book’s preface.

Born to Issei parents, who emigrated from Hiroshima, Hosokawa grew up in Seattle, Wash., where he worked at The Japanese American Courier, under editor/publisher Jimmy Sakamoto. After graduating from the University of Washington, Hosokawa moved to Singapore in 1939 to edit the Singapore Herald. Later he joined the staff of the monthly magazine the Far Eastern Review.

Hosokawa, wife Alice and infant son Mike returned to the United States six weeks before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. He was profoundly affected by his time at Heart Mountain Camp in Cody, Wyo., his daughter Susan Boatright said Saturday.

“It was a humiliating experience,” Boatright said to the Associated Press. “He came away from it not as a bitter man but as someone who wanted to educate the world about that experience and make sure it never happened again.”

At Heart Mountain, Hosokawa became editor of the camp newspaper the Heart Mountain Sentinel where he remained until he left camp in 1943 for a job at the Des Moines Register in Iowa.

He joined the staff of the Denver Post and worked there for 38 years, holding several positions, including as a war correspondent in Korea and Vietnam, and the editorial page editor.

For decades, he wrote the column “From the Frying Pan” for Pacific Citizen, the newspaper of the Japanese American Citizens League. He also wrote “JACL: In Quest of Justice” and co-authored “They Call Me Moses Masaoka,” the biography of JACL wartime leader Mike Masaoka.

“I would call Bill a national treasure for JACL,” said Floyd Mori, JACL national executive director. “He’s been there for most of the issues that faced our community. He quietly observed and wrote a lot of our history. He had a great respect for the JACL. He didn’t always agree with the board, but he was always there.”

Hosokawa’s support of Masaoka was a source of controversy among those who maintain that Masaoka collaborated with the U.S. government. In 2000, critics objected to having words written by Masaoka on the National Japanese American Memorial in Washington, D.C.

As a member of the memorial board, Hosokawa helped to draft wording that was on the memorial and supported Masaoka’s inclusion.

“I know the vigor and intensity with which we opposed the evacuation. The military came and said, ‘Get out or else.’ So I think the opposition to Mike is unfair,” Hosokawa said in a 2000 interview with the San Francisco Examiner.

After retiring from The Post, he was the reader’s representative at the Rocky Mountain News. Hosokawa served as honorary consul general to Japan and penned works of history including, most recently, a 2005 profile on Colorado’s Japanese Americans.

In February, the Anti-Defamation League’s Mountain States Regional Office presented Hosokawa with a civil rights award, honoring his writings on the internment.

The family will hold a private service. They have not decided yet whether there will be a public memorial in Denver.

“He was a very private, humble person,” said Harveson.
 
He is survived by daughter Christie Harverson in Sequim, Wash.; daughter Susan Boatright of Littleton, Colo.; son Michael Hosokawa of Columbia, Mo.; and a brother, Robert Hosokawa of Orlando, Fla.; 8 grandchildren and 5 great-grandchildren. Predeceased by his wife Alice in 1998 and son Pete in 2007.