Tony's Tuna

What a catch! Tony Skinner, the Knorr's Communications Officer, caught this bluefin tuna early this morning.

He said it took out almost all of his line, but it only took him about 30 minutes to bring it in. Boy was Paul impressed! (So are the rest of us, of course.)

I don't know, but my guess is that Tony has some experience at this sort of thing. He hails from Hawaii, where his relatives immigrated from Puerto Rico in the early 1900s.

Did you know that there are over 25,000 Puerto Rican-Hawaiians in our 50th state (Hawaii became a state in 1959)? Neither did I.

Immigrants first came to Hawaii from Puerto Rico after Puerto Rico was devastated by two major hurricanes in 1899. Hurricane San Circiaco, a category 4 storm, hit in early August. It had winds over 100 mph and was followed -- only 14 days later -- by another, unnamed storm. The result was over 3000 deaths, thousands of people left without homes or food, rain and flooding that lasted almost a month, and sugar and coffee plantations in ruins. Owners of sugar cane plantations in Hawaii immediately began to recruit experienced laborers from Puerto Rico.

Tony's relatives traveled to Maui on a ship like this one.

Tony's great grandparents were part of this first wave of Puerto Rican immigrants. They arrived in Hawaii on December 23, 1900, onboard the steamship Rio de Janeiro, having set sail from San Juan on November 22nd. They first lived on the island of Maui, where they worked on a plantation called Paella. Tony says his relatives still attend reunions of the families of the people who worked and lived together during those years.

Apparently, it was not easy going for the early immigrants. Puerto Ricans worked and lived among many other immigrants to Hawaii. From the late 1800s until the mid 1900s almost 400,000 people were brought to Hawaii to work on the sugar plantations. They came from China, Japan, the Philippines, Korea, Portugal, Samoa, Norway, Germany, Spain, India, and Russia (among others). Many of them returned to their homelands. But may stayed, making Hawaii a true multi-ethnic melting pot. Unfortunately, the plantation owners discriminated based on ethnicity and race, giving European immigrants better pay and better living quarters than that of their co-workers. This treatment resulted in much interethnic strife among the various immigrant groups.

When President Wilson signed the Jones Act in 1917 Puerto Rico became a territory of the US and Puerto Ricans became US citizens. The territory of Hawaii, however, refused to recognize that citizenship for the plantation workers. A lengthy court battle ensued. Finally, the territory was forced to recognize their citizenship, giving the immigrants a new, legal home and the rights and status they deserved.

Tony's family eventually moved to Oahu, where Tony still lives (when he's not living on the ship, that is). But the family history has not been forgotten.

Tony has been working on ships, creating more family history, for a long time now. In process he's managed to travel the world. On his way home from this cruise, he plans to stop off in France for a visit with his teenage son.

Thanks Tony for teaching us a bit about the history of Hawaii and, of course, for providing a great fish for dinner. We do get to eat it for dinner, don't we?!