Harry Kawabe
Japanese-American businessperson and philanthropist (1890-1969)
Harry Sotaro Kawabe (June 10, 1890 – 1969) was a Japanese businessman who was incarcerated during World War II. He is known for contributing greatly to the economy of Seward, Alaska. In 1969, he founded the Kawabe Memorial House for elderly Japanese Americans, and the 154-unit complex was built through the HUD Senior Housing program in 1972.
Biography
Harry Sotaro Kawabe (ja:川部 惣太郎) was born on June 10, 1890, in a small rural village near Osaka, Maihara, Shiga, Japan. His family members were farmers. In 1906, Kawabe moved to Seattle, Washington and worked as a houseboy. He moved to Alaska in 1909, hoping to become rich off of gold mining. He did not have much luck and used what he had to move to Seward. He started buying empty lots and businesses in Seward. In 1923 he moved back to Japan and married Toshiko Suzuki (c.1901-1930), who died in 1930. He moved back to Alaska and married Tomo Kawano (August 1, 1893 - March 1970).
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This entry incorporates text from “Harry Kawabe” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.