Tadao Beppu

Tadao Beppu (born March 26, 1919 in Kīhei , Hawaii Territory , †  July 22, 1993 in Honolulu , Hawaii ) was an American politician ( Democratic Party ). From 1968 to 1974 he was President ( Speaker ) of the House of Representatives of Hawaii .

Career

Tadao Beppu was born on the island of Maui as the child of the Japanese immigrants Tora and Teizo Beppu . From 1936 he visited on Oahu , the University of Hawai'i , where he took his degree in 1940. He then worked as a dock worker in Honolulu before joining the Army Corps of Engineers after the United States entered World War II . In 1943 he joined the US Army and served in the 442nd Infantry Regiment, which consisted almost entirely of Japanese Americans . After being wounded, he spent a year in a French hospital. He was awarded the Purple Heart for his commitment .

With the help of the GI Bill , he began studying at the School of Business at Northwestern University in Chicago after his recovery . He then returned to Hawaii and was active as a politician in the Democratic Party. First he worked as an assistant to the future US Senator Daniel Inouye , at that time the Democratic majority leader in the territorial House of Representatives. Beppu himself was elected to this in 1958; even after Hawaii became the 50th state to join the Union in 1960, it remained in this Chamber of Parliament. In 1968 he became the successor of Elmer Cravalho the Speaker of the House. He held this position until he left the State Legislature in 1974. The chairmanship of the chamber fell to James H. Wakatsuki .

Three years later, Beppu was named assistant director of the Hawaii Department of Health. In 1980 he retired. He died on July 22, 1993 in the state capital Honolulu and was buried in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific there.

Web links

• Tadao Beppu in the database of Find a Grave (English)
• Tadao Beppu at The Political Graveyard
• Biography (English)