Honolulu Harbor | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

December 9, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Italian POWs

On July 7, 1937, Japan invaded China to initiate the war in the Pacific; while the German invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, unleashed the European war.

World War II (WWII or WW2), also known as the Second World War, was a global war that was underway by 1939 and ended in 1945.

Italy entered World War II on the Axis side on June 10, 1940, as the defeat of France became apparent. On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor and the US entered the conflict.

World War II was fought between two sets of partners: the Allies and the Axis. The three principal partners in the Allies alliance were the British Commonwealth, the Soviet Union and the United States; the three principal partners in the Axis alliance were Germany, Italy and Japan.

During World War II, American forces captured 50,000 Italian soldiers and sailors. 5,000 Italian prisoners of war were sent to Hawaiʻi and held at Schofield, Kāneʻohe, Kalihi Valley and Sand Island.

Japanese Americans were also incarcerated in at least eight locations on Hawaiʻi. On December 8, 1941, the first detention camp was set up on Sand Island.

The Sand Island Detention Center held war captives as well as civilians of Japanese, German or Italian ancestry who were under investigation.

This Italian prisoner contingent was highly skilled in construction and engineering, and as a voluntary effort they were used extensively on many construction projects around the island where skilled labor was, at that time, in short supply, particularly around Honolulu Harbor, Sand Island, etc. (Ponza – Army-mil)

“For the most part, the US Army welcomed their labor and skills in construction of needed military facilities.” (Moreo)

“At the end of each day, the Italians would salvage whatever waste materials were about as well as scouring and scooping up cement from spillage.” (Moreo)

With this salvaged material the Italian POWs built buildings and works of art (fountains and statues) at various locations on Oʻahu (these pieces are at Schofield Barracks, Fort Shafter, Sand Island and the Immigration Building.)

The Mother Cabrini Chapel, designed by POW Astori Rebate, “was huge, with an alter, and two large paintings of Mother Cabrini all done by the POWs. The chapel had a full basement for vestments and religious articles. Out in front of the chapel, the area was paved and filled by ‘well constructed benches acting as pews for a thousand or more worshippers.’” (Moreo)

The Italian POWs “decided to dedicate to the memory of Mother Cabrini, who was at that time being considered for sainthood for her earlier good works in the United States, and who was subsequently canonized as the first American saint by the Vatican around the year 1946.” (Ponza -army-mil)

Upon the chapel’s completion, Sunday mass was celebrated every week with the prisoners exiting the prison compound in order to attend the services, seating themselves in the open air pews. As word spread to the adjoining areas, Pearl City, Honolulu, Nanakuli, and even as far as Waikiki, a small group of Catholic worshipers started to drive up to the chapel on Sunday mornings to attend the services.” (Ponza – army-mil) In the way of Kamehameha Highway construction, it was torn down in 1948.

At Sand Island, “(a)t sunset, hundreds of Italians formed a male chorale and sang for an hour. It became widely known and so popular that visitors came in the evening to listen and applaud.” (Moreo)

At Fort Shafter, a fountain crowned with pineapples was designed and crafted by POW Alfredo Giusti, with winged lions and topped with pineapples. (Reportedly, Giusti inscribed his name and address on the north side of the fountain.)

Dedicated to give hope to those without hope, Giusti also crafted two statues, “The Hula Dancer” and “The Bathing Beauty,”) which now sit outside the Coast Guard administration building on Sand Island.

A hard-to-see fountain crafted by the Italians is within the secured Immigration Center on Ala Moana Boulevard (you can see it through a chain link fence on the makai/Fort Armstrong side of the facility.)

The war ended in December 1945 and the Italian POWs were repatriated in 1946, having left some lasting legacies of the war and their time in Hawaiʻi. (Unfortunately, due to increased security concerns, access is restricted at the facilities where their work is located.)

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photo taken: 18JAN2006

Sand_Island_Coast_Guard_Building-Bathing_Beauty-(Burton)

154044_1.tif. VESPUCCI SAILOR>>August 30, 2002/BRUCE APS/BRUCE ASATO PHOTOMarinaio Sergio Cadalano of the Italian Tall Ship Amerigo Vespucci touches a part of the Hula Dancer sculpture that was created by Italian Prisoner of War Alfredo Giusti in 1944 while interned at Sand Island. Cadalano is aboard the Amerigo Vespucci which sailed into Honolulu Harbor last week and will head to Tahiti and New Zealand after departing Honolulu.

Sand_Island_Coast_Guard_Building-Hula_Dancer-Bathing_Beauty-(Burton)

Fountain and landscaping, Honolulu INS building (U.S. Immigration Station)-(Burton)

Fountain INS building (U.S. Immigration Station)-(Burton)

Detail of 1942 Chamber of Commerce tourist map showing Sand-(Burton)

July 24, 2019 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Coral Construction

Hawaiian architecture evolved over time, starting with Hawaiians use of natural resources, to influences from all of the various visitors to Hawaiʻi.

Soon after missionary arrival, builders began to incorporate coral blocks from Hawaiʻi’s reefs, with the coral serving as a substitute for bricks the American and Europeans used in their homeland.

Here are a few examples of existing or remnants remaining today of the early use of coral blocks in building construction.

Chamberlain House

Nearby at what is now the Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives, the Chamberlain House (Ka Hale Kamalani) was built in 1831 from materials procured locally: coral blocks cut from reefs offshore and lumber salvaged from ships.

Designed by the mission’s quartermaster, Levi Chamberlain, to hold supplies as well as people, it had two stories, an attic, and a cellar. The windows are larger, more numerous, and shuttered against the sun. The building now serves as the main exhibition hall for the Museum.

Lāhainā Fort Ruins

The reconstructed remains of one old Lāhainā Fort wall still stand at this old lockup. This fort overlooked one of the canals of Lāhainā, now a paved street, and was built to protect the town after unruly sailors who fired a canon at Rev. Richard’s house.

The fort was built in 1831-1832 in which to incarcerate rowdy sailors and others who disobeyed the law. The fort was used mostly as a prison. It was torn down in the 1850s to supply stones for the construction of Hale Paʻahao – the prison on Prison Street.

Kawaiahaʻo Church

Down the street, Congregational missionaries had earlier begun (1836) the construction of Kawaiahaʻo Church. The “Stone Church,” as it came to be known, is in fact not built of stone, but of giant slabs of coral hewn from ocean reefs.

These slabs had to be quarried from under water; each weighed more than 1,000 pounds. Natives dove 10 to 20 feet to hand-chisel these pieces from the reef, then raised them to the surface, loaded some 14,000 of the slabs into canoes and ferried them to shore.

Following five years of construction, The Stone Church was ready for dedication ceremonies on July 21, 1842. King Kamehameha III, who contributed generously to the fund to build the church, attended the service.

Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace

Catholic missionaries broke ground for the new church to be built on July 9, 1840. It coincided with the Feast of Our Lady of Peace, patroness of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary religious institute of which the missionaries were members

The cornerstone was officially laid in a ceremony on August 6 of that year. Construction continued after groundbreaking with devoted Native Hawaiian volunteers harvesting blocks of coral from the shores of Ala Moana, Kakaʻako and Waikīkī. On August 14, 1843, the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace was consecrated and dedicated.

Print House

Also at Mission Houses, in 1841, a covered porch and balcony were added to the frame house, and an extra bedroom was built next door out of coral blocks. Both additions show further adaptation to an indoor-outdoor lifestyle appropriate to the climate.

The extra coral building later became the mission’s Print House (Ka Hale Paʻi) and now serves as a museum exhibit to show how the missionaries and native Hawaiians worked together to produce the first materials printed in the Hawaiian language.

ʻIolani Palace Barracks

Originally completed in 1871, and looking like a medieval castle, 4000-coral blocks were stacked with parapets and towers to make Halekoa, the ʻIolani Barracks (with its open courtyard surrounded by rooms once used by the guards as a mess hall, kitchen, dispensary, berth room, and lockup.)

The Barracks was originally located on what are now the grounds of the Hawaiʻi State Capitol, mauka of the Palace. After being dismantled block by block, ʻIolani Barracks was moved and reconstructed at its present location in 1965.

Fort Kekuanohu (Fort at Honolulu)

Back in Honolulu, in 1815, Kamehameha I granted Russian representatives permission to build a storehouse near Honolulu Harbor. Instead, they began building a fort and raised the Russian flag. When Kamehameha discovered this, the Russians were removed.

The fort had 340-by-300-foot long, 12-foot high and 20-foot thick walls made of coral. Its original purpose was to protect Honolulu by keeping enemy or otherwise undesirable ships out. But, it was also used to keep things in (it also served as a prison.)

The fort’s massive 12-foot walls were torn apart and the fort dismantled in 1857 and used to fill the harbor to accommodate an expanding downtown.

Honolulu Harbor – Esplanade – Harbor Expansion

As Honolulu developed and grew, lots of changes happened, including along its waterfront. What is now known as Queen Street was actually the water’s edge.

Then, from 1856 to 1860, the work of filling in the land to create an area known as the “Esplanade” or “Ainahou,” and building up a water-front and dredging the harbor to a depth from 20 to 25-feet took place.

Following the demolition of Fort Kekuanohu (Fort Honolulu) in 1857; its walls became the 2,000-foot retaining wall used to extend the land out onto the shallow reef in the harbor.

The remaining fort materials were used as fill to create what came to be known as the Esplanade (it’s where Aloha Tower and surrounding land now stand – evidence of the coral blocks from the old Fort can still be seen at Pier 12, ʻEwa of the Aloha Tower cruise ship pier.)

Hawaiʻi law (§171-58.5 HRS) now prohibits the mining or taking of sand, dead coral or coral rubble, rocks, soil or other marine deposits seaward from the shoreline, except for non-commercial uses in volumes that do not exceed 1-gallon per person per day, or to allow replenishment or protection of public shoreline area and government maintenance of stream mouths and shoreline.

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Kawaiahao_Church-1900

Kawaiahao_Church

Lahaina-Old-Fort

Iolani_Barracks

Fort of Honolulu-John_Colburn-visited Honolulu twice during the voyage-July 8-23, 1837 and May 31-June 10, 1839

Coral_Tomb_of_Keopuolani-Wainee-Waiola_Church-Lahaina_Maui-(EngravedAtLahainaluna)

Chamberlain_House-WC

Chamberlain House-(LOC)-1902

Our Lady of Peace Cathedral, Honolulu, 1843

June 15, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Smallpox Epidemic – 1853

Smallpox was introduced to Hawai‘i by an American merchant ship, the Charles Mallory, sailing from San Francisco and arriving at Honolulu Harbor on February 10, 1853.

Displaying a yellow flag indicating a serious infection on board, the ship berthed in isolation on a reef off Kalihi.

One of the passengers had smallpox.

When the period of quarantine ended in late-March, no new cases had been reported, the smallpox patient was recovering and the ship set sail and left.

In May 1853, the disease reappeared.

Two native women were stricken; their homes and the adjacent properties were cordoned off and their infected clothing and grass huts were burned.

This time smallpox spread rapidly; cases were reported from most of Honolulu’s districts.

In response to the growing impacts, June 15, 1853 was declared a national day of mourning, prayer and fasting.

The epidemic was at its worst in July – August with the island of O‘ahu recording more than 4,000-cases and 1,500-deaths.

Despite efforts to contain it, smallpox spread to Kaua‘i, Maui and Hawai‘i, killing at least 450-people.

The people on Ni‘ihau, Moloka‘i and Lāna’i remained protected because of their remoteness, stricter quarantine and better vaccine quality.

Missionary Dr. Dwight Baldwin was the government physician for Maui, Moloka‘i and Lāna’i during the smallpox epidemic. Due to his vigilance, the number of smallpox deaths on these islands was only 200 deaths.

Statewide, during an eight-month period, about 8% of Hawai‘i’s population died of the disease.

When the epidemic ended late in January 1854, the estimated number of statewide cases was 6,400 – 9,100 and an estimated 2,500 – 5,750 deaths.

The intensity of the epidemic led the Hawaiian legislature to make vaccination mandatory for both residents and visitors in 1854.

Smallpox is a serious and contagious disease due to a virus, causing illness and death wherever it occurred. It mainly affected children and young adults. Family members often infected each other.

Smallpox localizes in small blood vessels of the skin and in the mouth and throat. In the skin, this results in a characteristic rash, and later, raised fluid-filled blisters.

After a twelve-day incubation period, patients developed severe headaches and backaches, a high fever, and chills, followed by a severe rash, a return of the fever, and bacterial infection. Death came by infection of the lungs, heart, or brain. The entire course from infection to death usually took five or six weeks.

Smallpox spreads easily from one person to another from saliva droplets. It may also be spread from bed sheets and clothing. It is most contagious during the first week of the infection. It may continue to be contagious until the scabs from the rash fall off.

It is reported that the Honuakaha Smallpox Cemetery (near South Street and Quinn Lane in Kakaʻako) has more than 1,000 burials from the 1853-1854 smallpox epidemic.

This is near the present Honolulu Fire Department Headquarters stands, adjoining the former Kakaʻako Fire Station. (Some suggest, because of this, the Kakaʻako firehouse is haunted.)

Because of the smallpox epidemics a Small-Pox Hospital opened. Likewise, over the years a small island in the reef across from Downtown Honolulu was used as a quarantine site.

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‘View_of_Smallpox_Hospital’,_oil_on_canvas_painting_by_Paul_Emmert,_c._1853-59

Honolulu_Harbor-Reef_Titles-Reg1471 (1885)-Note_’Quarantine_Island’-(present_day_Sand_Island)

Smallpox

Kakaako Fire Station, Hook & Ladder Building, 620 South Street, Honolulu-LOC-218878pv

Kakaako Fire Station, Hook & Ladder Building, 620 South Street, Honolulu

Hawaii_Small_Pox-tally

Hawaiian officials documented statistics of the smallpox epidemic, O‘ahu, 1854

April 29, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Esplanade

Coral doesn’t grow in freshwater. So, where a stream enters a coastal area, there is typically no coral growth at that point – and, as the freshwater runs out into the ocean, a coral-less channel is created.

In its natural state, thanks to Nuʻuanu Stream, Honolulu Harbor originally was a deep embayment formed by the outflow of Nuʻuanu Stream creating an opening in the shallow coral reef along the south shore of Oʻahu.

Honolulu Harbor (it was earlier known as Kuloloia) was entered by the first foreigner, Captain William Brown of the English ship Butterworth, in 1794.

They called the harbor “Fair Haven” which may be a rough translation of the Hawaiian name Honolulu (it was also sometimes called Brown’s Harbor.) The name Honolulu (meaning “sheltered bay” – with numerous variations in spelling) soon came into use.

Tradewinds blow from the Northeast; the channel into Honolulu Harbor has a northeasterly alignment. Early ships calling to Honolulu were powered only by sails. The entrance to the harbor was narrow and lined on either side with reefs. Ships don’t sail into the wind. Given all of this, Honolulu Harbor was difficult to enter.

Boats either anchored off-shore, or they were pulled into the harbor (this was done with canoes; or, it meant men and/or oxen pulled them in.)

It might take eight double canoes with 16-20 men each, working in the pre-dawn calm when winds and currents were slow. In 1816 (as stories suggest,) Richards Street alignment was the straight path used by groups of men, and later oxen, to pull ships through the narrow channel into the harbor. (Richards Street was named for a man selling luggage to tourists in his shop on that street.)

As Honolulu developed and grew, lots of changes happened, including along its waterfront. What is now known as Queen Street was actually the water’s edge.

The reef belonging to the land of Waikahalulu, on the south side of Honolulu Harbor, had been purchased by the government from the Queen Dowager Kalama.

About 22-acres of reef land were added to the downtown area between Fort Street and Alakea Street; it was filled in with material dredged from the harbor.

Following the demolition of Fort Kekuanohu (Fort Honolulu) in 1857; its walls became the 2,000-foot retaining wall used to extend the land out onto the shallow reef in the harbor.

The remaining fort materials were used as fill to create what came to be known as the Esplanade (it’s where Aloha Tower and surrounding land now stand.)

The old prison was built in 1856-57, to take the place of the old fort (that also previously served as a prison.) The new custom-house was completed in 1860. The water-works were much enlarged, and a system of pipes laid down in 1861.

An 1887 Hawaiian Government Survey map of Honolulu shows continued urban expansion of the Downtown Honolulu area.

Many dredging and filling operations soon followed, and the 1890s and 1900s saw the construction of many new piers and channels in the harbor, the dredged material going to create new dry land areas.

The dredging of Honolulu Harbor and expansion of the Esplanade soon followed; major alteration of Honolulu from its natural configuration began in 1890 with the dredging of the main channel to 200 ft width by 30 ft deep for about 1000 ft through the sand bar at the entrance.

Piers were constructed at the base of Richards Street in 1896, at the site of Piers 17 and 18 in 1901 to accommodate sugar loading and at Piers 7 and 12 in 1907. Further dredging was conducted at the base of Alakea Street in 1906.

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Honolulu_Harbor-Esplanade_Lots-Reg0279 (1857)

Honolulu_Map-(1847)-over_GoogleEarth

Honolulu_Harbor-InteriorDept-Wall-Reg_1119 (1886)

Honolulu Harbor-Ships pulled by canoes-Henry Walker-1843

‘Honolulu_Beach’-would_later_become_the_area_from_Pier_5_to_Fort_Armstrong-Burgess-(SagaOfTheSandwichIslands)-mid-1850s

Auguste_Borget_-_’Honolulu_Waterfront’,_graphite_on_paper,_1838

Western_ships_docked_in_Honolulu’s_deep_harbor-early-1800s

Boats_in_Honolulu_Harbor-1900

Honolulu_Harbor-Aerial-June 11, 1924

Downtown_Honolulu–Map-1893

April 7, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Aloha Tower

Honolulu Harbor (it was earlier known as Kuloloia) was entered by the first foreigner, Captain William Brown of the English ship Butterworth, in 1794.

Boats either anchored off-shore, or they were pulled into the harbor (this was done with canoes; or, it meant men and/or oxen pulled them in.) It might take eight double canoes with 16-20 men each, working in the pre-dawn calm when winds and currents were slow.

A few years after, in 1825, the first pier in the harbor was improvised by sinking a ship’s hull near the present Pier 12 site. As Honolulu developed and grew, lots of changes happened, including along its waterfront. What is now known as Queen Street used to be the water’s edge.

Between 1857 and 1870, the coral block walls of the dismantled Fort edged and filled about 22-acres of reef and tideland, forming the “Esplanade” or “Ainahou,” between Fort and Merchant Streets.

In 1904, the area around South Street from King to Queen Streets was filled in. The Hawaiʻi Department of Public Works reported that “considerable filling (was) required” for the extension of Queen Street, from South Street to Ward Avenue, which would “greatly relieve the district of Kewalo in the wet season.”

With the opening of the Panama Canal in 1914 and anticipated increased trans-Pacific shipping, government and business planned to further enlarge Honolulu Harbor by dredging Kalihi Channel and Kapālama Basin.

Even in today’s high-tech environment with tools and toys with satellite support, the simple illumination from a known point continues to serve as a navigational aid, as well as warn mariners of hazardous areas.

Carl W Winstedt and the National Construction Company began construction on the Aloha Tower in 1924. The project took a year and a half to complete.

Aloha Tower opened in 1926; at 10 stories and 184-feet, 2-inches tall it was the tallest building in the Territory (and remained such for the next forty years.) (LRB)

It has 4 clocks, each face 12 feet in diameter (by far the biggest clock in the Territory of Hawai‘i and one of the largest in the United States at the time) and facing different directions, were made of bronze and weighed 7 tons each.

“Large public clocks first appeared in the 1840s and 1850s. In 1842, James Hunnewell presented Kawaiahaʻo Church with the large church clock on the gallery wall below the new organ.”

The public clock served the functional purpose of telling passers-by the time. But it also served as a village landmark, a reference point, and a symbol of civic pride. Indeed, public clocks were something of a status symbol for a community, a sign that a town had reached a certain level of prosperity, that there was action there.

If a ship or person was too far away to read the clock, two other means of time synchronization were provided. A time ball was lowered to the bottom of the forty-foot mast atop the tower each day at noon, and the blast of a siren was sounded at 7 am, noon and 4 pm.

Aloha Tower was built as a control tower for the Honolulu harbormaster and a lighthouse as part of a modern freight and passenger terminal at piers 8, 9 and 10.

In addition, it provided offices for the harbor master, pilots and customs officials. The eleventh floor of the tower served as a lookout for the harbor pilots, with balconies on all four sides.

In the day (pre-1959 trans-Pacific jetliner service,) the method of travel to Hawai‘i was by ship. Aloha Tower welcomed cruise passengers/visitors to the islands.

When the attack on Pearl Harbor came on December 7, 1941, Coast Guardsmen took up defensive positions around Aloha Tower and protected it from being occupied.

The Aloha Tower received little damage during the bombing of Pearl Harbor, but shortly thereafter, it was camouflaged with brown and green paint, and its light was extinguished for the remainder of the war.

Pre- and during WW II, the tower had been secretly a control facility for military convoy shipping for the Pacific Theater of Operations.

The military took control of the facility and painted it camouflage to minimize detection. (In 1947, the green camouflage paint was sandblasted from the tower and the brilliant white paint replaced.)

By the late 1960s, tall buildings were crowding the tower, and the Coast Guard decided to discontinue the beacon atop the Aloha Tower and install one on a 220-foot television tower.

This navigational aid served until 1975, when the present Honolulu Harbor Light was established on a metal pole at the end of Pier 2.

Owned by the State of Hawai’i, the Aloha Tower was renovated in 1994, at no cost to taxpayers, by the developer of the adjacent Aloha Tower Marketplace.

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Aloha_Tower-Honolulu_Harbor-Postcard-aerial-1935

19990624 CTY Construction of the Aloha Tower between 1924 and Sept. 1926 when the Aloha Tower was dedicated. COPY PHOTO BY DENNIS ODA FROM THE STATE ARCHIVES ON JUNE 23, 1999.