Ladies are very difficult to track in history.  I have not come across anything written about great-grandmother Itoyo.  I’ve seen couple of photo pages that she had put together to preserve her family photos.  I was very impressed with the logical way the pictures were organized on the pages and the precise labels for each photo.    Because of family situations, I never met great-grandmother Itoyo.  I always thought that if it had not been for her, the Okada and the Harunaga families would not have achieved as much as they did.  She had a goal and kept everyone working towards it.   Upon obtaining a copy of the Harunaga Koseki Tohon (Japanese family register), I noticed that my Harunaga grandmother, Shizuko’s maiden name was Hada.  I had always thought that it was Okada like her siblings Yoshiko and Haruto.  

In the Harunaga Koseki Tohon, grandmother Shizuko’s father’s name is Hisaji Hada.  However, the kanji for Hada can also be read as Namita and Hisaji can also be read as Kyuji.  I had a strong feeling that great-grandmother Itoyo had arrived in Hawaii with her first husband Hisaji (or Kyuji) Hada.   

I looked for any arrivals in the Hawaii Immigration Index for the late 1890’s with the approximate names of Kyuji/Hisaji Hada or Namita, Itoyo Hada or Namita and Shizuko Hada or Namita.  I chanced upon their immigration records.  Kinji and Itayo Hada with a daughter Shizuko traveling under Itayo’s passport.  Names were sort of approximately close and the family was from Hiroshima prefecture.  

I left a message on the Ancestry Message Boards under Hiroshima on 22 Jun 2014 asking for anyone who could help me identify this family.  On 29 May 2015, I received a message from a genealogist in Hiroshima that included a page from the October - December 1897 Hiroshima Prefecture Passport Book.  Itoyo and Hisaji (abt 27 Nov 1872 - abt Jan 1901) applied and received their passports on 27 Dec 1897.  One day old Shizuko (26 Dec 1897 - 17 Feb 1928) was to travel on Itoyo’s passport.  

Great-grandmother Itoyo and great-grandfather Hisaji were born in Nakanomura, Aki-gun, Hiroshima-Ken, Japan (information from the Hiroshima Prefecture Passport Book).  They grew up in the same village and married early in 1897.

The passport numbers on the immigration index that I had found earlier matched.  I was not able to obtain the ship manifest for the Riojun Maru that they arrived on 26 Jan 1898.  The manifest would have stated which plantation they were headed for.   The passport information lead to other information on the Internet.  I found a 1900 census taken on the 19th of Jun 1900 for the family.  The census indicated that the family lived in Hamakua, HI.  According to the census, great-grandfather Hisaji was a laborer and great-grandmother Itoyo was a cook.  Historically, a cook able to cook traditional Japanese food in a community heavily dominated by Japanese men on the plantations was a great asset.  

Then I found a birth record for Yoshiko Okada (15 Dec 1901 - 20 Feb 1987) on familysearch.org with mother Itoyo Bessho and father Toshitaro Okada.  My first reaction was, what happened to great-grandfather Hisaji!  I was not able to find a tombstone record or a death record, but I’m guessing that great-grandfather Hisaji died sometime after the 1900 census and great-grandmother married Toshitaro Okada (13 Oct 1875-1954).  Their daughter, Yoshiko was born on 15 December 1901.  

Japanese ladies without a husband did not remain unmarried for very long in those early days of Japanese immigration to Hawaii.  The saga of the Okada/Harunaga extended family probably started around 1901 or 1902.  

Grandfather Manki Harunaga (30 Jun 1880-20 Dec 1973) arrived from Kumamoto Prefecture on 13 Aug 1901 (Hawaii Immigration Index).  Why he immigrated and went to Honokaa is unknown because he did not arrive to work at a plantation.  The 1910 census placed him in Honokaa living in the same household as Itoyo and Toshitaro Okada and working as manager of the livery stable in Honokaa.  Toshitaro was a driver for the livery stable.

Itoyo & Toshitaro (my guess) wedding picture (photo from the Okada Collection at the North

Hawaii Education Research Center (NHERC) Heritage Center in Honokaa)

The couple of pages out of great-grandmother’s photo albums that the NHERC Heritage Center sent indicated that she came from a very prominent family in her hometown.  The pages show the wedding story of her brother with < pictures of the family graves with kamon (family crest), family photo of the wedding couple in front of their home/business with a large display of the family kamon (family crest) and various smaller photos of the family members and the bride.  

On 10 Oct 1904, great-grandmother Itoyo gave birth to her son, Haruto.  The event provided the Okada/Harunaga family with a goal of creating a medical doctor family business.  Great-grandmother Itoyo felt that the public school system on the Big Island would not provide Haruto with an education good enough to attend medical school.  Talk about a Tiger-mom.  Haruto spent most of his young school years at boarding schools in Honolulu and Urbana, Illinois.

Haruto was sent to Central Grammar School (graduated in 1918) in Honolulu and on to Urbana High School (graduated on 4 Jun 1921)  in Illinois.  He continued his studies at the University of Illinois School of Medicine and graduated in 1927 with a medical degree.  The family then sent him to Japan to study surgery.   

After studying in Japan, Haruto came back to Honokaa to work with Dr. Koshiro Tofukuji at Dr. Tofukuji’s hospital.  In 1934, Dr. Tofukuji moved his practice to Maui.   The family built the Okada Hospital in Honokaa in 1934 where Haruto (10 Oct 1904-11 Dec 1983) practiced until 1950.  Great-grandmother was the cook and later, Haruto’s wife Harue (2 Mar 1913-29 Oct 1999) was the cook.  I don’t believe that it was mere coincidence that grandfather Manki sold the Harunaga Theater to H. Tanimoto in 1934.  The proceeds were probably invested into the Okada Hospital.  Grandfather Manki and Toshitaro worked for the hospital in some capacity or other from 1934 until after World War II.  Haruto closed the hospital in Mar 1950 and went to work at the Hamakua Infirmary.  

The Okada/Harunaga family plan included the marriage of grandfather Manki (30 Jun 1880-20 Dec 1973) and grandmother Shizuko (26 Dec 1897-17 Feb 1928).  Their children were to be groomed to expand the medical doctor family business.   

Grandfather Manki and grandmother Shizuko had three sons.  The eldest son, Yoshiaki was born in 1913.  The second son, Toshio was born in 1925.  Grandmother Shizuko died giving birth to their third son, Shizuo in 1928.  Shizuo was adopted by daughter Yoshiko and her husband Takashi Nishimoto.   Grandfather Manki continued to live with his in-laws with his two sons after his wife died.  Great-grandmother raised her two grandsons, Yoshiaki (13) and Toshio (3).  They attended public schools.  Yoshiaki graduated Hilo High School in 1931 and went on to the University of Illinois and graduated as a dentist in 1942.  Yoshiaki, his wife Teruyo and daughter Windi Kaye were detained in Chicago during the war years.  They returned to Honolulu and set up a dental practice in 1946.   

Toshio graduated from Honokaa High School in 1943 and was drafted into the Military Intelligence Service,  442nd Regimental Combat Team.  He spent his enlisted years in the South Pacific.  Toshio returned to the University of Utah in the fall of 1946 to continue his education.  He changed majors from pre-med to law sometime in the early 1950’s and graduated with a law degree in 1959.  He moved to San Jose, CA and opened a law office.

circa 1939 (the Okada/Harunaga family unit; photo from the Okada Collection at the NHERC Heritage Center in Honokaa) Standing on the left is Manki Harunaga, (Dr.) Haruto and Harue Okada Sitting on the left is Itoyo and Toshitaro Okada

 Grandfather Manki left Honokaa in 1947 to live with Yoshiaki in Honolulu.  Toshitaro died in 1954.  Judging from the number of people who attended the funeral, the family was very well thought of in Honokaa.  

In the end, the Okada/Harunaga medical doctor family business was to be a single generation phenomena.  None of the Harunaga grandsons became medical doctors.  In 1950 Dr. Okada and his wife adopted a daughter Esther Emiko (25 Mar 1950-19 Oct 2012) and she did not pursuit a career in medicine either.   

Great-grandmother Itoyo was a Tiger-mom to her son and grandsons and they all continued on to higher education.  It may have taken more than a few years, but they did achieve their goals.  Great-grandmother Itoyo died in an accident crossing a street in 1965 at the age of 87.