I would like to know about the history of the Oda line? I know that
Ichiro Oda came to Hawaii in the late 20's.

Hi obutt,

It’s nice that you’re interested in finding out more about your family
origins. Tracing genealogy can be an arduous yet fulfilling task.
People sometimes spend years, even lifetimes researching and filling
in the gaps of their family tree, and a well-researched family tree is
a treasure for everyone who comes after you.

Obviously a job like tracing your family or ancestors is not one a
researcher can do for you in an hour or so in a forum like this. So,
what I’d like to do is give you a handful of leads so that you will be
able find out more about your family yourself.


The first place you should begin is at the Worldweb genealogy
database:

The name you mention, Oda, is very common. A full search of that site
for “Oda” returns 1360 results. Of those 3 Oda ancestors were born in
Hawaii between 1870 and 1905:
http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi

From there you can view their background information, their
descendants, and their links to other people’s family trees, and
perhpas your own.

Another source is the Hawaii Genealogy Forum – my quick search of this
forum led to two posts regarding the Oda family. You should consider
posting your request there as well.
http://genforum.genealogy.com/hi/all.html

"Hawaiian Genealogy" is a resource site for people searching their
roots in Hawaii. Go right to their resource page for a great
step-by-step instruction and lists of places in Hawaii to check for
family records:
http://hawaiiangenealogy.com/

Other genealogy websites specific to Hawaii are:
http://www.hawaiian-roots.com/
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~cgaunt/hawaii.html
http://dmoz.org/Regional/North_America/United_States/Hawaii/Society_and_Culture/Genealogy/
http://www.rootsweb.com/~higenweb/hawaii.htm

When I did a Google “search this site” for “Oda” on that last one,
here is the return I get:
://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q=site:www.rootsweb.com+oda

As you can see there are many links there for you to explore.

I hope this serves to get you started on a fun search for your
Hawaiian roots. So many people are publishing their family trees
online these days that your search should prove fruitful.

Thank you for using Google Answers. 

-K~
Search Terms Used:  
Oda Hawaii Genealogy
Hawaiian Genealogy

---

Clarification of Answer by knowledge_seeker-ga on 26 Jun 2002 18:53 PDT

Hi again!

One thing I meant to mention, was that you can do online searches of
Hawaiian Cemeteries. For example here is the "O" directory for the
National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii - it
includes entries for 11 Oda's.

http://www.interment.net/data/us/hi/oahu/natmem/hawaii_odol.htm

-K~

Thanks so much for your help. One more thing, though. You are very
knowledgable abou this. Do you know of any sites that can help me
track the general histrory of the Oda name in Japan?

As you said, it's very common. I would just like to find more about
the historical siginificance of the Oda name.

Thanks so much for your help.

Hello obutt-ga,

It appears that your Ichiro Oda is listed in the Social Security Death
Index:

ICHIRO ODA
  SSN xxx Residence:  96819  Honolulu, Honolulu, HI 
  Born 5 Jul 1904 Last Benefit:     
  Died Feb 1984 Issued:  HI (Before 1951) 

I xxx out the SSN since this is a public forum, but you can find the
record yourself online for free here (just fill in the fields for
first and last name):
http://www.ancestry.com/search/rectype/vital/ssdi/main.htm

To learn more about his parentage and birth location (hopefully it
lists a town in Japan) you can write to the Social Security
Administration for a copy of his SS-5 application. The cost is $27 and
will take a few weeks to reach you. You can learn more about how to do
this here:
http://genealogy.about.com/library/weekly/aa010801a.htm

If you can learn enough information from the SS application, then you
can try writing to Japan to request the koseki (family registry):
http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Garage/4464/koseki1.html

I don't know if you are related (you'll have to trace your individual
tree back for that) but the ODA family was once a very influential
family in Japan:
http://library.thinkquest.org/C001119/history/parse.php3?textonly=1&src=nobunaga&tqskip1=1&tqtime=0627

I hope this helps you in your search,

inquisitive-ga