Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Threes and Eights

No, it’s not a typo (I don’t mean black Aces and Eights, Wild Bill Hickock’s “dead man’s hand”;) this relates to Noah Webster, Henry ʻŌpūkahaʻia, and Hawaiian grammar and spelling.

How in the world are these in common? … Let’s look.

Noah Webster (1758-1843) was the man of words in early 19th-century America. He compiled a dictionary which became the standard for American English; he also compiled The American Spelling Book, which was the basic textbook for young readers in early 19th-century America.

ʻŌpūkahaʻia, in 1809, boarded a sailing ship anchored in Kealakekua Bay and sailed to the continent.  ʻŌpūkahaʻia latched upon the Christian religion, converted to Christianity in 1815 and studied at the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall, Connecticut (founded in 1817) – he wanted to become a missionary and teach the Christian faith to people back home in Hawaiʻi.

A story of his life was written (“Memoirs of Henry Obookiah” (the spelling of his name prior to establishment of the formal Hawaiian alphabet, based on its sound.))  This book was put together by Edwin Dwight (after ʻŌpūkahaʻia died.)  It was an edited collection of ʻŌpūkahaʻia’s letters and journals/diaries.

This book inspired the New England missionaries to volunteer to carry his message to the Sandwich Islands.

On October 23, 1819, the pioneer Company of missionaries from the northeast United States, set sail on the Thaddeus for the Sandwich Islands (now known as Hawai‘i) – they first landed at Kailua-Kona on April 4, 1820.  (Unfortunately, ʻŌpūkahaʻia died suddenly (of typhus fever on February 17, 1818) and never made it back to Hawaiʻi.)

OK, so what about the 3s and 8s – and Hawaiian grammar and spelling?

It turns out that a manuscript was found among Queen Emma’s private papers (titled, “A Short Elementary Grammar of the Owhihe Language;”) a note written on the manuscript said, “Believed to be Obookiah’s grammar”.

Some believe this manuscript is the first grammar book on the Hawaiian language. However, when reading the document, many of the words are not recognizable.  Here’s a sampling of a few of the words: 3-o-le; k3-n3-k3; l8-n3 and; 8-8-k8.

No these aren’t typos, either.  … Let’s look a little closer.

In his journal, ʻŌpūkahaʻia first mentions grammar in his account of the summer of 1813: “A part of the time [I] was trying to translate a few verses of the Scriptures into my own language, and in making a kind of spelling-book, taking the English alphabet and giving different names and different sounds. I spent time in making a kind of spelling-book, dictionary, grammar.”  (Schutz)

So, where does Noah Webster fit into this picture?

As initially noted, Webster’s works were the standard for American English.  References to his “Spelling” book appear in the accounts by folks at the New England mission school.

As you know, English letters have different sounds for the same letter.  For instance, the letter “a” has a different sound when used in words like: late, hall and father.

Noah Webster devised a method to help differentiate between the sounds and assigned numbers to various letter sounds – and used these in his Speller.  (Webster did not substitute the numbers corresponding to a letter’s sound into words in his spelling or dictionary book; it was used as an explanation of the difference in the sounds of letters.)

The following is a chart for some of the letters related to the numbers assigned, depending on the sound they represent.

Long Vowels in English (Webster)
..1……..2…….3………4……….5…….6………7……….8
..a……..a…….a………e……….i……..o………o……….u
late, ask, hall, here, sight, note, move, truth

Using ʻŌpūkahaʻia’s odd-looking words mentioned above, we can decipher what they represent by substituting the code and pronounce the words accordingly (for the “3,” substitute with “a”(that sounds like “hall”) and replace the “8” with “u,” (that sounds like “truth”) – so, 3-o-le transforms to ʻaʻole (no;) k3-n3-k3 transforms to kanaka (man;); l8-n3 transforms to luna (upper) and 8-8-k8 transforms to ʻuʻuku (small.)

It seems Henry ʻŌpūkahaʻia used Webster’s Speller in his writings and substituted the numbers assigned to the various sounds and incorporated them into the words of his grammar book (essentially putting the corresponding number into the spelling of the word.)

“Once we know how the vowel letters and numbers were used, ʻŌpūkahaʻia’s short grammar becomes more than just a curiosity; it is a serious work that is probably the first example of the Hawaiian language recorded in a systematic way. Its alphabet is a good deal more consistent than those used by any of the explorers who attempted to record Hawaiian words.” (Schutz)

“It might be said that the first formal writing system for the Hawaiian language, meaning alphabet, spelling rules and grammar, was created in Connecticut by a Hawaiian named Henry ʻŌpūkahaʻia.  He began work as early as 1814 and left much unfinished at his death in 1818.” (Rumford)

“His work served as the basis for the foreign language materials prepared by American and Hawaiian students at the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall, Connecticut, in the months prior to the departure of the first company of missionaries to Hawai’i in October 1819.”  (Rumford)

It is believed ʻŌpūkahaʻia classmates (and future missionaries,) Samuel Ruggles and James Ely, after ʻŌpūkahaʻia’s death, went over his papers and began to prepare material on the Hawaiian language to be taken to Hawaiʻi and used in missionary work (the work was written by Ruggles and assembled into a book – by Herman Daggett, principal of the Foreign Mission School – and credit for the work goes to ʻŌpūkahaʻia.)

Lots of information here from Rumford (Hawaiian Historical Society) and Schutz (Honolulu and The Voices of Eden: A History of Hawaiian Language Studies.)

I encourage you to review the images in the folder; I had the opportunity to review and photograph the several pages of ʻŌpūkahaʻia’s grammar book.

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Whose Footprints Are These?

Geologic evidence suggests that the modern caldera of Kīlauea formed shortly before 1500 AD. Repeated small collapses may have affected parts of the caldera floor, possibly as late as 1790. For over 300-400 years, the caldera was below the water table.

Kilauea can be an explosive volcano; several phreatic eruptions have occurred in the past 1,200 years.  (Phreatic eruptions, also called phreatic explosions, occur when magma heats ground or surface water.)

The extreme temperature of the magma (from 932 to 2,138 °F) causes near-instantaneous evaporation to steam, resulting in an explosion of steam, water, ash and rock – the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens was a phreatic eruption.

The 1924 eruption at Halemaʻumaʻu documents and illustrates the explosive nature of Kilauea.  However, the 1924 explosions were small by geologic standards and by the standards of some past Kilauea explosions.

The hazards of larger explosions, such as those that took place multiple times between about AD 1500 and 1790, are far worse than those associated with the 1924 series.  (USGS)

There were explosions in 1790, the most lethal known eruption of any volcano in the present United States. The 1790 explosions, however, simply culminated (or at least occurred near the end of) a 300-year period of frequent explosions, some quite powerful.  (USGS)

Keonehelelei is the name given by Hawaiians to the explosive eruption of Kilauea in 1790.  It is probably so named “the falling sands” because the eruption involved an explosion of hot gas, ash and sand that rained down across the Kaʻu Desert.  The character of the eruption was likely distinct enough to warrant a special name.  (Moniz-Nakamura)

At the time, Kaʻū Chief Keōuakūʻahuʻula (Keōua) was the only remaining rival of Kamehameha the Great for control of the Island of Hawaiʻi; Keōua ruled half of Hāmākua and all of Puna and Kaʻū Districts.  They were passing through the Kilauea area at the time of the eruption. The 1790 explosion led to the death of one-third of the warrior party of Keōua.  (Moniz-Nakamura)

Camped in Hilo, Keōua learned of an invasion of his home district of Kaʻū by warriors of Kamehameha. To reach Kaʻū from Hilo, Keōua had a choice of two routes one was the usually traveled coastal route, at sea level, but it was longer, hot, shadeless and without potable water for long distances.  (NPS)

The other route was shorter, but passed over the summit and through the lee of Kilauea volcano, an area sacred to, and the home of, the Hawaiian volcano goddess Pele. Keōua chose the volcano route, perhaps because it was shorter and quicker, with water available frequently.  (NPS)

In 1919, Ruy Finch, a geologist at the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory discovered human footprints fossilized in the Kaʻū desert ash. Soon, this area of the desert became known as “Footprints.”

Barefoot walkers left thousands of footprints in wet volcanic ash within a few miles southwest of Kīlauea’s summit.

Many historians and Hawaiians believe the footprints were made by Keōua and his warriors.  Keōua was known to be in the area at the time, and previous thought suggested this part of the desert did not have pre-contact use, so it was narrowed down to them.

Scientists later investigated – one approach was to look deeper at the evidence.

Forensic studies indicate that the length of a human foot is about 15% of an individual’s height. A man’s foot may be slightly more that 15%, a woman’s slightly less, but it is possible to estimate the height to a couple of inches.  (USGS)

They measured 405-footprints to determine how tall the walkers were.  The average calculated height is only 4-feet 11-inches, and few footprints were made by people 5-feet 9-inches or more tall. Early Europeans described Hawaiian warriors as tall; one missionary estimated an average height of 5-feet 10-inches. Many now believe that most of the footprints were made by women and children, not by men, much less warriors.  (USGS)

Meanwhile, Keōua’s party was camped on the upwind side of Kīlauea’s summit – perhaps on Steaming Flat – waiting for Pele’s anger to subside. They saw the sky clear after the ash eruption and began walking southwestward between today’s Volcano Observatory and Nāmakanipaio.  (USGS)

Suddenly, the most powerful part of the eruption began, developing a high column and sending surges at hurricane velocities across the path of the doomed group. Later, survivors and rescuers made no footprints in the once wet ash, which had dried.  (USGS)

Then, archaeologists looked for other evidence to help identify who the footprints may have belonged to.  Contrary to general thought that the area was not used by the Hawaiians, archaeological investigations discovered structures, trails and historic artifacts in the area.  (Moniz-Nakamura)

Most of the features were along the edge of the Keʻāmoku lava flow.  Several of the trails converge south of the flow, suggesting a major transportation network.  The structures are likely temporary, used as people were traversing through the desert on their way to/from Kaʻū and Hilo.  (Moniz-Nakamura)

The sheer number of temporary shelters along the Keʻāmoku flow, as well as the trail systems and quarry sites, strongly suggest that this area was frequently used by Hawaiians travelling to and through the area – before and after the 1790 eruption.  (Moniz-Nakamura)

If the footprints aren’t Keōua’s warriors, then how did one-third of his warriors die?

Several suggestions have been made: suffocation due to ash; lava, stones, ash and other volcanic material; or strong winds produced by the eruption, asphyxiation and burning killed them.  (Moniz-Nakamura)

A more recent suggestion is that a “hot base surge, composed primarily of superheated steam … (traveling at) hurricane velocity” was the cause of death.  The wind velocity prevented the people from running away; they probably huddled together, then “hot gases seared their lungs.”  (Moniz-Nakamura)

Some now suggest that, if these observations and ideas are correct, the footprints were made in 1790, but not by members of Keōua’s group.  (USGS)

A reconstruction of events suggests that wet ash, containing small pellets, fell early in the eruption, blown southwestward into areas where family groups, mainly women and children, were chipping glass from old pāhoehoe. They probably sought shelter while the ash was falling. Once the air cleared, they slogged across the muddy ash, leaving footprints in the 1-inch thick deposit.  (USGS)

On August 1, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signed the country’s 13th national park into existence – Hawaiʻi National Park.  At first, the park consisted of only the summits of Kilauea and Mauna Loa on Hawaiʻi and Haleakalā on Maui.

Eventually, Kilauea Caldera was added to the park, followed by the forests of Mauna Loa, the Kaʻū Desert, the rain forest of Olaʻa and the Kalapana archaeological area of the Puna/Kaʻū Historic District.

In 1961, Hawaiʻi National Park’s units were separated and re-designated as Haleakalā National Park and Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.) (Lots of good information here is from USGS, NPS and Jade Moniz-Nakamura.)

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Crusades

In about 1095, Alexios I Komnenos, the Byzantine emperor, sent to the pope, Urban II, and asked for aid from the west against the Seljuq Turks, who taken nearly all of Asia Minor from him. (Fordham)

At the Council of Clermont (in what’s now southern France), Pope Urban II called for peace among his audience, for them to unite against a common enemy. (Forbes)

“All who die by the way, whether by land or by sea, or in battle against the pagans, shall have immediate remission of sins. This I grant them through the power of God with which I am invested.”

“O what a disgrace if such a despised and base race, which worships demons, should conquer a people which has the faith of omnipotent God and is made glorious with the name of Christ!” (Pope Urban II, Fulcher of Chartres, Fordham)

“Of holy Jerusalem, brethren, we dare not speak, for we are exceedingly afraid and ashamed to speak of it. This very city, in which, as you all know, Christ Himself suffered for us, because our sins demanded it, has been reduced to the pollution of paganism and, I say it to our disgrace, withdrawn from the service of God.” (Pope Urban II, Balderic of Dol, Fordham)

“Let us suppose, for the moment, that Christ was not dead and buried, and had never lived any length of time in Jerusalem. Surely, if all this were lacking, this fact alone ought still to arouse you to go to the aid of the land and city — the fact that ‘Out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of Jehovah from Jerusalem!’” (Pope Urban II, Guibert de Nogent, Fordham)

“And you ought, furthermore, to consider with the utmost deliberation, if by your labors, God working through you, it should occur that the Mother of churches should flourish anew to the worship of Christianity, whether, perchance, He may not wish other regions of the East to be restored to the faith against the approaching time of the Antichrist.”

“For it is clear that Antichrist is to do battle not with the Jews, not with the Gentiles; but, according to the etymology of his name, He will attack Christians. And if Antichrist finds there no Christians (just as at present when scarcely any dwell there), no one will be there to oppose him, or whom he may rightly overcome.” (Pope Urban II, Guibert de Nogent, Fordham)

Pope Urban II called for defense of his fellow Christians who were under threat, and to retake Jerusalem that he said was rightfully theirs. (Forbes)

Thus began the crusades – a holy war.  The aristocracy of 11th-century Europe was indeed prepared to kill, if in service of the ‘right’ cause. And this was the ‘right’ cause for many of them. This warrior culture overlapped already with religion. They fought for family and for themselves, and certain types of warfare (in defense of the defenseless) could even lead to salvation.

In the end, Urban’s preaching tour inspired men to leave home, walk 2,500+ miles to Jerusalem, to kill people they’d never met and hardly heard of before. (Forbes)

The Crusades were waged by Christians against Muslims, Jews and fellow Christians. They were launched in the Middle East, in the Baltic, in Italy, in France and beyond.  (Smithsonian)  Between 1095 and 1291 there were seven major crusades.

Victorious leaders promptly divided up the territory into a small group of principalities that modern European historians have often called the “Crusader states.”

Crusading, or the idea of taking a holy vow to engage in military activity in exchange for spiritual reward, was refined over the next century, redirected to apply to whoever the pope decided might be an enemy of the faith (polytheists and Orthodox Christians in the north, Muslims in Iberia, heretics or rival European Christian powers in France and Italy).

In the Middle East, Jerusalem fell back into Islamic hands with the conquest of the city by the famed sultan Saladin in 1187. The last “Crusader” principality on the eastern Mediterranean coast, based out of the city of Acre, fell to the Mamluk ruler Baibars in 1291. (Smithsonian)

At this same time, stuff was happening in the Pacific, as well.

Using stratigraphic archaeology and refinements in radiocarbon dating, recent studies suggest it was about this same time that “Polynesian explorers first made their remarkable voyage from central Eastern Polynesia Islands, across the doldrums and into the North Pacific, to discover Hawai‘i.”  (Kirch)

“Most important from the perspective of Hawaiian settlement are the colonization dates for the Society Islands and the Marquesas, as these two archipelagoes have long been considered to be the immediate source regions for the first Polynesian voyagers to Hawai‘i. …”

“In sum, the southeastern archipelagoes and islands of Eastern Polynesia have a set of radiocarbon chronologies now converging on the period from AD 900–1000.”  (Kirch)

Research indicates human colonization of Eastern Polynesia took place much faster and more recently than previously thought. Polynesian ancestors settled in Samoa around 800 BC, colonized the central Society Islands between AD 1025 and 1120 and dispersed to New Zealand, Hawaiʻi and Rapa Nui and other locations between AD 1190 and 1290.  (Hunt; PVS)

With improved radiocarbon dating techniques and equipment to more than 1,400-radiocarbon dated materials from 47 islands, the model considers factors such as when a tree died rather than just when the wood was burned and whether seeds were gnawed by rats, which were introduced by humans.  (PVS)

“There is also no question that at least O‘ahu and Kauai islands were already well settled, with local populations established in several localities, by AD 1200.”  (Kirch)

Late and rapid dispersals explain remarkable similarities in artifacts such as fishhooks, adzes and ornaments across the region. The condensed timeframe suggests assumptions about the rates of linguistic evolution and human impact on pristine island ecosystems also need to be revised.  (PVS)

So, as the holy wars of the Crusades were waging into the Middle East, the Polynesians were first arriving and settling in what we refer to as the Hawaiian Islands.

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

James Magee

A “convivial, noble-hearted Irishman,” James Magee was born in 1750 and appears to have emigrated shortly before the American Revolution.  Boston town records for 1768 note the arrival of a James Magee with a group of Irish fishermen from Newfoundland (it’s not clear that that’s the same person).

Captain James Magee, of Boston, rose to eminence in maritime pursuits; he helped establish the first American commercial house in China; and he was one of the first in the East-India trade.

During the American Revolution, Magee commanded the privateer (privately owned armed vessel commissioned to attack enemy ships, usually vessels of commerce) Independence, which captured and brought into Boston harbor the British ship Countess.

From 1779 to 1783 Magee was master of at least three vessels: Amsterdam, Hermione and Gustavus.  With the war over, he married Margaret Elliot of Boston in October 1783, the youngest daughter of Simon Elliot, a well-known tobacco and snuff dealer.

Post-war Yankee ships expanded their reach and found their way into the ports of the Baltic, the Mediterranean and even around the Cape of Good Hope to the Indies.

In 1784, as part of this probing operation, Major Samuel Shaw sent the Empress of China to Canton with a cargo of ginseng. The Empress of China arrived at Macao on August 23, 1784, six months out from New York.

Later, after receiving the honorary title of American consul at Canton, Shaw, Isaac Sears and other New York merchants arranged for the ship Hope to both Batavia (Dutch East Indies, present-day Jakarta, Indonesia) and Canton (Guangzhou, China).

Sears chose James Magee to Captain the voyage, and on February 4, 1786 Hope sailed from New York carrying both Sears and Shaw as passengers and established the first American commercial house in China

By summer, Magee was back in Boston, and in September a portion of Hope’s cargo was offered for sale at the store of his nephew, Simon Elliot.

“As the first Boston captain to visit either Batavia or Canton, Magee must have been a source of keen interest among the town’s merchants and his voyage an important stimulant to those mulling the prospects of Oriental trade.”

Although America was outstripping every other nation in China trade, save Britain, she could not long compete with Britain without a suitable medium. The Canton market accepted little but specie (a silver coin, as distinguished from bullion or paper money) and eastern products.

Ginseng, the typical exchange, could be procured and sold only in limited quantities.  The ship Columbia was fitted out by a group of Boston merchants who believed the solution of the problem lay in the furs of the Northwest Coast.

The first association of Boston with the Northwest Coast was in 1787, when Joseph Barrell and his co-adventurers sent out the Columbia and the Washington.  (Howay)  John Kendrick commanded both the expedition and the ship Columbia.

The Columbia left Boston on September 30, 1787; that voyage began the Northwest fur trade, which enabled the merchant adventurers of Boston to tap the vast reservoir of wealth in China.

In the summer of 1789, before a full cargo of skins had been obtained, provisions began to run low. Captain Kendrick therefore remained behind, but sent Gray in the Columbia to Canton, where he exchanged his cargo of pelts for tea, and returned to Boston around the world. Her rivals were quick to follow.

Following this, Lieutenant Thomas Lamb and his brother James, merchants, joined Captain Magee in building the ship Margaret, one hundred fifty tons, which was commanded by Magee on December 24, 1791, “bound on a voyage of observation and enterprise to the North-Western Coast of this Continent.”

The Margaret was under command of Captain James Magee, one of her owners; David Lamb, first mate; Otis Liscombe, second mate; Stephen Hills, third mate, and John Howell, historian.

The Margaret was, says Haswell, “as fine a vessel as ever I saw of her size, and appeared exceeding well fitted for the voyage and I believe there was no expense spared.”

The captain, Magee, was Irish; Mr. Howel was English; there were two Swedes and one Dutchman before the mast; but all the remainder of her officers and crew were American. Including the boys, the total number on board was twenty-five.

About July 19, 1792, the Margaret sailed to the Columbia River in search of furs. On her return she reported little success. Magee got sick, and on August 12, Lamb, the first mate, took command of the Margaret and had sailed in company with the Hope.

Magee got sick to such a degree that he was intensely anxious to put foot on shore, in the hope that change of scene and the land air might prove beneficial. The men were set to work to build a house for his temporary residence.

When Vancouver anchored there on August 28, 1792, he found Captain Magee living on shore with his surgeon and John Howel. 

Captain Magee appears to have steadily improved in health after leaving the coast.  On November 8, while off Hawai‘i, where the Margaret was busy buying supplies, Captain Barkley of the Halcyon went on board.

Captain Magee received his visitor in a friendly manner and they soon agreed to go in company to Waikiki Bay, Oahu, to procure water. The three vessels, Halcyon, Margaret, and Hope anchored at Waikiki about a mile and a half off shore. The water was so clear that lying in ten fathoms they could plainly see the bottom.

The next night, fearing that the natives had some scheme to capture them, they set sail and, on the morning of 11th, arrived at Kauai. Late that afternoon they anchored in Waimea Bay. On the 13th the Halcyon sailed for China. The Margaret followed her ten days later, and reached Macao January 3, 1793.

Returning to the Islands, Magee wrote the following on behalf of one of his crew who was to stay in Hawai‘i: “Ship Margaret at Anchur, Whahoo, Oct’r 6th 1793. This may certify that the bearer, Oliver Holmes, having ever behaved himself with great propriety, as an honest and active man, towards his duty while on board the Margaret, under my command, and was discharged, by his own desire, to tarry on shore at the Island. James Magee.”

(Holmes became one of the first dozen foreigners (and one of the first Americans) to live in Hawaiʻi (he lived on the island of Oʻahu.)  Holmes married Mahi i, daughter of a high chief of Koʻolau who was killed in the battle of the Nuʻuanu Pali. Holmes made his living managing his land holdings on Oʻahu and Molokai, providing provisions to visiting ships. (Oliver Wendell Holmes was born August 29, 1809 in Cambridge, Massachusetts – Oliver Holmes was in Hawai‘i at the time.))

By this time, the trade route Boston – Northwest Coast – Canton – Boston was fairly established. Not only the merchantmen of Massachusetts, but the whalers balked of their accustomed traffic by European exclusiveness, were swarming around the Horn in search of new markets and sources of supply.

To obtain fresh provisions and prevent scurvy, the Northwest traders broke their voyage at least twice; at the Cape Verde Islands, the Falklands, sometimes Galapagos for a giant tortoise, and invariably Hawai‘i (which proved an ideal spot to replenish supplies).

The Northwest trade, the Hawaiian trade, and the fur seal fisheries were only a means to an end – the procuring of Chinese teas and textiles – to sell again at home and abroad. China was the only market for sea otter, and Canton the only Chinese port where foreigners were allowed to exchange it. Magee was part of the origins of the China trade.

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Coffee Schedule

“You know, when you in the seventh grade like that, to carry one bag of coffee was quite a chore. And load three bags on a donkey and come up the trail. When it rain, the donkey would slip on the trail, fall. Had to unload the coffee, get the donkey up, load it again. I know, many times, I used to cry.” (Minoru Inaba)

As early as 1684, a grammar school founded in Massachusetts required 12 months of education. In 1841, Boston schools operated for 244 days while Philadelphia implemented a 251-day calendar.

In the beginning of the nineteenth century, large cities commonly had long school years, ranging from 251 to 260 days. During this time, many of these rural schools were only open about 6 months out of the year.  (Pedersen)

The origin for the traditional school calendar based purely on agrarian needs was not entirely accurate. In the 19th century districts organized their calendars around the needs of the community.

For example, some special provisions were made for vacations during September and October for communities with large fall harvests. Prior to 1890, students in major urban areas were in school for 11 months a year. But by 1900, the more popular 180 day, 9-month calendar had been firmly established. (Pedersen)

In the days before air conditioning, schools and entire cities could be sweltering places during the hot summer months. Wealthy and eventually middle-class urbanites also usually made plans to flee the city’s heat, making those months the logical time in cities to suspend school.

By the late 19th century, school reformers started pushing for standardization of the school calendar across urban and rural areas. So a compromise was struck that created the modern school calendar.  (PBS)

In Kona, the harvest of coffee used to set the school calendar.  “(B)ecause coffee was the basic industry in those days, much of the land was planted in coffee, of course. As of now, much of the land has been abandoned. But in those days, coffee was the basic industry in Kona.”

“(T)here was no other industry in Kona except coffee farming, and the sugar plantation, for a while. And of course, ranching, they had from way back. There was no tourism. No other businesses except coffee farming in Kona. … Most of the families were farmers. … coffee farmers.” (Minoru Inaba)

“As early as 1916 a ‘coffee vacation’ of three weeks in each November was an established institution in central Kona, where 95 per cent of Hawaii’s coffee industry is located.”

“It continued up to 1924, when the ‘vacation’ became optional – each school deciding when and how many weeks the vacation may be held each autumn.” (Inouye)

Then, in 1931, “A special vacation of three weeks for all schools in Kona has been sanctioned by the department of public instruction … The length of the vacation was a compromise between four or five weeks wanted by the (coffee) planters, and two weeks favored by most school principals.” (Hawaii Tribune Herald, Sep 23, 1931)

That, apparently, wasn’t good enough to address the needs of families of Konawaena – a couple weeks later it was announced, “Members of the Kona-waena Parent-Teacher association gave their unanimous approval at a meeting yesterday …”

“… to the plan to change the Kona-waena school year from September to June to December to September, allowing school children to assist in the coffee harvest during the months of September, October, and November.”

“The action was taken to eliminate the so-called ‘coffee vacation’ which makes it necessary for students to make up the time lost by attending school during the Thanksgiving holiday period and for five Saturdays after the first of February.”

“Much opposition had developed to the coffee vacation and the new proposal was suggested as a means of adapting the school year to the needs of industry in the Kona district.” (Hawaii Tribune Herald, Nov 23. 1931)

The Star Bulletin announced “Change in Vacation Time at Kona-Waena … With the approval of the new vacation schedule for the Kona-waena high school and grammar school in Kona by the West Hawaii commissioners, the annual vacation will be shifted from summer to winter.” (SB, Feb 13, 1932)

“)B)ecause of the need of the farmers to have their children help them on the farms, the coffee schedule was established. And the coffee schedule ran from … August, September, October, November – those three months – was the regular vacation – coffee vacation. This is the time when it was coffee season, you see?” (Minoru Inaba)

“(T)he summer vacation was really a fall vacation and started around the 16th of August and went through to about the 16th of November. So, that took most of the football season. The community associations didn’t get into football, because that would have only hurt the reason for the schedule as it was.”

“It would take kids away from picking coffee and helping their families. I think eventually, though, these kids found other things to do – possibly (because of) family transportation. Kids found other things to do a lot better than picking coffee.” (Sherwood Greenwell)

“You see, how they got that, you have to have the school kids pick coffee, eh? That’s the only way they can help the parents, by picking coffee. So, if you stay home from school, you lose that much education. I guess they entered a resolution or whatever you call it. Anyway, they got their school to change the time … that’s when you’re picking coffee.”

“We [normally] go back September. … the peak season is right when the school go back. So, they change it so that they have their Kona schedule on a coffee harvest time. Well, it worked out all right like that.” (Willie Thompson)

“(I)n the earlier days, on off season, the time before harvesting and after trimming, there weren’t job opportunities for the farmers. There was a criticism – probably doesn’t hold as much today because there’re not as many schoolteachers that are in the coffee business – but a lot of the schoolteachers that came back here, came back here because they had coffee farms – their

families had coffee farms.”

“Well, the coffee schedule really ended because the families could no longer get the kids to come back and spend the time on the farms to pick coffee, which the coffee schedule was supposed to take care of.”

“But those teachers that had coffee farms were more concerned about their coffee operations really than they were on their teaching. The teaching gave them the security of a steady income, while the coffee income was what they were really concerned about.” (Sherwood Greenwell)

“There were probably five or six years of where there was a question, (should) the coffee schedule be continued or (should) they give it up?  This became quite a hassle. It was kept, I think, longer than it was practical.”

“Probably for one reason more than anything else, and that was that a lot of the farmers felt that it was a concession that they had somehow gotten that was very important to them. Not that it was that worthwhile to them, but it was a concession that government had given them and they wanted it sort of there, even though it wasn’t working out as well as it should.”

“So, I think that probably extended the [time].  And it also – you got a feeling from the attitude of some people that if you were for going back to the regular schedule, that you were an enemy to coffee.”

“This was a feeling, I think, that a lot of people had who would like to have seen the thing [coffee schedule] dropped. It took some time and some guts for most of the people to overcome that feeling. So, I think it did continue longer than it should have.”

“I think it would have been better for the kids and everybody that it would be over with sooner. Kids going into college off the Kona schedule, college almost had started before they graduated, and I don’t think it helped that type of education – you know, ongoing education – for the kids.”  (Sherwood Greenwell)

Kona was not the only place with crop-based vacations … “(O)ne year, we were cutting back across the states, and there was a kid in Idaho fishing at a stream where we were fishing. We asked him how come he wasn’t in school. He said, ‘oh, spud vacation’. What they did was, school was let out at the height of the potato harvesting season for two weeks.”

“Something like that probably would have been a better way of doing it. Going on the regular schedule and then just having a vacation tied right into the harvesting period.” (Sherwood Greenwell)

“Then, the coffee kind of faded out. All the new teachers, they didn’t like teaching when all the other teachers have a rest, and they working. Then, they changed back to the regular. Then, the weather kind of changed too. Not much coffee. The season kind of different, too. So, that’s how they got the schools like that … about in the ’60s, they changed back to the regular schedule.” (Willie Thompson)

“I think, at the beginning, there was a real reason for it and I think it worked out very well. I think it strengthened the ties within the family where they all were working together for something.”

“I know it’s been said at times, if you had someone applying for a job that came from Kona, he was a good worker. He had good loyalty and he was a good worker. I think that all comes from that period where everybody in the family worked hard together.” (Sherwood Greenwell)

In 1932, the school coffee schedule was inaugurated. There are 1,077 coffee farms in Kona, covering 5,498 acres. The farms ranged in size from 3 to 30 acres, with the average size being 5 acres.

Kona students picked a total of 25,320 bags during their “summer” vacation period between October and December in 1932.  (Social History of Kona)

On June 20, 1968, “The Kona coffee schedule of November – to – August year for Kona schools was ended … in a complicated series of actions by the State Board of Education.  The board thus ended a 36-year-old unique tradition devised to free youngsters to pick coffee during the harvest months of September and October.”

A transition year in 1968-69 was “a temporary measure to provide time to plan for implementing an entirely new system in the 1969-70 school year.”  (SB, June 21, 1968)

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