Sakadas

(January 03, 2006 to March 27, 2006)

100th Year of the Sakada.

On December 26, 1906, the first group of Filipino laborers known as Sakadas arrived from the Philippines to work in the Hawaii sugar plantations. This marked the start of a historic migration, making the Filipinos the largest single Asian ethnic group in the state of Hawaii.

As contract agricultural workers, Sakadas were the lowest paid and least skilled members of society. They faced discrimination which led to a strike against the Hawaii Sugar Planters Association in 1924. The union faced “goons and gangsters,” now considered to be “one of the bloodiest in Hawaii’s history.”

Today, Filipinos have become a part of all sectors of Hawaii and in the other 49 states of America. They have achieved the highest level of civic life as businessmen, medical practitioners, educators, artists and elected government officials.

A century later migration continues……….. this is their story.