As of the 2000 Census, over half of the 37,279 people of Japanese ancestry in the U.S. state of New York lived in New York City.Robinson, Greg. "Japanese." In: Eisenstadt, Peter R. and Laura-Eve Moss (editors). The Encyclopedia of New York State. Syracuse University Press, 2005. , 9780815608080. p. 808. As of 2012, the New York City metropolitan area was home to the largest Japanese community on the East Coast of the United States.Kano, Naomi. "Japanese Community Schools: New Pedagogy for a Changing Population" (Chapter 6). In: García, Ofelia, Zeena Zakharia, and Bahar Otcu (editors). Bilingual Community Education and Multilingualism: Beyond Heritage Languages in a Global City (Volume 89 of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism). Multilingual Matters, 2012. , 9781847698001. START: p. 99. CITED: p. 105. The community has grown to the point that the first annual Japan Day Parade, the largest outside Japan, took place in Manhattan in 2022.
History
In 1876, six Japanese businessmen arrived in New York City on the Oceanic and established companies. They were the first Japanese people in the state of New York. Almost all of the 1,000 issei in New York State by 1900 were in New York City. The Chinese Exclusion Acts of 1882 restricted Japanese immigration to the United States and the United States and Japanese governments had a gentlemen's agreement where the Japanese would deny visas to laborers wishing to immigrate to the United States in exchange for the U.S. not officially ending Japanese immigration. For those reasons, before the 1950s New York City had few Japanese immigrants. Japanese individuals of higher socioeconomic backgrounds did enter New York City during that period.Smith, Andrew F. New York City: A Food Biography. Rowman & Littlefield, November 26, 2013. , 9781442227132. p. 65. Until the 1960s there was never a greater number than 5,000 Japanese people in New York State.
The National Origins Act of 1924 officially barred Japanese immigration into the United States. By the 1920s, Issei with high socioeconomic status had moved to Long Island and to New Rochelle and Scarsdale in Westchester County.
After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 the Japanese consulate in New York City closed. Several Japanese businesses closed as well. The overall New York State Japanese population was not mass-interned. Issei community leaders were interned at Ellis Island. After the internment of Japanese Americans ended, New York's Japanese community accepted the arrivals who had formerly been interned.
Japanese officials connected with the United Nations arrived in the 1950s and businesspeople associated with Japanese companies began arriving in the late 1950s. Japanese immigrants became the main presence of Japanese communities after the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. By 1988 there were 50,000 Japanese businesspersons working in Greater New York City, with 77% of them being temporary employees with plans to return to Japan.Kunieda, p. 132. At that time employees of Japanese companies and their families were over 80% of the Japanese residents of the New York City area.Kunieda, p. 133. About 25% of Japanese residents in the New York City metropolitan area had considered and/or decided to stay in the United States permanently.Kunieda, p. 132-133. The first annual Japan Day Parade, the largest outside Japan, took place in Manhattan in 2022.
Commerce
The oldest Japanese grocery in the United States, is Katagiri Grocery on East 59th Street. Established in 1907, it was founded by two immigrant brothers from Japan. The two stores have been providing Japanese groceries to New Yorkers in Manhattan as early as 1907 until today. At that time, they also served premium imported coffee and tea to New Yorkers as they didn't have many Japanese customers. They expanded their operations, and the service scope to include tableware, books, and clothes in addition to fresh Asian vegetables, Japanese sushi, bento, and other Japanese groceries.
In March 2011, Sam Dolnick and Kirk Semple of The New York Times wrote that the "prominent outpost of Japanese culture" in New York City was a group of sake bars and sushi restaurants in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan.Dolnick, Sam and Kirk Semple. "For New York's Japanese, a Desire to Meld Into the Mainstream." The New York Times. March 15, 2011. Print version: March 16, 2011, A23 New York Edition. Retrieved on January 17, 2014. In December 2014, Pete Wells of The Times heralded the new clusters of Japanese restaurants in the East Village and on the east side of Midtown Manhattan for their variety of dishes and the excellence of their food; this latter neighborhood in Midtown East also houses the Japan Society and the Consulate-General of Japan in New York City, as well as Japanese cafes, markets, and corporate offices, although it is not formally recognized as a Japantown.
As of 2002, there were 2,528 Japanese citizens employed by 273 companies in the states of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut.Zhao, Yilu. "IN BUSINESS; Japanese Presence Shrinks." The New York Times. December 8, 2002. Retrieved on January 17, 2014.
The Japanese Chamber of Commerce and Industry of New York stated that in 1992 357 companies had operations in Greater New York City and these companies employed 6,048 Japanese nationals living in Greater New York City. The Japanese consulate in New York City stated that in 1992 there were about 16,000 Japanese people living in Westchester County, New York, and about 25-33% of the expatriates employed by the Japanese companies in the New York City area lived in Westchester County. Up to a few years before 2002, Japanese companies gave benefits to their staffs, and the annual supporting costs of a mid-level employee were about $50,000. The companies provided cars with full-time chauffeurs for senior staff and paid for golf club membership, magazine subscriptions, tuition for schools, and housing expenses for all employees.
By 2002 the Japanese presence in Westchester County decreased since many Japanese companies reduced or eliminated overseas departments due to the recession in Japan. Japanese companies also eliminated many benefits for their overseas staff. The population of Japanese citizens employed by the companies decreased 58% from 1992 to 2002.
Geographic distribution As of 2007, there were 51,705 Japanese persons living in the New York metropolitan area. Westchester County, New York and Bergen County, New Jersey were popular settlement areas.
As of 1988, ethnic Japanese often settled in certain suburban residential communities before ethnic Koreans began settling in the same areas. During that decade, Queens was the most common location for Japanese permanent residents, while wealthier temporary resident Japanese businesspeople tended to live in Westchester County. In general, ethnic Japanese residents were dispersed across various communities throughout the New York City metropolitan area.
Queens and Manhattan As of 2011, within New York City the largest groups of Japanese residents were in Astoria, Queens, and Yorkville on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. According to the 2010 U.S. census, about 1,300 Japanese residents lived in Astoria and about 1,100 in Yorkville. Approximately 500 Japanese people lived in the East Village. As of that year, many short-term Japanese business executives in the Greater New York City area resided in Midtown Manhattan or in nearby suburbs.
In 2011, The New York Times wrote that, unlike some other ethnic groups in the New York City region, Japanese residents were relatively dispersed and lacked a single focal neighborhood comparable to Chinatown for the Chinese population. The relatively smaller size of the Japanese population contributed to this pattern; the newspaper estimated that there were about 20,000 Japanese residents in New York City compared with about 305,000 Chinese residents.
Clusters of Japanese restaurants and businesses have developed in the East Village and in Midtown East. Since around 2010, numerous Japanese restaurants have also opened in Manhattan's Koreatown, centered on West 32nd Street between Fifth Avenue and Sixth Avenue. Japanese cuisine has achieved notable recognition in New York City; in 2014, thirteen Japanese restaurants in Manhattan received Michelin stars.
Bergen County, New Jersey As of 2011, the Japanese population in Bergen County, New Jersey, had rebounded to approximately 6,000 individuals. Dolnick and Semple of The New York Times wrote that Japanese supermarkets such as the Mitsuwa Marketplace in Edgewater, New Jersey, the largest Japanese-oriented shopping center on the U.S. East Coast, function as informal centers of Japanese cultural and commercial activity in the region. The Japanese-American Society of New Jersey is headquartered in Fort Lee.
In 1987 there were 1,800 Japanese national children in the North Jersey region.
Westchester County, New York As of 2000, Japanese expatriates in Westchester County, New York lived mainly in Scarsdale. According to The New York Times, the area was well known in Japan for its housing and school systems, which attracted expatriate families.Foderaro, Lisa W. "For Expatriate Families, A Home Away From Home; Foreign Enclaves Dot the Landscape as County Attracts Temporary Residents." The New York Times. May 7, 2000.
Some Japanese residents also lived in nearby communities including Eastchester, Harrison, Hartsdale, and Rye.
The economic slowdown in Japan during the 1990s led to a decline in the Japanese population in Westchester County, and by 2002 some Japanese businesses and community activities had closed. However, according to the 2009–2013 American Community Survey, the number of Japanese residents had increased again to approximately 5,000 in Westchester County.
Demographics As of 2011, there were about 20,000 Japanese in New York City and a total of 45,000 in the Greater New York City area. Many of the Japanese are from transient groups such as university students, artists, and business workers. Many expatriate business executives and workers are posted to the United States for three to five year terms. As of 2011 65% of the Japanese in New York City have bachelor's degrees and the median income for Japanese over the age of 25 is $60,000. This is $10,000 above the citywide median income.
Institutions
In 2011, Sam Dolnick and Kirk Semple of The New York Times wrote that few Japanese organizations in New York City have "broad-based constituencies" and those that exist tend to promote Japanese arts and assist elderly populations. They added that among the Japanese community there are "few" civic or religious leaders with prominence.
In 1901, the Japanese Methodist Church opened in New York City. In 1905, the social organization Nippon Club opened. In 1907 the Japan Society, an artistic foundation, opened. The Japan Society was an interracial organization. In 1930, the leaders of the Japanese Association sponsored the Tozei Club, an all-nisei organization. The Nippon Club was seized after the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor and the property sold.
The Japanese American Association of New York (JAA, ) is in operation. The is located on the 18th Floor of 299 Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan."Location/Hours/Contact." Consulate-General of Japan in New York City. Retrieved on January 18, 2014. The Japanese American Committee for Democracy was active during WWII.After Camp: Portraits in Midcentury Japanese American Life and Politics By Greg Robinson Page 185-189.
The Noguchi Museum is located in Long Island City, Queens.
Media The , published by the New York Seikatsu Press, is a weekly Japanese-language newspaper in the New York City area. It was founded in January 2004. The paper is headquartered in Midtown Manhattan."About Shukan NY Seikatsu." () About Shukan NY Seikatsu. Retrieved on January 18, 2014.