$50.00 CAD
| /
Great atmospheric B&W photo of Waimea Canyon on the island of Kauai. Taken by the famed Hawaiian photographer W.J. Senda.
Written on negative 'Waimea Canyon Kauai'.
Pencil text on back 'Waimea Canyon Kauai'
Stamped in blue: SENDA STUDIO LIHUE HAWAII
Corner creases
3 ⅝” x 5 ½”
(Red text is an electronic watermark that is not physically part of the photo for sale)
Unlike most of the 300 Japanese immigrants who walked off the Hong Kong Maru at Honolulu Harbor on Oct. 23, 1906, 17-year-old W.J. (William Junokichi) Senda (1889-1984) had no job to claim at an island sugar plantation, nor were there friends and family waiting for him.
But, he managed to land a job soon after as a delivery boy for a Japanese newspaper in Honolulu that paid $17 a month — a good job, considering that plantation laborers of the time needed to work a month’s worth of 10-hour days in the fields to earn as much.
Other low-paying jobs followed, but he still managed to save, and in his spare time he learned English by attending night school at the Nu‘uanu Congregational Church.
He also became fascinated by photography, a hobby that would become his profession for 44 years.
His first camera was a Brownie box that he bought from a Montgomery Ward catalog, and in 1913, following two years of training at the Yamamoto Photo Studio in Honolulu, he sailed off to Kaua‘i to purchase the Gokan Photo Shop located at Kapaia.
Two years later he married Kayo Yamada, and the following year, W.J. moved his photo shop to the new Tip Top Building in Lihue,
https://www.thegardenisland.com/
