Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Tea Party

“On Tuesday of last week (December 11, 1827,) Mrs Bingham & Mrs Richards, undertook to make a ‘tea party’ to bring all the chiefs in the place & the members of the mission family together to join in a friendly & social cup of tea, to shew Christian kindness & civility to our Sandwich Island neighbors and to promote kind feelings among the chiefs themselves now assembled from the different Islands.” Those in attendance included, Ka‘ahumanu, Kalākua, Pi‘ia, Kauikeaouli (Kamehameha III,) Nahienaena, Kuakini, Naihe, Kapi‘olani, Hoapili, Kaikioewa, Keaweamahi, Kapule, Kaiu, Kekāuluohi, Kīna’u, Kekauōnohi, La‘anui, Keli‘iahonui, Kana‘ina, Leleiōhoku and Kamanele.

“But look, for a few moments, at the present group: twenty-one chiefs of the Sandwich islands mingling in friendly, courteous and Christian conversation with seven of the mission family, whom you have employed among them. Contemplate their former and their present habits, their former and their present hopes. They have laid aside their vices and excesses, and their love of noise and war.”

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Sybil’s Rocking Chair

There were seven American couples sent by the ABCFM to convert the Hawaiians to Christianity in this first company. Among them were Hiram and Sybil Bingham (he was the leader of the mission.) Bingham, like most Yankees at that time, was handy with tools and with a piece of driftwood from the northwest, a stick of sandalwood given him, some Koa and seal skin for the seat, he managed to make a rocking chair for his wife Sybil. The rocking chair had its admirers, including Queen Kaʻahumanu. Ka‘ahumanu asked Bingham to make her a chair like it; he did in 1830.

“She highly prized it, and had it conveyed to her residence on O‘ahu, where she often used it with pleasure in her subsequent life.” In 1840, the Binghams left Honolulu for the United States, Sybil’s rocking chair was taken with them, and when they reached Boston Sybil refused to part with it for a fine piece of upholstered furniture. Sybil’s wish was that when the last summons came she might be found in that chair … and her wish was granted when she died in her rocking chair on February 27, 1848 in New Haven Connecticut.

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Sewing Circles

The use of stitchery in Hawai‘i is documented as early as 1809. After contact, Western and Chinese cloth and silk became available as trade with the islands opened up. When missionaries from New England arrived in 1820, the missionary women brought with them their quilts (mostly as keepsakes.) Missionary women helped Hawaiian women to learn to sew in the European style, typically patchwork style.

It is theorized that Hawaiian women gradually began incorporating elements of kapa design into patchwork quilts, and soon discarded the patchwork approach altogether in favor of the appliqué quilt. The appliqué fabric is folded in half, or three times and all 8 layers are cut out at the same time, then opened out, like a “snowflake”. The image shows my mother with quilts she made for her grandchildren in the patchwork tradition her great-great grandmother (Sybil Bingham) and the other missionary wives used in 1820 when teaching sewing aboard the Thaddeus and later.

by Peter T Young 3 Comments

The First School

After the Pioneer Company of missionaries landed at Kailua-Kona, Hiram and Sybil Bingham sailed for Honolulu and arrived April 19, 1820. It is said that Sybil started the first school in Hawaiʻi in May 1820.

Sybil’s June 20, 1820 journal entry notes, “After neglect of my journal for more than two months in a most interesting part of our history too … Very soon I gathered up 12 or 15 little native girls to come once a day to the house …. That was an interesting day to me to lay the foundation of the first school ever assembled in this dark land.”

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Old Mission School House

“Very soon I gathered up 12 or 15 little native girls to come once a day to the house so that as early as possible the business of instruction might be commenced. That was an interesting day to me to lay the foundation of the first school ever assembled”.  (Sybil Bingham) “Mother Bingham … teaching […]