Clear, 47° F
DENVER (AP) — Bill Hosokawa, a former Denver Post editor and reporter who organized and served as editor of the internment camp newspaper the Heart Mountain Sentinel, has died. He was 92.
Hosokawa died Friday at the home of his daughter Christie Harveson in Sequim, Wash., the paper reported.
During 38 years at The Post, Hosokawa held several positions, including war correspondent in Korea and Vietnam, columnist, editor of the Sunday magazine and editorial page editor.
Hosokawa was among thousands of Japanese-Americans forced from their homes and into internment camps by the government during World War II. He was profoundly affected by his time at Heart Mountain Camp, his daughter Susan Boatright said Saturday.
"It was a humiliating experience," Boatright said. "He came away from it not as a bitter man but as someone who wanted to educate the world about that experience and make sure it never happened again."
Hosokawa was 26 when he was sent from his home in Seattle to the camp in 1942 with his wife and an infant son.
"In the eyes of the government, I was not a native-born American citizen — I was an enemy alien," he said in an interview years later. "Why? Because my parents were born in Japan, a country with which we were at war."
While at Heart Mountain, Hosokawa organized and became the editor of The Heart Mountain Sentinel, a newspaper distributed to camp residents. He was released from Heart Mountain in 1943.
Hosokawa also worked at The Des Moines Register in Iowa, the Japanese Consulate in Seattle and at The Far Eastern Review, a monthly in Shanghai, China.
After retiring from The Post, he was the reader's representative at the Rocky Mountain News.
