He supported efforts to distribute Bibles across the globe -- a natural for a devout Christian hotelier -- and for a time served as president of the Taiwanese arm of the Red Cross.
"I feel I am a very lucky person, and this luck was given by God," he said in the oral history. "I rarely fail anything I do. Those things that couldn't be accomplished by others, I finished them successfully."
Though Hsu's three children have not matched his prominence, he put two -- David and Christine -- in charge of the Hilton. David "is more talented in business than I am," Henry said in the oral history.
Hotel employees say the siblings occasionally throw parties at the hotel for friends but otherwise keep to themselves and have few exchanges with workers.
"It's just 'hi' and 'bye,' " says Miguel Vargas, 34, a waiter who has worked at the hotel for 15 years and has seen more of the Hsus than most employees. "They come down to the restaurant for breakfast, lunch and dinner. But we don't talk, and definitely not about what's going on with the union."
After buying the Hilton, the Hsus reduced the staff from 800 to about 400, according to the oral history. (The number appears to have since rebounded to more than 600, according to industry estimates.) Henry Hsu also spent $25 million to remodel the hotel completely.
The Hsus have few dealings with public officials. Councilman Bill Rosendahl met with David Hsu during the recent turmoil, but Rosendahl says the meeting was "off the record." By contrast, the Zen family, known best for its stewardship of the Westin Bonaventure, has been an active player in city politics.
"In the Chinese American community, they're not really visible at all," said former City Councilman Mike Woo, whose father has been a friend of Henry Hsu. "They didn't come up through the community. They came in as overseas buyers."
Despite their isolation -- perhaps because of it -- the Hsus have proved to be a difficult foe for the union.
In Los Angeles and other cities, Unite Here has used an organizing formula that relies heavily on public pressure, criticizing hotel owners until they agree to let the union organize workers without interference or federally supervised elections. But the Hsus have been unmoved by the campaign or public criticism.
"They need to know the union is going to back those workers as long as it takes," says Bruce Raynor, general president of Unite Here.
