Guardian of the Sea - Jizo in Hawaii

Journey Leads to a New Book

We walk by them every day; pieces of history quietly sitting by the roadside or buildings that we work and play in throughout our daily routine. Sometimes they are noted on occasion by historians for the role that they played in our society but most fall into obscurity, forgotten by each succeeding generation. Oftentimes the most well known are those that have some memorial significance but even then, memories and appreciation fade with the passing of time.

One of the most unnoticed pieces of history, yet probably the most important reminders for fishermen, are the wooden warning markers many remember as the “make-man (dead man) poles” that used to dot the shoreline around the island of Oahu.  Many were already gone when I started to fish for ulua in 1982 but the few markers left and a statue in the middle of nowhere always piqued my curiosity. Years before, my father had told me that they were put up as a warning and reminder of those that had drowned from being washed off the cliff at those very same locations. Seeing them standing silently along the shoreline, I would always wonder who made them and what the story behind them was. Maybe it was just too much idle time on my hands while sitting around and shooting the breeze with friends, patiently waiting for a strike.  Something always in the back of my mind thought “It would be interesting to talk with someone who knew”.

How do the warning markers, ulua fishermen and the Jizo statue at Bamboo Ridge, Oahu connect to each other?  John R.K. Clark, retired Honolulu Fire Department Deputy Fire Chief and former City and County lifeguard, carefully and thoughtfully brings the story to life in his new book, Guardian of the Sea – Jizo in Hawaii.  In addition to a timeline of events and narratives of media reports that illustrate the history, John also brings compelling and often heart-wrenching stories to life through interviews with survivors and family members who lived through the actual tragedies.

In 1999, while doing some research on shorecasting clubs in Hawaii, I contacted John about some information that he had included in his first book, Beaches of Oahu (John has also done many related books, including a series of books on beaches of each of the islands).  The section on Sandy Beach mentioned a Honolulu Japanese Casting Club and their work to erect the warning markers and statue at Halona Point or “Bamboo Ridge”. John generously shared the additional information that he had gathered some 30 years earlier when talking with former members of the HJCC, Tadashi Fukunaga and Yasuhei Tsustumi.

A year passed and I made no progress in gathering more information on my own, as many HJCC members and those John had talked to passed on. Then one day, out of the blue, I heard from a friend who said “You have to talk to this guy I work with. He says he was one of the original guys to start fishing at Bamboo Ridge and all other kinds of interesting things.” My friend gave me his co-worker’s name, Horace Sasaki, and I discovered that Horace was previously pointed out to me in a Capitol Casting Club photo that I had come across a year earlier.  There would be many, many coincidences to follow - so many that I began to wonder if I was having some otherworldy “help”.

I met with Horace several times over the next two years and learned that, besides being an avid ulua fisherman himself during the 1940s to 1960s, his father was one of the HJCC founders and knew Mr. Fukunaga and Mr. Tsutsumi. I introduced Horace to John Clark, who carefully documented in meticulous fashion all the details that poured out of Horace’s memory of 60 years prior.  Horace told us stories of his father, Mokichi Sasaki, and how he had been a charcoal supplier during the early 1920s, working out of the area formerly  known as Alan Davis Ranch on the east end of Oahu. Through his business, he became friends with Kaichi Kaya, owner of K. Kaya Fishing Supply, a store still operating in downtown Honolulu at the corner of Nimitz Highway and Kekaulike Street. Horace’s stories matched up perfectly with family photos and oral history provided by Maurice Kaya, Kaichi’s grandson and current K. Kaya Fishing Supply owner.

Mokichi also knew a Hawaiian man, “Mumu” Joe, who often stopped by his farm to pick haole koa branches that he used in his traditional Hawaiian “hang-bait” style of fishing along the coastal sea cliffs in the area. “Mumu” Joe showed Sasaki and Kaya, both 1st generation Japanese immigrants or issei, all of the ulua “houses” that today are the well known ulua fishing grounds of Oahu’s east end.  As word quickly spread, many other issei friends took an interest in fishing for ulua with contemporary fishing tackle and modern-day ulua fishing in Hawaii was born. In 1929, tackle dealer Kaya, Sasaki and several others spearheaded the formation of the HJCC, one of the earliest shorecasting clubs in Hawaii.

Two of the stories that Horace told were about the warning markers or “obelisks” and the Buddhist statue of Jizo that were put up by the club.  Not only were members of the club avid fishermen, they had a civic responsibility in mind as well. Seeing many of their own members, other fishermen and visitors from the general public dying because of their unfamiliarity with the ocean’s hazards, the group in 1931 decided to place the markers at dangerous coastline spots around the island.  Many ended up along the Ka Iwi coastline of Oahu.  As more deaths continued to occur, the club commissioned in 1932 a statue of the Buddhist guardian god, Jizo, to be placed atop the trail to Oahu’s most famous ulua fishing spot, Bamboo Ridge.  The monument was dedicated, with the blessing of the City Parks Department, as a monument to those who perished and as a future protector of fishermen and other ocean users.

For an amateur historian of our shoreline fishing heritage, this has been a wonderful eight year journey.  Along the way, it has led me to meet up with some very special people and allowed me to share in perpetuating and preserving our island fishing culture.  I am honored to say that John Clark’s Guardian of the Sea – Jizo in Hawaii is a fascinating yet previously undocumented study of the life of the issei in Hawaii, including the significance of religion and recreation in their everyday life. Most significantly for fishermen in Hawaii, this book provides the definitive work illustrating early contributions that the issei made to the sport of ulua fishing in Hawaii.

John Clark, former lifeguard and retired deputy fire chief of the Honolulu Fire Department, is author of several books about Hawaii’s beaches. He also has a water safety and research consulting business.

Guardian of the Sea – Jizo in Hawaii is available at most bookstores, online booksellers and at publisher University of Hawaii Press’ website: www:uhpress.hawaii.edu  In addition to the book, John has also commissioned and released a T-shirt design featuring Jizo for fishermen and fishing enthusiasts. Other items are planned to be released in the future but the T-shirts are available now at Hanapa’a Hawaii.