For Kona’s fast growing Japanese immigrant population, Daifukuji was a welcome glimpse of home. How comforting it must have been to see that high peaked roof and an altar gleaming with golden lotus blossoms, to hear the notes of the temple gong ringing in the air and to breathe the familiar scent of incense once more.
Read MoreIn 1917 the U.S. Congress approved the 18th Amendment to the Constitution which banned the import, export, manufacture, sale and transportation of alcohol. When the new law went into effect in January of 1920, if Kona police had caught sight of Hayata delivering sake up and down Mamalahoa Road, they would have arrested him. The profitable importation of Masamune sake from Japan was deemed a crime, much to Dr. Hayashi's chagrin.
Read MoreThis stunning display of brightly painted koi announced the important fact the Ashihara family had a boy in its midst!
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