Hiram Hisanori Kano

Born 1889 Tokyo (Japan)

Died 1988
Fort Collins, CO

Hiram Hisanori Kano was born to a distinguished noble family in Japan. When he was a young man, William Jennings Bryan encouraged him to move to Nebraska to study agriculture. Kano had farmed for several years near Litchfield, Nebraska, when George Beecher, Episcopal Bishop of Western Nebraska enlisted him to minister to Japanese immigrants who were agricultural laborers in the region. Kano was ordained a priest and served Episcopal Japanese churches in North Platte and Mitchell. He taught immigrants English and helped them with legal affairs, while also advocating for rights for Japanese Americans in the state legislature. On Sunday, December 7, 1941, the day Pearl Harbor was bombed, Kano had conducted the morning service in North Platte and was arrested that afternoon. He spent most of three years in internment camps and jails due to his family and political connections and his advocacy for Japanese immigrants. After the war ended, Kano earned a Master of Divinity degree at Nashotah House Seminary in Wisconsin. He returned to Western Nebraska, where he continued to conduct religious services, teach, and advocate for Japanese immigrants. Kano became a naturalized American citizen as soon as it was legally permitted in 1953. He retired in 1957, when he and his wife Ai (Ivy) Nagai Kano moved to Ft. Collins, Colorado, where their daughter lived.

Places Lived

Japan
Lincoln, NE
Litchfield, NE
Scottsbluff, NE
Fort Collins, CO

Author Of

Nonfiction

Keywords

History--Japanese in Nebraska; Agriculture; Religion

Education

B.S., Imperial University, Tokyo, Japan
M.A in Agricultural Economics, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 1918
M.Div. Nashotah House Episcopal Seminary, Nashotah, Wisconsin, 1946

Bibliography

A History of the Japanese in Nebraska. 1984.
Nikkei Farmer on the Nebraska Plains : A Memoir. 2010.

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