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Joseph Heco (born Hamada Hikozō September 20, 1837 – December 12, 1897) was the first Japanese people person to be naturalization as a United States citizen and the first to publish a Japanese language newspaper.
The American freighter Auckland picked up seventeen survivors from the sea and brought them to San Francisco in February 1851. This was the second time Japanese castaways would come to San Francisco. John Manjiro was the first, although Hasekura Tsunenaga had earlier sailed past Cape Mendocino. The Eiriki Maru's cook, Sentarō, then became the first Japanese person known to have his photograph taken, and would soon traverse the continent.
In 1852 the group was sent to Macau to join Commodore Matthew Perry as a gesture to help open diplomatic relations with Japan. However, Heco met an American interpreter who asked him to return to the United States with him and learn English language, with the thought that Heco would be able return to Japan with important language skills when the country was open for trade. Heco accepted the offer and arrived in San Francisco in June 1853.
Heco attended a Roman Catholic school in Baltimore and was baptized "Joseph" in 1854. He returned to the West Coast for further study, when in 1857 he was invited by California Senator William M. Gwin to come with him to Washington, D.C. as his secretary. Here he became the first nonofficial Japanese person to be introduced to a U.S. President. Heco stayed with Gwin until February 1858. He then joined Lt. J.M. Brooke on a survey of the coast of China and Japan. In June of that year, Heco became the first Japanese subject to become an American citizen.Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). " Hamada Hikozō" in .
Heco worked as interpreter for the U.S. Consulate in Kanagawa but resigned on February 1, 1860. He became a general commission agent in nearby Yokohama, waiting for the arrival of his partner from California. However, the partnership was dissolved on March 1, 1861, after doing poorly for a year. Heco returned to the United States in September 1861 on board the USS Carrington. In Yokohama he met Wilhelm Heine, Francis Hall and Mikhail Bakunin and traveled back to San Francisco with Bakunin in September. In March 1862 he met President Abraham Lincoln.
Heco returned to Kanagawa at the end of September 1862 and began work at the U.S. Consulate once again. After nearly a year, he left to establish a trading firm. In 1863, Heco began his publishing career with Hyōryūki (漂流記 Record of a Castaway), an account of his experiences in America. From 1864 to 1866, Heco helped publish the first Japanese language newspaper, the Kaigai Shinbun. Today, Heco is regarded in Japan as the father of Japanese journalism.
In June 1867, Kido Koin and Itō Hirobumi (Chōshū samurai) called upon Heco under the guise of being Satsuma Domain officials, and asked questions about the United States and England, especially regarding the U.S. Constitution. In October, they called again and asked Heco to serve as their agent in Nagasaki. He did so for two years without remuneration. Heco later helped Itō visit England with the assistance of Royal Navy Henry Keppel of the HMS Salamis.
On January 1, 1868, Kobe was opened as a treaty port and, according to Heco, "Yokohama, Nagasaki, and the China ports all sent their quota of bearded foreigners on the hunt for the Almighty Dollar." Heco described these early days of 1868 as troubled times. "Wild and disquieting rumours of the happenings in Kyoto and Osaka were ever arriving."
In February 1868, the victorious forces of the Boshin War of the Meiji Restoration promised that they would not harm foreigners in Nagasaki. Heco went with Francis Groom of Glover & Co. to Osaka to negotiate the transfer of the CSS Stonewall to the Japanese government. That summer Heco was asked to find a Western physician for the daimyō of Hizen. He found Dr. Samuel Boyer of the . Heco moved between Nagasaki and Osaka at this time and reported on the rice riots of 1869. In February 1870 the Japanese government began to persecute the 3000 Christians from Urakami, and Glover & Co. went bankrupt.
In the month of August the firm I had been serving since 1867 Glover failed all of a sudden. The first meeting of creditors was held at the English Consulate in Nagasaki on the 16th Sept., and on the 19th, the firm laid a full statement of affairs before them.
In October, Heco accompanied Mackenzie to Kobe. He was soon back in Nagasaki, leasing a house on the bund No. and began a business as a commercial agent. He also was appointed by the daimyō of Hizen to look after his interests in the Takashima coal mine. Visiting the daimyo in Kobe, in 1871, he stayed a month. Then in December, he went with Thomas Glover to visit the daimyō of Kumamoto at his Kumamoto Castle, but the daimyō was away at the time. They still, however, received a tour of the castle before returning to Nagasaki.
In May 1872, Heco received an offer to work under Inoue Kaoru, the Minister of Finance. He left Nagasaki in early August to do so. However, he had the opportunity to witness the Meiji Emperor's visit to Nagasaki on July 19 before he left. Heco stayed with the Finance Ministry until the beginning of 1874, when he left of his own accord. In May 1875 Heco went to work in Kobe, where he remained until becoming ill in 1881. Heco died in 1897. As an American he was buried in the foreign section of Aoyama Cemetery in Aoyama, Tokyo.
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