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April 20, 2015 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Future Farmers

Boys were leaving the farms.

The Smith-Hughes Vocational Education Act (1917) sought to “provide for the promotion of vocational education … in agriculture and the trades and industries”. Initially not available in Hawaiʻi, the provisions of the Act were extended to the Islands on March 10, 1924.

The law provided funding “for agricultural education that … is under public supervision or control; that the controlling purpose of such education shall be to fit for useful employment …”

“… that such education shall be of less than college grade and be designed to meet the needs of persons over fourteen years of age who have entered upon or who are preparing to enter upon the work of the farm or of the farm home”. (USDA)

Later, on the continent, Walter S Newman proposed forming an organization that offered farm boys “a greater opportunity for self-expression and for the development of leadership. In this way they will develop confidence in their own ability and pride in the fact that they are farm boys.”

In 1925, Newman and a few other Virginia Tech agricultural education teacher educators (Henry Groseclose, Harry Sanders, and Edmund Magill) spoke of forming agriculture classes for boys.

The idea was presented during an annual vocational rally in the state in April 1926, where it was met positively. The Future Farmers of Virginia was born. Two years later, the idea reached the national stage during the American Royal Livestock Show in Kansas City, Mo.

‘Manual education’ was not new in Hawaiʻi, especially agricultural training and hands on experience.

Instruction in elementary agriculture for boys and in homemaking for girls became a strong feature of public education under Richard Armstrong’s administration.

Armstrong was the second Minister of Public Instruction in Hawaiʻi (and often referred to as the father of American public education in Hawaiʻi.) His administration made very real contributions to education in agriculture in Hawaiʻi.

JE Higgins was appointed teacher of agriculture for the Honolulu schools in 1900. His work in 7 schools consisted mostly of growing vegetables, flowers, sorghum, sweet potatoes, strawberries, corn, carrots, and the beautification of the school grounds.

In 1908 an itinerant vocational instructor was appointed for each of the major island. The instruction was mainly prevocational and consisted, for the most part, of practical instruction in gardening. (History of Agricultural Education)

Back on the continent … in 1928, 33 students from 18 states gathered in Kansas City to form the Future Farmers of America.

Then, in the Islands … on December 28, 1928, delegates from seventeen island chapters met at Lahaina, Maui to draft the Territorial Constitution.

The following chapters were represented: Kona, McKinley, John M. Ross (Hakalau,) Maui, Lahainaluna, Laupāhoehoe, Haiku, Honokaa, Hilo Intermediate, Aiea, Pāhala, Makawao, James Dole (Leilehua,) Pahoa, Molokai, Kohala and Hilo High. WW Beers was the first Territorial Adviser of the Hawaiian Association Future Farmers of America.

On April 20, 1929, Charter Number 13 of the Future Farmers of America was issued to the Hawaiian Association. By winning the State association award in 1934, the Hawaiian Association became the outstanding association of the Future Farmer organization for that year.

In 1929, national blue and corn gold became the official colors of FFA. A year later, delegates adopted the official FFA Creed and by 1933 the familiar Official Dress of blue corduroy jackets was adopted.

Girls were restricted from the earliest forms of FFA membership by delegate vote at the 1930 national convention. It wasn’t until 1969 that females gained full FFA membership privileges (today, females represent more than 45 percent of FFA members and roughly half of all state leadership positions.)

Since 1928, millions of agriculture students have donned the official FFA jacket; all 50 states are currently chartered members of the national organization, representing 610,240 individual FFA members and 7,665 local chapters. It’s a testament to the power of common goals and the strong ideals of the FFA founders.

Their mission was to prepare future generations for the challenges of feeding a growing population. They taught us that agriculture is more than planting and harvesting – it’s a science, it’s a business and it’s an art. (FFA)

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April 19, 2015 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

“A Quiet Retreat from the Noise and Bustle of Honolulu”

On October 23, 1819, the Pioneer Company of missionaries from the northeast US, set sail on the Thaddeus for the Islands. There were seven couples sent by the ABCFM to convert the Hawaiians to Christianity.

These included two Ordained Preachers, Hiram Bingham and his wife Sybil and Asa Thurston and his wife Lucy; two Teachers, Mr. Samuel Whitney and his wife Mercy and Samuel Ruggles and his wife Mary; a Doctor, Thomas Holman and his wife Lucia; a Printer, Elisha Loomis and his wife Maria; a Farmer, Daniel Chamberlain, his wife and five children. (The Honolulu contingent arrived on Oʻahu on April 19, 1820.)

In 1829, Kaʻahumanu wanted to give Hiram and Sybil Bingham a gift of land and consulted Hoapili. He suggested Kapunahou (although he had already given it to Liliha).

According to AF Judd, “Not unnaturally, Liliha objected to the proposal, but Hoapili consented. And Liliha’s resentment could avail nothing against the wish of her father, her husband, and the highest chief of the land.”

At first, the Binghams lived in a grass home erected by Kaʻahumanu beside a larger structure of her own. By 1831 the Binghams moved into a more permanent adobe cottage that stood beside a clump of hau trees.

While at Punahou, the Binghams created for themselves “a quiet retreat from the noise and bustle of Honolulu.” The building had two main rooms, a porch, a storeroom and a pantry. There was a separate cookhouse. (Punahou)

“Dear Punahou cottage, once my home sweet home, where the precious mother cherished her little ones.” (Hiram Bingham II, April 19, 1905)

The land was given to the Binghams (it was considered to be a gift from Kaʻahumanu, Kuhina Nui or Queen Regent at that time,) but by missionary rules, it was really given to the mission as a whole. (NPS) The Binghams left in 1840.

“The founding of Punahou as a school for missionary children not only provided means of instruction for the children, of the Mission, but also gave a trend to the education and history of the Islands. In 1841, at Punahou the Mission established this school and built for it simple halls of adobe.”

“From this unpretentious beginning, the school has grown to its present prosperous condition.” (Report of the Superintendent of Public Education, 1900)

“The trustees of Oahu College propose to set up a memorial in memory of the late Rev. Hiram Bingham, first missionary on the Island of Oahu, and a benefactor of the college.”

“The house occupied by Rev. Mr. Bingham was situated just mauka of the site now occupied by the president’s house on the college grounds and about 20 feet from the driveway.”

“The trustees will select a large bowlder and place it in position as nearly as possible on the spot where the house originally stood. One face of the rock will be trimmed off to receive a suitable inscription.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, July 20, 1897)

“The exact site of the cottage has since then been discovered by the unearthing of the foundation of the southern corner, and now, after the lapse of five years … we are here today to dedicate this memorial, and to witness to our belief in the propriety and usefulness of the same.” (Hiram Bingham II, April 19, 1905)

Like other missionaries who had benefitted from the generosity of the Hawaiian ali‘i, Bingham managed the land together with other mission members. As explained by fellow missionary Samuel Whitney on September 24, 1850, “The land could be received and immediately appropriated, as far as it was capable, to sustaining the missionary cause.”

“It was never my privilege to be a pupil at the Punahou Mission School but I can well remember how in summer days, when the heat was great and we were wont, for a change, to dwell in the humble cottage which stood here, an older sister and myself used to start out on foot to cross the dusty and arid plain two miles to Kawaiahao to attend the little mission school held in Dr. Judd’s back yard, the germ of this college.”

“Memory goes back sixty-six years to the delights of this refreshing spot, where, after the long weary walks of the day, I was wont to meet a mother’s welcome, and to refresh myself, not in this magnificent bathing tank so near at hand, but in an artificial pond originally constructed by my father for purposes of irrigation …”

“I remember with what delight I used to paddle about in my boat, only a box, in a fresh pond close to the spring. I remember how I was wont to stroll in the cool, shady spots so romantic to me in childhood among the banana trees which grew by the side of the taro patches”.

“… how in this cottage we children eagerly listened to the reading of “the Rollo Books” when they first appeared, and how we rejoiced over the toys as one by one they were taken from the box just arrived from around Cape Horn.”

“Finally, I remember how, in a neighboring shady grove, just a few yards makai of this cottage, not long before we went forth from it (was it prophetic?), I tried to sing with my sister the anthem ‘Daughter of Zion, awake from thy sadness,’ which we had heard sung by the choir in the old Bethel on King street.”

“Those were happy days, but they are forever gone. I would not have them back. It is enough for me, full enough that I have the memory of them, that in my oId age I hear the merry voices of the rising student generations as after school hours of faithful study they gleefully roam this campus, seeking rest and recreation”

“(M)y heart will to the last, beat with joy at the remembrance of the gift of my father and the continued prosperity of Oahu College.”

“In your walks through these shady avenues, kind friends, will you not once and again linger a moment here to reread this inscription (which I now unveil) and call to mind the labors of love which my dear father put forth in this city for the redemption of Hawaiʻi, and his parting gift, Punahou?” (Hiram Bingham II, April 19, 1905)

“The memorial tablet is a simple but beautiful affair. On a grass mound in the shape of a truncated pyramid is a pedestal of lava rock on which is a great rough lava boulder hewn out from the slopes of Rocky Hill.”

“On its rough face is an oval bronze tablet bearing in simple raised letters this inscription:” (Ceremonies In Memory of the Pioneer Missionary Rev Hiram Bingham, April 19, 1905)

“On This Spot
Stood The Home Of The
Rev. Hiram Bingham
Who Gave This Broad Estate
To The Cause Of
Christian Education”

(Hiram and Sybil Bingham are my great-great-great grandparents.)

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BinghamTablet-(Punahou Archives Photo)

Bingham_Tablet-(Punahou Archives Photo)

Dedication_of_BinghamTablet-1905-(Punahou Archives Photo)

Bingham-Tablet-(Punahou Archives Photo)

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April 18, 2015 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

General Meeting

The Prudential Committee of the ABCFM in giving instructions to the pioneers of 1819 said: “Your mission is a mission of mercy, and your work is to be wholly a labor of love. … Your views are not to be limited to a low, narrow scale, but you are to open your hearts wide, and set your marks high.”

“You are to aim at nothing short of covering these islands with fruitful fields, and pleasant dwellings and schools and churches, and of Christian civilization.” (The Friend)

Over the course of a little over 40-years (1820-1863 – the “Missionary Period”,) about 180-men and women in twelve Companies served in Hawaiʻi to carry out the mission of the ABCFM in the Hawaiian Islands.

The missionaries were scattered across the Islands, each home was usually in a thickly inhabited village, so that the missionary and his wife could be close to their work among the people.

In the early years, they lived in the traditional thatched houses – “our little cottage built chiefly of poles, dried grass and mats, being so peculiarly exposed to fire … consisting only of one room with a little partition and one door.” (Sybil Bingham) The thatched cottages were raised upon a low stone platform. Later, they lived in wood, stone or adobe homes.

Very prominent in the old mission life was the annual “General Meeting” where all of the missionary families from across the Islands gathered at Honolulu from four to six weeks.

“The design of their coming together would naturally suggest itself to any reflecting mind. They are all engaged in one work, but are stationed at various and distant points on different portions of the group, hence they feel the necessity of occasionally coming together, reviewing the past, and concerting plans for future operations.”

“Were it not for these meetings, missionaries at extreme parts of the group might never see each other, and in some instances we know that persons connected with the Sandwich Island Mission, have never seen each other’s faces, although for years they have been laboring in the same work.” (The Friend, June 15, 1846)

The primary object of this gathering was to hold a business meeting for hearing reports of the year’s work and of the year’s experiences in more secular matters, and there from to formulate their annual report to the Board in Boston.

Another important object of the General Meeting was a social one. The many stations away from Honolulu were more or less isolated-some of them extremely so. Perhaps a dominant influence in the consumption of so much time was the appreciation of the social opportunity, and the unwillingness to bring it unnecessarily to a speedy close. (Dole)

“Often some forty or more of the missionaries besides their wives were present, as well as many of the older children. … Much business was transacted relating to the multifarious work and business of the Mission. New missionaries were to be located, and older ones transferred.”

“Expenditures upon schools, printing, dwellings, etc., were decided upon. Assignments of work were made in translating, revising and writing books.” (Bishop)

As an example, in 1835, at the General Meeting of the Mission, a resolution was passed to promote boarding schools for Hawaiians; several male boarding schools and two female boarding schools were begun. One of them, Wailuku Female Seminary on the island of Maui, was the first female school begun by the missionaries.

In 1839, the membership discussed “Instruction for the young Chiefs.” The meeting minutes note, “This subject was fully considered in connection with an application of the chiefs requesting the services of Mr. Cooke, as a teacher for their children; and it was voted:”

“That the mission comply with their request, provided they will carry out their promise to Mr. Cooke’s satisfaction; namely, to build a school house, sustain him in his authority, over the scholars, and support the school.”

This became the Chiefs’ Children’s School (later known as Royal School,) founded by King Kamehameha III as a boarding school to educate the children of the Hawaiian royalty (aliʻi). The school was first located where the ʻIolani Barracks stand now.

The annual gathering of the Cousins, descendants of the early missionaries, continues. Our family is part of the Society and Cousins. Hiram and Sybil Bingham (Hiram was leader of the first 1820 group of missionaries to Hawai‘i) are my great-great-great grandparents.

Today, the Hawaiian Mission Children’s Society, a nonprofit educational institution and genealogical society, exists to promote an understanding of the social history of nineteenth-century Hawai‘i and its critical role in the formation of modern Hawai‘i.

The Society operates the Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives, comprised of three historic buildings and a research archives with reading room. The Society also compiles the genealogical records of the American Protestant missionaries in Hawai‘i and promotes the participation of missionary descendants in the Society’s activities.

Through the Mission Houses, the Society collects and preserves the documents, artifacts and other records of the missionaries in Hawai‘i’s history; makes these collections available for research and educational purposes; and interprets the historic site and collections to reflect the social history of nineteenth century Hawai‘i and America.

Guided tours of the house and other parts of the historic site are offered Tuesday through Saturday, starting on the hour every hour from 11 am with the last tour beginning at 3 pm.

Nominal fees include: General – $10; Kamaʻaina, Senior Citizens (55+) & Military – $8 and Students (age 6 to College w/ID) – $6; Kamaʻaina Saturday (last Saturday of the Month) 50% off admission for residents. (Reservations for groups of 10 or more are required.)

The tradition of the annual gathering of cousins continues … today is the annual meeting for the Hawaiian Mission Children’s Society. As part of the gathering, the names of the missionary families are called out, in the order of the company that they arrived in the Islands.

Our family is part of the Society and cousins. Hiram and Sybil Bingham (Hiram was leader of the first 1820 group of missionaries to Hawai‘i) are my great-great-great grandparents.

I am honored and proud to serve on the Mission Houses Board of Trustees. Please also consider visiting the Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives (on King Street, adjoining Kawaiahaʻo Church.) Take a tour, have a bite to eat in the Mark Noguchi run Mission Social Hall and Cafe, visit the gift shop/book store.

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Old School House-General Meeting-Site-Centennial Book

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Commemorative Plaque to Amos and Juliette Cooke – listing students they taught at Royal School

Royal School layout

Photograph_of_the_Royal_School,_probably_after_1848

Wailuku Female Seminary-MissionHouses

Wailuku Female Seminary-Mission Houses

April 16, 2015 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Hoʻomana Naʻauao

Hoʻomana Naʻauao o Hawaiʻi was the first independent Hawaiian Christian organization in the Islands. It was founded by John Kekipi Maia; he named his denomination “Hoʻomana Naʻauao,” which members translate as meaning “reasonable service.”

It started with the help of John Hawelu Poloailehua.

Poloailehua was born in Kukuihaele, Hamakua, Hawaiʻi in about 1838; at the age of 14 he moved to Honolulu. In February of the next year, when he was incapacitated by a violent fever, he asked for and received a Bible; it was placed on his chest.

He prayed while keeping his eyes closed and holding the Bible, as soon as he opened the Bible, read a verse and pledged his faith, he recovered from his illness.

April 16, 1853 (the date which Kekipi considers was the beginning of the church) is when Poloailehua, still a 15-year-old boy, started his mission work after he recovered from his illness.

He stayed in Honolulu to carry out mission work in his neighborhood where smallpox was prevalent at that time; his family was also afflicted with the illness – all died except for Poloailehua. (Inoue)

On April 16, 1881, Poloailehua met John Kekipi Maia of North Kohala and told him “Whatever secret you have within you, you must bring it out.” (Ritz)

Kekipi moved to Oʻahu and joined the Kaumakapili Church; he seemed to develop his work inside the congregation as he had in Kohala, Hawai’i.

However, in 1890, he left Kaumakapili Church, taking his followers with him. He built a meeting house on the seaside of Kālia and started his mission work as an independent group. (Inoue)

On July 31, 1897, a new church building (on Cooke Street in Kaka’ako) was sanctified and named Ke Alaula O Ka Mālamalama. With this church as a mother church, more than ten sister churches were founded on Hawaiʻi, Maui, Lānaʻi and Molokaʻi.

It was officially recognized as a religious organization on February 16, 1911 whose purposes “are purely those of religion, charity, education and general relief” and that “its main church and mission is at Koula, near King and South Streets in said Honolulu, with branch missions and churches at various places throughout the Territory of Hawaii.”

Hoʻomana Naʻauao was established on the concept of “reasonable service,” based on the passage in Romans: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” (Ritz)

Church members believed that Hawaiians were descended from Hebrews and Egyptians and that ancient Hawaiian religion evolved from the same source as Christianity. Teaching that the causes of illness and misfortune could be discerned after praying and fasting, the church gained many adherents among prominent individuals in the Hawaiian community.

The church emphasized repentance as a premise to salvation. In the practices of Hoʻomana Naʻauao, the importance of visions was one of the main characteristics.

Another significant characteristic of the practices of Hoʻomana Naʻauao was the opening of the Bible to a random page to see the divine will in sacred phrases on the page. (Inoue)

Some may call this “the Hawaiian Christian science,” and others say the teachings most resemble that of the Congregationalist Church. But at its simplest form, Hoʻomana Naʻahuao is a mixture of Protestant Christianity and Hawaiian. Members espouse a belief in the trinity and follow the Bible, as well as Hawaiian values. (Ritz)

It was the largest independent Hawaiian Church; several offshoot churches broke away in the 1930s and the 1940s.

Other Hoʻomana Naʻauao o Hawaii churches include Ke Kilohana oka Mālamalama in Hilo, Ka Hoku oka Malamalama, Paipaikou, Ka Nani oka Malamalama, Kohala, Ka Elele oka Malamalama, Kapoho, and Ka Mauloa oka Malamalama in Kurtistown, and Ka Lanakila oka Malamalama and Ka Lokahi oka Malamalama on the island of Lanaʻi (there were others.)

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Ke Alaula O Ka Malamalama Ka Ho’omana Na’auao Church – side

Ke Alaula O Ka Malamalama Ka Ho’omana Na’auao Church – Kakaa’ako

Ke Alaula O Ka Malamalama Ka Ho’omana Na’auao Church – sign

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Ka Mauloa oka Malamalama in Kurtistown

Ka Lokahi oka Malamalama church at lodge_at_koele

Ka Lokahi oka Malamalama church – lodge_at_koele

Ka Lokahi oka Malamalama church – koele

April 13, 2015 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

For the Sake of Public Health

Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives presents it’s highly popular Cemetery Pupu Theatre series with a new set of historical characters.

These programs are waaay cool.

Actors are dressed in period costume, telling the life events of select individuals buried at O‘ahu Cemetery, at their respective grave sites.

Each ‘stage’ is at the respective subject’s gravesite at Oʻahu Cemetery in Nuʻuanu. There was nothing ghoulish about it; rather, it was very effective storytelling.

Cemetery Pupu Theatre takes us back to our shared history and allows us to “meet” people who have influenced Hawaiian history and hear their stories.

The scripts are researched and documented, making Cemetery Pupu Theatre a unique presentation of real history.

“For the Sake of the Public Health” presents a series of people who were intimately involved with the health, care and welfare of the people of Hawaiʻi.

Hawaiʻi faced many public health crises and had many healthcare needs during the days of the Kingdom, the Republic and the Territory.

Each person has an interesting and important story to share that sheds light on the challenges faced by doctors and victims of disease.

They are: the first licensed female physician in the islands tending to the needs of women and children; a dentist turned politician; a doctor who dedicated his life to fight against the Great White Plague of Tuberculosis; a doctor who did leprosy research at Kalihi Leper Hospital; and a victim of the 1853 smallpox epidemic.

These people who shaped health care in our islands today, help us remember those who have gone before us were public servants, and witnessed history.

Dr Archibald Sinclair (portrayed by Richard Valasek,) the founding director of Lēʻahi Hospital and an important pioneer in immunology who sought a cure for Tuberculosis.

Haliʻa is a composite character (portrayed by Karen Kualana) who was a victim of the 1853 smallpox epidemic in which 6,000 people died, 8% of the Kingdom’s population.

Dr John Mott-Smith (portrayed by Adam LeFebvre,) Hawaiʻi’s first royal dentist, who also negotiated both Reciprocity Treaties and was the Kingdom’s last ambassador to the United States.

Dr Sarah Eliza Pierce Emerson (portrayed by Karen Valasek,) Hawaiʻi’s first licensed female doctor, who was on the Board of Examiners for the Oʻahu Insane Asylum.

Dr William L. Moore (portrayed by Dezmond Gilla,) a member of the board of Health and superintendent of the Hilo Hospital, and was involved in searching for a cure for Leprosy.

Mike Smola and others at Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives researched the scripts.

William Haʻo directed “For the Sake of the Public Health.” He has performed in Hawaiian Mission Houses’ A Midsummer Night’s Dream, as well as all four Cemetery Pupu Theatre shows.

Carlyon Wolfe was the costume designer. She is currently the staff designer for Mānoa Valley Theatre. She has earned four Hawaiʻi State Theatre Council Poʻokela design awards for her efforts.

This sold out program was presented in June 2014 (with an encore in 2015.) If you weren’t one of the fortunate ones to see it live, the links will take you to the respective performances.

Click HERE for a link to the Mission Houses Calendar.

Don’t miss the Cemetery Pupu Theatre, or any of the other great programs at Mission Houses. (Lots of info here from Mission Houses.)

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