HONOLULU – Peter A. Aduja, the first Filipino-American to hold a major elective office in the United States, died recently while vacationing in Las Vegas. He was 87. Aduja was elected in 1954 to the Territorial House of Representatives as a Republican from Hilo.

He served one two-year term and went to work for the  Department of Attorney General before returning to politics as a state representative from 1966-74. Aduja was also elected as a delegate to the 1968 Constitutional Convention. He was a native of Salindig, Vigon in Ilocos Sur. He came to Hawaii at age 8 in 1928 and grew up in the Big Island in Hakalau, where his father worked in a sugar plantation for a $1 daily wage. He was a resident of Kane’ohe, Hawai’i prior to his death.