Hayato Okino was born August 18, 1912, in the Waiakea Town section of Hilo. He was the fourth of five children of Shimakichi Okino and Tsune Hamasaki Okino, who both immigrated to Hawai'i from Japan in 1901. Okino attended Wa.iakea Kai, Hilo Junior High, and Hilo High schools, graduating in 1932. His first job after graduation was an auto parts salesman for Ruddle Sales and Service in Hilo. Twenty-three years later, in 1955, he started his own auto parts business, Automotive Supply Center. The building was complete destroyed in the 1960 tsunami.

Herbert Sadamu Nishimoto was born June 15, 1929 in N"mole, Hawai'i. He is the youngest of Senichi Nishimoto and Misano Masukawa Nishimoto's five children.

The oldest of two children born to Willard Hogle Branch and Elizabeth Mason Branch, Jeanne Branch Johnston was born in Hilo on December 2, 1939. Johnston's maternal grandfather, Charles William Mason, was the inventor of Canec, a fiberboard made from sugarcane bagasse. Mason became the superintendent of Hawaiian Cane Products Company, Ltd., located in Hilo near the site of the Waiakea Mill Company. After spending her early childhood in Hilo, Honolulu, Midway Island, and California, Johnston and her mother returned to Hilo in 1944.

Joe A. Joseph, Portuguese-Hawaiian, was born in Kalihi on March 10, 1913.  His father, Antone Joseph ( 11Antone Joe 11 ) owned a dairy located near the present site of Kalihi Shopping Center. As a youth, Joe helped his father at the dairy. Joe attended Kalihi-Waena Elementary School and completed the ninth grade at Kalakaua Intermediate. In 1932, he began work as a surveyor at the Pearl Harbor Naval Shipyard. Just prior to World War II, Joe moonlighted as a nightclub bouncer. Until 1945, Joe, along with his brothers, helped at the family-run dairy.

John Vegas, Puerto Rican, the sixth of fifteen children, was born on November 30, 1912, in North Kohala, Hawaii.  His parents immigrated to North Kohala from Puerto Rico in 1901.  Antone Vegas, John's father,worked as a laborer at Kohala's Union Mill Plantation.  In 1924, the family moved to Honolulu where Antone Vegas worked as a track layer for Honolulu Rapid Transit (HRT).

Josephine Nelson Todd was born November 9, 1906 in Pepe'ekeo, Hawai'i. She was the seventh of eleven children born to Hans Peter Nelson, an immigrant from Denmark, and Mary Morgado Nelson, an immigrant from Portugal. Hans Peter Nelson was an employee for Pepe'ekeo Sugar Company. When Todd was a young girl, the family moved to Hilo. She grew up in the Villa Franca section of Hilo, an area populated predominantly by Portuguese. Portuguese was Todd's flrst language.

June Mitsuko Odachi Shigemasa was born September 27, 1935 in the Shinmachi district of Hilo, Hawai'i. Her parents, Kinzaemon Odachi and Kameki Tsuno Odachi, were immigrants from Japan who came to Hawai'i as Tenri-kyo [a Buddhist sect] ministers. Shigemasa, her parents, and siblings lived in a two-story house on the temple grounds. She was attending nearby Waiakea Kai School when World War II broke out. Following the Pearl Harbor attack, Kinzaemon Odachi was arrested by the FBI and interned at Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Kapua Wall Heuer was born February 1, 1912 in Kainaliu, Kona, Hawai'i. She was the youngest child of Allen Wall and Christina Lilinoe Roy Wall. Heuer's maternal grandparents were William F. Roy, a Scotsman who arrived in Hawai'i in 1860, and Eliza Davis Roy, a native Hawaiian. Together, they took up ranching in Kona. Growing up in Waihou, an area mauka of Kainaliu town, Heuer lived the ranching lifestyle. She rode horses, and learned to rope, herd, and ship cattle. Beginning in 1918, Heuer spent most of her time in Honolulu attending Punahou School.

Laura Yuen Chock, the fourth of six children, was born July 18, 1927 in Hilo. Her father was Mun Hon Yuen, an immigrant from Canton, China. Her mother was Fannie Yen Tai Loo Yuen, a Honolulu- born Chinese American. Chock's parents owned the Hawaii Chicken Store, a poultry and herb business located on Mamo Street in downtown Hilo. Chock and her family lived in two-bedroom quarters above the store.

Lenore Kumulani Van Gieson was born June 16, 1935 in Hilo, Hawai'i. Her father, Ebenezer Coit Hobron Van Gieson, was from a Honolulu family and educated at Kamehameha Schools; her mother, Victoria Kumulani Todd Van Gieson, a Hilo native. The oldest of four siblings, VanGieson grew up on property owned by her mother's side of the family in the Keaukaha section of Hilo. This section, known as Pu'umaile by old-timers, was an area where many of Hilo's elite resided full-time or part-time in beachfront homes and cottages.