Japan Air Lines sponsored a haiku contest for poets in the United States in 1964. This was the first and by far the largest competition outside Japan; some 41,000 entries were received in 17 contests arranged by local radio stations. Prominent Zen specialist Alan Watts was the contest judge. Watts selected one National Winner and eighty-three semifinalists, whose winning haiku were published by JAL in a booklet, Haiku ’64. The 1964 JAL contest is commonly believed to have been the catalytic event in American haiku.
In the early years interest in haiku was stimulated across the United States by several contests sponsored by Japan Air Lines. In 1964 something over 41,000 haiku were submitted to their National Haiku Contest. Seventeen contests conducted by radio stations in different parts of the United States screened the entries, and five winners from each local contest were submitted for final judging by Alan Watts. The selection of Watts, not himself a haiku poet but rather an expert on Zen, to judge this seminal contest reinforced the notion that haiku is informed by Zen. In his introduction to the conference chapbook Haiku ’64, the JAL contest compendium that contained the 84 semifinal haiku, Watts wrote, “Haiku represents the ultimate refinement of a long tradition in Far Eastern literature which derived its inspiration from Zen Buddhism.” This was a view that was certainly held by the leading haiku specialists of the 1960s and undoubtedly influenced the course of American haiku for years to come.
Japan Air Lines published the 84 national entries in a booklet titled Haiku ’64. James W. Hackett was declared the National Winner and won the grand prize of two round-trip tickets to Japan.
The names of the National Winner and the 83 Runners-up, as well as their winning haiku, were published in a chapbook, Haiku ’64, by the Japan Air Lines Foundation in Tokyo.
In the table below, winners’ names are styled as published in Haiku ’64, except that they have been rearranged alphabetically by last name. Poets whose names are marked with a link are known to have continued to write and publish haiku.
| Judge | Alan Watts |
| Number of entries | More than 41,000 |
| National Winner | J. W. Hackett, San Francisco, California |
| Runners-up (83) | Betty Bardshar, Coronado, California |
| Mrs. Louis A. Bassion, Atlanta, Georgia | |
| Glenn Beaudry, Dallas, Texas | |
| Jean Berggren, Cleveland, Ohio | |
| Judith B. Biehl, Cherry Hill, New Jersey | |
| Thomas H. Birch, Cincinnati, Ohio | |
| Wendy Bleiman, Northridge, California | |
| Richard L. Brown, Dallas, Texas | |
| Mrs. William C. Cook, Denver, Colorado | |
| Mr. Alvaro Cardona-Hine, North Hollywood, California | |
| Andrew N. Cothran, Riverdale, Maryland | |
| Dorothy Downs, Atlanta, Georgia | |
| Marion Doyle, Hooversville, Pennsylvania | |
| Nadine DuHamel, San Diego, California | |
| Grace S. Dunn, Boulder, Colorado | |
| James E. Dyer, Fort Worth, Texas | |
| The Rev. J. E. Festle, Milford, Ohio | |
| Robert G. Frost, Greensburg, Pennsylvania | |
| Evan H. Gentry, Houston, Texas | |
| Dr. Charles B. Gillespie, Decatur, Georgia | |
| Charles Glover, Portland, Oregon | |
| Johanna Gravell, Houston, Texas | |
| Charles Harbaugh, Seattle, Washington | |
| Lorraine Ellis Harr, Portland, Oregon | |
| Cristina Harris, Portola Valley, California | |
| Leonard Helie, New York, New York | |
| Marcia Helland, Denver, Colorado | |
| Adele R. Heller, Silver Spring, Maryland | |
| Karl F. Heumann, Bethesda, Maryland | |
| Joel Holmberg, Boston, Massachusetts | |
| Charles W. Jorgensen, Detroit, Michigan | |
| Sally F. Kanaga, Redlands, California | |
| Karin Kuish, Grosse Pointe Woods, Michigan | |
| Kathy Lang, Seattle, Washington | |
| L. Leonowich, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | |
| Louise Lessin, Brooklyn, New York | |
| James Levey, Cleveland, Ohio | |
| D. A. Levy, Cleveland, Ohio | |
| Robert F. Mainone, Battle Creek, Michigan | |
| Dave Martin, San Francisco, California | |
| Sharron McCuistion, San Francisco, California | |
| Mrs. J. Danford McDonnell, Chagrin Falls, Ohio | |
| Grady L. McMurtry, Washington, D.C. | |
| Jessie S. Melvin, Milton, Massachusetts | |
| Janet Michelena, Akron, Ohio | |
| Jack L. Mitchell, Redlands, California | |
| Edward Morin, Cincinnati, Ohio | |
| Katherine Mormino, Los Angeles, California | |
| Matt Movesesian, Forest Hills, New York | |
| Mrs. S. W. Newman, Portland, Oregon | |
| Mary Ellen Olmsted, Wilmington, Delaware | |
| John T. Parker, Palo Alto, California | |
| David Peterson, Bothell, Washington | |
| Beverly Planinsek, Laughlintown, Pennsylvania | |
| Elizabeth Pollock, New York, New York | |
| Carolla Postlewaite, Littleton, Colorado | |
| Marjory Bates Pratt, Pennington, New Jersey | |
| Lyndall Procter, Levittown, Pennsylvania | |
| John M. Purcell, Cincinnati, Ohio | |
| Thomas D. Redshaw, Marblehead, Massachusetts | |
| Mrs. Ralph V. Righton, Stone Mountain, Georgia | |
| Sylvia Roller, El Cajon, California | |
| Phyllis Roth, Brooklyn, New York | |
| Sara Margaret Sanford, Portland, Oregon | |
| Mrs. T. F. Schneider, Dallas, Texas | |
| Bertha Wilcox Smith, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania | |
| Richard S. Sparer, Hollis, New York | |
| Robert Spiess, Madison, Wisconsin | |
| John Stadler, Ann Arbor, Michigan | |
| James T. Staples, San Diego, California | |
| Judy T. Sternbergs, Cincinnati, Ohio | |
| John Tagliabue, Lewiston, Maine | |
| Don Tarabochia, Seattle, Washington | |
| Dudley Trudgett, Los Angeles, California | |
| B. M. VanBrooks, Dallas, Texas | |
| Connie Vecchione, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | |
| Mrs. Arthur Verharen, Portland, Oregon | |
| David Ward, Ann Arbor, Michigan | |
| Diane A. Wax, Austell, Georgia | |
| Mike Weaver, Arvada, Colorado | |
| Lloyd C. Welling, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania | |
| Mrs. Veris A. Wessel, Seattle, Washington | |
| Hans A. Zutter, Warminster, Pennsylvania |
COMPILED BY: The Haikupedia editors
SOURCES: Haiku ’64. Tokyo: Japan Air Lines Foundation, 1964.
Charles Trumbull. “The American Haiku Movement—Part I: Haiku in English.” Modern Haiku 36:3 (Autumn 2005), 33–73. Available online in The Haiku Foundation Digital Archive at http://www.thehaikufoundation.org/omeka/items/show/1155.
Charles Trumbull. “Shangri-La: James W. Hackett’s Life in Haiku.” Peter McDonald, ed., Juxtapositions: The Journal of Haiku Research and Scholarship 1:1 (2015), 45. Also available on The Haiku Foundation website: https://www.thehaikufoundation.org/juxta/juxta-1-1/.