First Among Nisei: The Life and Writings of Masaji Marumoto

Primarily based on Masaji Marumoto’s oral histories, this book is an account of Marumoto’s life and career - from the time he was a child until he was well into his retirement years in the mid-1980s. One of Hawaii’s most distinguished Nisei, Marumoto was the first person of Asian ancestry to graduate from Harvard Law School, the first Japanese American president of the Hawaii Bar Association, and the first Japanese American to serve on the Hawaii Supreme Court. This volume includes portions of a diary Marumoto kept as a fourteen-year-old schoolboy and letters to his wife and son during his World War II military service. It is an intimate portrait of a remarkable individual - a figure of major consequence in the story of modern Hawaii.