Professor Watson spent much of the summer on two projects: continuing research of the aftermath of slavery in South Africa, and, with his wife Kay, visiting his stepson in Hawaii. For several days he read, took notes on, and photocopied correspondence from missionaries at the Yale Divinity School Library. Then, for a much longer time, he struggled to make sense of the information he had gathered, separating the useful from the trivial.

An article of his based on previous research, "‘Prize Negroes’ and the Development of Racial Attitudes in the Cape Colony," was published this summer in the South African Historical Journal.

The Hawaii trip was both enjoyable and though-provoking. He learned much about volcanoes and how islands are formed, about how eight or so islands were unified into one kingdom, which was then, through fair means and foul, mostly foul, turned into an important outpost of U. S. imperialism, and then a state.

Visiting Pearl harbor, he reports, was quite moving, especially when it was done in concert with hundreds of Japanese-Americans, and nearly as many Japanese tourists.

Native Hawaiians constitute only .5% of the state’s population. About 20% is Hawaiian mixed with other groups. Some 60% of the population is of Asian descent, including Chinese, Filipino, and Japanese, the largest of the Asian groups. Syphilis, smallpox, and other European diseases, combined with harsh working conditions on sugar and pineapple plantations, decimate the native population. This is obviously a fascinating, ethnically diverse, society.