Called the U.S.’s first ambassador to Japan, a 14-year-old
fisherman by the name of Manjiro is considered America’s
first Japanese immigrant, arriving in the country on May 7,
1843, by way of a whaling ship.

According to the National Endowment of the Humanities,
the boy and his crew were caught in a violent storm, with
their ship eventually washing up on a desert island 300
miles away from their coastal Japanese village.

Rescued five months later by an American whaling ship,
Manjiro was adopted by American Capt. William Whitfield,
who renamed him John Mung and brought him back to the
states to his home in Massachusetts.

Nakahama Manjirō (John Mung) 
(January 27, 1827 – November 12, 1898)

William H. Whitfield 
(November 11, 1804 – 14 February 1886)

On February 19, 1847, the first rescuers reached surviving members
of the Donner Party, a group of 89 California-bound emigrants led
by the Donner and Reed families, stranded by snow in the Sierra
Nevada Mountains. Three additional rescue parties arrived later.

The trip back to Sutter’s Fort was also brutally hard. Only 45 of the original 89 members of the Donner Party survived.

Amedeo Obici   (July 15, 1877 – May 22, 1947)

In 1906, Italian immigrant Amedeo Obici, along with his
friend and business partner, Mario Peruzzi, founded
Planters Peanut Company in Wilkes-Barre, PA. He
started his career as a bellhop and fruit stand vender
in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Obici later moved to Wilkes-
Barre, opened his own fruit stand, and invested in a
peanut roaster. He turned peddler within a few years,
using a horse and wagon, and calling himself "The
Peanut Specialist". Today, the snack food company
is a division of Kraft Foods.

A 1917 drawing of the company’s brand icon by artist Elmer
Cecil Stoner based upon a contest entry by 14 year old
Antonio Gentile.

    1921

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