James Kimo Mitchell

• Missing Since 03/07/1977
• Missing From Kahoolawe, Hawaii
• Classification Lost/Injured Missing
• Sex Male
• Race Pacific Islander
• Date of Birth 02/15/1952 (72)
• Age 25 years old
• Height and Weight Unknown
• Associated Vehicle(s) Surfboard
• Distinguishing Characteristics Pacific Islander male. Black hair, brown eyes. Mitchell goes by his middle name, Kimo.

Details of Disappearance

Mitchell was raised in Keanae, Molokai, Hawaii. He was a good swimmer and a star on the football team at Baldwin High School. After graduation from high school, he attended Coalinga Junior College and Fresno State College in California, but decided not to try out for the National Football League.

Instead he returned to Hawaii to rejoin his family, which included his father, four older siblings and their children. He took a job with the National Park Service, working in the Kipahulu District of Haleakala National Park. He hunted, farmed and fished in his spare time, and was on the senior men's crew at the Hana Canoe Club.

The island of Kahoolawe (occasionally spelled "Kaho'olawe") had been used as a United States Navy bombing target since 1941. The area was also overrun by a large goat population, which destroyed most of its vegetation. Many activists were becoming more involved with Kahoolawe's problems, especially after the end of the Vietnam War.

Numerous native Hawaiian activists began embarking on secretive runs to Kahoolawe in the mid-1970s. The United States military did not allow civilians on to the island at the time. Mitchell and his friend and distant cousin, George Helm, departed from Maui on their surfboards on March 7, 1977 in an attempt to paddle to Kahoolawe. The men never arrived there and have never been heard from again.

The military conducted an extensive search of the area of the Pacific Ocean where Helm and Mitchell disappeared, but no trace of the men was located. It is generally believed that they perished in some sort of accident at sea, but many Hawaiian activists believed that foul play was involved in their disappearance. Evidence supporting that theory has never been uncovered.

Unconfirmed sightings of Helm continued into the 1980s. He and Mitchell became martyrs symbolizing the Hawaiian movement. Kahoolawe was returned to the state of Hawaii in 1994. Helm's recordings were re-released in 1996, 19 years after his presumed death. His music received critical praise and gained renewed attention afterwards.

Helm and Mitchell's cases remain unsolved, but their disappearances are no longer actively investigated.