News and Events Blog « Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Program

Americans of Japanese Ancestry in Multicultural Hawai‘i

From May 23 to November 30, 1999, the Asian Pacific American Program hosted Japanese American National Museum’s exhibition, From Bento to Mixed Plate: Americans of Japanese Ancestry in Multicultural Hawai‘i, attracting over 300,000 visitors. Over 150 volunteers served as gallery guides.

This exhibit told the story of how Japanese immigrated to Hawai‘i to work on sugar plantations, became part of the “local” Hawai‘i cultural mix, and established themselves as community leaders in Hawai‘i.

This was a traveling exhibition from the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles.