(http://web.archive.org/web/200607191926 ... any-e.html)Marukai Corporation U.S.A. wrote: Company History （ Los Angeles Division）
1938 Founded Marukai Corporation (Japan)
1965 Established Marukai Hawaii, the predecessor of Marukai Corporation USA. The beginning of US market.
1975 Merged New York Office and established Marukai Los Angeles
1980 Established Marukai Corporation USA
1982 Opened Marukai Wholesale Mart (Membership) in Gardena, Los Angeles County, CA.
K.M. Richards of UHFTelevision.com goes into a bit more detail on Richard Eaton, although that doesn't exactly pin down who was making the decision to subtitle, or how they were connected exactly to Marukai Trading:KHNL-TV History wrote: 1966 - Richard Eaton, President of Friendly Broadcasting Company of Ohio and United Broadcasting Company of Maryland, bought KTRG on January 15 for $605,000. The station moved to 150-B Puuhale Road.
1967 - KTRG changed to KIKU (Chrysanthemum in Japanese) Channel 13. Owner Eaton unveiled the new name, with a marked increase in Japanese broadcasting, on October 5, along with "plans to go color." Japanese programming was scheduled from 5-10PM, with English presentations running from 1-5PM, and 10-11PM.
1979 - The Cushmans of San Diego, in partnership with TV Asahi of Tokyo and ten local investors, formed Mid-Pacific Television Associates and bought KIKU on April 9. Japanese programming was pared-down and moved to late evening; KIKU switched to a "kid vid" format, scoring success with "The Children's Hour" and "Professor Fun."
1984 - Rick Blangiardi, former Sales Manager of KGMB (CBS affiliate), became General Manager in February. Channel call letters changed from KIKU to KHNL. The station began to actively market itself as "The News Alternative" and "The Free Movie Channel." The broadcasts of the WAC Baseball Tournament in May, and subsequent NCAA Regionals in Arizona marked the beginning of KHNL's close relationship with the University of Hawaii Athletic Program.
(http://www.uhftelevision.com/articles/wook.html)K.M. Richards wrote:By the end of 1971, Eaton appeared to have had enough of television, and announced his intent to sell all six of United's TV stations. In that year, WFAN-TV had incurred $135,694 in cumulative operating losses; WMET-TV in the same period lost $72,354; WMUR-TV, $64,504; KECC-TV, $58,949, and KIKU/13 Honolulu HI (which Eaton had acquired in 1966), $89,524. United also claimed unrecovered investments on the WJMY CP of $639,898 and said the total losses from television -- which totalled approximately $4 million, including unamortized investments -- had wiped out the profits from the radio stations by $75,124 in 1970 and $30,614 in 1971. To make matters worse, as 1972 began the FCC designated the Cleveland radio stations' renewal for hearing due to allegations of equal-time and Fairness Doctrine violations, failure to file time-brokerage contracts and exercise adequate control over brokered programming, contest rigging, and misrepresentations regarding the stations' news staff and news and public affairs programming in the renewal application. (The proceedings took until 1982 and the licenses were renewed.)
The initial decision regarding WMUR-TV and KECC-TV was released in 1974, with the licenses renewed on the condition that United sell the stations under the "distress sale policy"; Eaton announced a sale of both at the end of 1977 pending the decision being made final, but it took until 1981 for the remaining legalities to be resolved and the stations sold. In the interim, KIKU was sold at the end of 1979 (it is today's KHNL-TV). KECC-TV's call letters were changed to KECY-TV after the sale.
If anything, its probably still sitting in that shop from the last time I was there (which has been about 2 years Valentines Day). If anything im sure that old-as-hell Gelgoog model kit is in that nasty box with 40 pounds of newspapers on top of it.davemerrill wrote:Oh, I want all those toys.
My pal Devlin who runs Bizarro Wuxtry in Athens GA, he has the Groizer X diecast seen there. I honestly think that was the first time that property impinged itself onto my consciousness, seeing that toy and reading "Groizer X" on the foot stamped in the diecast, and saying "well, I guess I gotta look that up."
Dave Choo wrote:Ninomiya, the godmother to a legion of local fanboys, was the longtime general manager of KIKU. In 1972, she went to Japan to purchase new shows for the station when she heard of a new tokusatsu (literally “special filming,” but refers to a television show or film that features superheroes) that was about to air in prime time, a first in Japan at the time.
[. . .]
“When I first saw the show, I knew immediately that it would be a hit. The story was simple, the characters were strong and there was all that action,” says Ninomiya. “We beat the network shows. That never happened at KIKU before.”
Ninomiya left KIKU in 1980 to start JN Productions, which, in the ’80s and ’90s, produced videos for the tourist industry but now translates manga and anime for distributors on the Mainland.
(http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/artic ... bz05p.html)Catherine E. Toth wrote: Q. You founded JN Productions Inc. in 1981, starting with producing commercials and broadcasting Japanese language programs on cable. Now, JNP is a full-service video production house servicing various global clients with the capability to translate videos in English, Japanese and Chinese. Where has JNP seen its biggest growth?
A. Taking on high-end Japanese (productions) into English translations in the field of manga and anime. This market is growing by leaps and bounds in the U.S. It's the third largest export from Japan now. Locally, with the Japanese tourist market coming back, we have lots of opportunities to produce video and DVD for retailers and organizations who sell to this market.
Q. How are Japanese manga (comic books) and anime (animated shows) different than American-style cartoons?
A. It's a different drawing style. The Japanese work is very intricate, they're very artistic people. The storylines and humor are different, too.
Q. The themes and plots of these stories are heavily tied into Japanese culture and history. Yet, anime and manga found a following in America, especially Hawai'i. What has the industry done in Japan to make itself more marketable to an American audience?
A. Because it's such a large industry in Japan, now the trend is to make the themes a little more universal. They have the audience in mind more.
Q. Is it difficult to find people who know enough about the details of the Japanese culture and language to make accurate translations into English?
A. We always laugh about that. It's hard to find people (who can do this). Most of my translators have been with me for more than 20 years. Now it's more difficult to find good translators. Most of ours are local- or Mainland-born but who have a background in the Japanese language, have lived in Japan and know how to write (in Japanese).
Q. JNP produced training videos for high-end retailers that marketed to Japanese visitors during the '80s and '90s. Are you still producing these videos now that the Japanese are returning to the Islands?
A. Not so much now but (Japanese) tourists are just coming back so I imagine that retailers and those marketing to the Asian tourists eventually will want them again.
Q. Do you think these training videos will become important when Chinese visitors start coming to Hawai'i?
A. I think (this area of our company) is going to grow because China with its economy growing and its population becoming more affluent, I'm sure they'll come here. ... When the Chinese start coming, it's going to be interesting, especially with the training that will need to be done.
Q. How did you get involved in Japanese translations?
A. Because of my background in Japanese television. I used to do all the buying for the Japanese stations, then of course you had to do all the subtitling for that. I was always interested in Japanese language and culture and history. Then I found so many people here that with Japanese backgrounds were interested in the same things I was interested in. It all started to fall into place.
If I remember the discussions on Toybox DX right, those things are fragile as hell nowadays, the plastic as brittle as can be. Of course nobody expected them to even exist 40 years later, so there's that.davemerrill wrote:Oh, I want all those toys.
My pal Devlin who runs Bizarro Wuxtry in Athens GA, he has the Groizer X diecast seen there. I honestly think that was the first time that property impinged itself onto my consciousness, seeing that toy and reading "Groizer X" on the foot stamped in the diecast, and saying "well, I guess I gotta look that up."
