Toyama Kyuzo
Tôyama Kyûzô is considered the father (or grandfather) of Okinawan immigration.
Born into a peasant family in Kin Village in northern Okinawa, Tôyama lost his father at the age of seven, and grew up in relatively impoverished conditions. As an adult, he worked for a time as the principal of the local elementary school, but later resigned in protest against the policies and politics of Okinawa prefectural Governor Narahara Shigeru. He then joined the Freedom and People's Rights Movement (Jiyû minken undô) pioneered by Jahana Noboru.
A leader of the Freedom and People's Rights Movement (Jiyû minken undô) in Okinawa, Tôyama petitioned the Japanese government to allow Okinawans to emigrate to Hawaii and to the Americas as contract laborers. In light of the severe economic problems in Okinawa ever since the overthrow of the Ryûkyû Kingdom, this would allow people to seek a better life, and also to earn money they could send home to Okinawa as remittances to help their families and the prefecture's economy.
Kyûzô and his younger brother Tôyama Matasuke, along with tens of others, departed Okinawa in December 1899 and arrived in Honolulu the following month, becoming the first Okinawans in Hawaii.
References
- Mitsugu Sakihara, "Okinawans in Hawaii: An Overview of the Past 80 Years," in Uchinanchu, University of Hawaii (1981), 106.