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May 28, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Day 148 – March 18, 1820

March 18, 1820 – no entry. (Thaddeus Journal)

March 18. After proceeding very slowly for about a fortnight and being so near the sun as powerfully to feel its scorching rays, we have now entered the trades which are carrying us 8 miles an hour toward our wished for port. During the extreme warm weather I have felt very lanquid & have been able to do but little. I believe it is owing in a measure to want of exercise. I bathe in salt water once a day which I think beneficial to my health. (Mercy Partridge Whitney Journal)

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May 27, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Day 149 – March 19, 1820

March 19, 1820 – Lord’s Day. – Favored with the privilege of public worship on deck. The attentive audience listened to a discourse from Luke 23: 39-43, in which the prominent and distinguishing doctrines of grace were illustrated by Br. B. Our only hope with respect to the seed sown is in God who giveth the increase. Tamoree absented himself from public worship as he often does from our family devotions. He has, to our grief, expressed some skeptical views respecting Christianity. His intercourse with a Deist on board has been no serious advantage to him. We still hope the Lord will save him from the power of the enemy and make a blessing and not a curse to his countrymen. (Thaddeus Journal)

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May 26, 2019 by Peter T Young 3 Comments

Uncle George

George Lycurgus (1858–1960) was a Greek American businessman who played an influential role in the early visitor industry of Hawaiʻi.

He was instrumental in the development of the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory and Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.

In 1893, Lycurgus leased a small guest house on Waikīkī Beach. He expanded it and renamed it the “Sans Souci” (French for “without care” and named after the palace of Frederick the Great in Germany.)

It became one of the first Waikīkī beach resorts (that end of Waikīkī is still called “Sans-Souci Beach.”) Among its guests was Robert Louis Stevenson.

Stevenson wrote in the guest book: “If anyone desires such old-fashioned things as lovely scenery, quiet, pure air, clean sea water, good food, and heavenly sunsets hung out before their eyes over the Pacific and the distant hills of Waianae, I recommend him cordially to the Sans Souci.”

“In 1893 Sans Souci was a rambling hostelry, nestled among the coconut and palm trees of Waikiki Beach. The guests occupied small bungalows, thatched-roof affairs about ten by twelve, the bed being the principal article of furniture.”

“It was in one of these bungalows that Stevenson had established himself, propped up with pillows on the bed in his shirt-sleeves.” Scribner’s Magazine, August, 1926.

By 1898, the Spanish American War had increased American interest in the Pacific. Hawaiʻi was annexed as a territory of the United States and Lycurgus applied for American citizenship.

He opened a restaurant called the Union Grill in Honolulu in 1901. He later invested in a logging venture in 1907 and also bought the Hilo Hotel in 1908.

In 1903, when he returned to Greece to visit his mother, he met and married Athena Geracimos from Sparta. She was probably the first Greek woman in Hawaiʻi.

In December 1904, George and his nephew (Demosthenes Lycurgus) became principal stockholders of the Volcano House Company and took over the management of the Volcano House hotel on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi.

His nephew always introduced him as “Uncle George” to the guests, which earned him his new nickname.

He worked with Lorrin Thurston and others for ten years, starting in 1906, to have the volcano area made into Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.

In January 1912, geologist Thomas Jaggar arrived to investigate the volcano. A building for scientific instruments was built in a small building next to the hotel. Jaggar stayed in Volcano for the next 28 years.

In 1921, George Lycurgus sold the Volcano House to the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company and moved to Hilo. During the Great Depression the company was going bankrupt and Lycurgus bought it back.

A fire destroyed the hotel in 1940, ironically from a kitchen oil burner, not volcanic activity. Only a few artifacts, such as a koa wood piano, were saved.

At the age of 81, he traveled to Washington, DC to have the construction of the new park headquarters building farther back from the lip of the crater.

That allowed him, in 1941, to build a more modern hotel at the former Hawaiian Volcano Observatory site. He reopened the new Volcano House (designed by notable architect Charles William Dickey.)

After another eruption in 1952, at the age of 93, he arranged a publicity stunt involving riding a horse to the rim of the erupting vent and tossing in his ceremonial bottle of gin. (The offering of gin became a regular at Volcano after that.)

Uncle George died in 1960 at the age of 101.

The National Park recently announced that Hawaiʻi Volcanoes Lodge Company has been selected to operate the Volcano House Hotel, Nāmakanipaio cabins and campground and other commercial services within Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park. The facility is scheduled to reopen in late-2012.

Volcano has been a special place for me.

As a kid, our family often visited Volcano and regularly stayed at the Volcano House. I remember seeing and meeting Uncle George while he was sitting before the continuously-burning fireplace at the Volcano House.

Decades later, I purposefully went to Volcano to plan the formation of my first business; the initial planning was on cocktail napkins at the Volcano House bar (the business succeeded.)

Today, the Young siblings own a house at Volcano our mother built; I used to visit there once a month, but now get back to it less frequently.

The Volcano Art Center Gallery is located in the 1877 Volcano House Hotel (now adjacent to the Volcano Visitor Center) under a cooperative agreement with the National Park Service.

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Uncle George Lycurgus

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Uncle_George_Lycurgus-1958

Sans_Souci_Hotel_Ad-1893

San Souci Beach Area – large house (Mitchell) is where Natatorium is now located-1886

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Volcano_House_1904

Image_of_Pele_in_Volcano_House_Fireplace

May 26, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Day 150 – March 20, 1820

March 20, 1820 – Special mercies received in answer as we believe to special prayer. in the case of a member. (Thaddeus Journal)

March 20th. Sail rapidly at the rate of 200 miles a day. Expect to see our long wished for Owhyhee (Hawaii) in 6 or 8 days. O how shall we rejoice again to set our feet on land. (Samuel & Nancy Ruggles)

March 20.-When I gave my hand to Mr. Thurston, and came out from my father’s house, to go far away to a land unknown, I felt assured of the care and friendship of one precious friend. But my expectations have been more than realized. To be connected with such a husband, and engaged in such an object, in the present state of the world, is, of all situations in life, what I choose. (Lucy Goodale Thurston)

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May 25, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Kawainui Marsh

Ko‘olau volcano started its life as a seamount above the Hawaiian hotspot around 4-million years ago. It broke sea level some time prior to 2.9-million years ago.

About 2-million years ago, much of the northeast flank of Ko‘olau volcano was sheared off and material was swept more than 140-miles north of O‘ahu and Moloka‘i onto the ocean floor (named the Nu‘uanu Avalanche) – one of the largest landslides on Earth.

Following a period of dormancy, Ko‘olau eruptions about 1-million years ago (known as the Honolulu Volcanic Series) created landmarks such as Diamond Head, Hanauma Bay and Punchbowl Crater. Ko‘olau’s eroded remnants make up the Ko‘olau Mountain Range.

About 6,000 years ago and before the arrival of the Hawaiians, Kawainui (“the large [flow of] fresh water”) and Ka‘elepulu (“the moist blackness”) were bays connected to the ocean and extended a mile inland of the present coastline. This saltwater environment is indicated by inland deposits of sand and coral.

A sand bar began forming across Kawainui Bay around 2,500 years ago creating Kawainui Lagoon filled with coral, fish and shellfish. The Hawaiians probably first settled along the fringes of this lagoon.

Gradually, erosion of the hillsides surrounding Kawainui began to fill in the lagoon with sediments.

About 500 years ago, early Hawaiians maintained the freshwater fishpond in Kawainui; the fishpond was surrounded on all sides by a system of canals (‘auwai) bringing water from Maunawili Stream and springs to walled taro lo‘i.

In 1750, Kailua was the political seat of power for the district of Ko‘olaupoko and a favored place of the O‘ahu chiefs for its abundance of fish and good canoe landings.

Kawainui was once the largest cultivated freshwater fishpond on Oahu. Rimming the wetland are numerous heiau (temples.)

Farmers grew kalo (taro) in the irrigated lo‘i (fields) along the streams from Maunawili and along the edges of the fishponds. Crops of dryland kalo, banana, sweet potato and sugarcane marked the fringes of the marsh. Fishermen harvested fish from the fishponds and the sea.

In the 1880s, Chinese farmers converted the taro fields of Kawainui to rice, but abandoned their farms by 1920. Cattle grazed throughout much of Kawainui.

The marsh drains into the ocean at the north end of Kailua Beach through Kawainui Canal (Oneawa Channel.)

The marsh attracts migratory seabirds and is home to four species of endangered waterbirds: the Hawaiian stilt (aeʻo), the Hawaiian coot (ʻalae keʻokeʻo), the Hawaiian gallinule (ʻalaeʻula) and the Hawaiian duck (kōloa maoli).

In 1979, the US National Registrar for Historic Places issued a “Determination of Eligibility Notification” finding that Kawainui Marsh area is eligible for listing in the National Register for Historic Places.

According to the determination, “Kawainui Marsh is important as a major component of a larger cultural district which would include … the ponding/wet agricultural area … remains of extensive terracing systems, ceremonial sites, burial sites, and habitation areas associated with this agricultural complex”.

In 2005, the Kawainui and Hāmākua Marsh Complex was designated as a Wetlands of International Importance and added to the Ramsar List (Ramsar site no. 1460.)

The Convention on Wetlands (Ramsar, Iran, 1971) – called the “Ramsar Convention” – is an intergovernmental treaty that embodies the commitments of its member countries to maintain the ecological character of their Wetlands of International Importance and to plan for the “wise use”, or sustainable use, of all of the wetlands in their territories.

Kawainui Marsh also functions as a flood storage basin to protect Kailua. As part of flood control measures, the Oneawa Canal and levee started in 1950 and were completed a few years later. When flood waters over-topped the levee and flooded Coconut Grove in the December 31, 1987-January 1, 1988 flood, the levee was raised and floodwall added.

Projects are underway to restore waterbird habitat, as well as care for some of the historic sites. DLNR has plans for visitor center and trails around the wetland – they have been on the books for a long time, it would be nice to see those community visions come to fruition.

Lots of good work is being done by lots of dedicated folks in helping to restore Kawainui Marsh, including ‘Ahahui Mālama I Ka Lōkahi (led by Doc Burrows,) Kailua Hawaiian Civic Club and others.

When I was a kid, we referred to this area as the “swamp” – many of the old maps referred to it as such. Auto parts shops lined the road at its edge; the dump was nearby. Times have changed.

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