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Hana Shimozumi (LOC)

from The Library of Congress

• Pixel Wrangler said:

  Hana Shimozumi (Mme. Hana Shimozumi, Mme. Hana Shimozumi Iki) (1893-1978) was a Japanese prima donna singing the role of Yum Yum in Gilbert and Sullivan's "The Mikado" with the new Gallo English Opera Company. It was scheduled to open on Labor Day, September 1, 1919 at the Shubert Theatre, New York City for two weeks before going on a tour of the United States and Canada. Hana was born in Honolulu, brought up in an American family in San Francisco and educated at Stanford University. Her vocal study was with Mrs. A.F. Bridge. –excerpted from The New York Times, [1] The Musicians and Stagehands Unions went on strike at 7:00PM, September 1, 1919, which delayed the opening of "The Mikado" for a week. When it did give it's first performance on September 8, 1919, both Hana Shimozumi and the production received a glowing review in The New York Times.  [2] [3] She later sang Fire Fly and Madame Butterfly and was a star with the San Carlos Opera Company and the Gallo English Comic Opera.   Mme. Shimozumi gave up a promising operatic career when she married Dr. G Iki (George S. Iki) (1892-1974) a surgeon, and a University of California graduate, of Sacramento. They had a daughter Marsha Y. Iki (b.1922). [4] [5] After the United States entered World War II, Hana Iki, her husband, daughter and three other family members were forcibly relocated and interned at Tule Lake Relocation Center in Newell, California in 1942. Hana was a U.S. Citizen, born in Honolulu County, Hawaii. She attended public schools in San Francisco, had never been to Japan, and didn't speak, read or write Japanese. [6]