Peter T Young

February 2, 2016 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Likelike

She was the sister of a King and Queen – and the daughter of High Chief Kapaʻakea and Chiefess Analeʻa Keohokālole – her sister became Queen Liliʻuokalani and her brothers were King Kalākaua and William Pitt Leleiōhoku.

Miriam Kapili Kekāuluohi Likelike was born on January 13, 1851. Unlike her brothers and sister, Princess Likelike’s early years were spent on the Island of Hawaiʻi.

On returning to Honolulu, “Her first course of instruction was at the school of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart, and she finished her education at Kawaiahaʻo Seminary.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, February 4, 1887)

Then her musical endeavors began in earnest; encouraged by her siblings she wrote music. With her sister, she led one of the three royal music clubs that held regular friendly competitions to outdo each other in song and poetry.

Like her sister, Princess Likelike sponsored many concerts and musical pageants in and around Honolulu, and played an important role in the development and perpetuation of Hawaiian music by the encouragement and patronage she gave to young musicians and composers. (HMHOF)

On September 22, 1870, Princess Likelike was married to Honolulu businessman Archibald Scott Cleghorn. The wedding was held at Washington Place, the residence of Governor Dominis and Princess Liliʻuokalani.

Cleghorn, born November 15th 1835 in Edinburgh, Scotland, was brought to Hawaii by his parents, Mr and Mrs Thomas Cleghorn by way of New Zealand.

After arriving to Honolulu in 1851, Thomas set up a dry goods store in Chinatown, but within the year, at the age of 54, Thomas suffered a fatal heart attack while on his way home from church. Archibald took over his father’s business and turned it into one of the most successful mercantile chains in the islands. (Kaʻiulani Project)

“Princess Likelike visited New Zealand and Australia with her husband, Hon AS (Archibald Scott) Cleghorn, soon after her marriage and was very favorably impressed with what she saw, more especially the city of Melbourne.”

“She also twice visited San Francisco. Her mind, expanded by travel and intercourse with the world, was bent upon the moral and physical elevation of her own race, and she therefore lent herself heartily to every educational scheme looking to that end.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, February 3, 1887)

When her brother David Kalākaua became King in 1874, Miriam was given the title ‘Princess Likelike’ and she was appointed governess of Oʻahu.

The Cleghorns had one child Kaʻiulani (born on October 16, 1875) – “the only member of the Royal Family having issue.” (Daily Herald, February 3, 1887)

ʻĀinahau, Princess Likelike’s Waikiki home was said to have been the most beautiful private estate in the Hawaiian Islands. A driveway between rows of stately palms led to the gracious pillared mansion set in a grove of 500 coco palms. Artificial lakes dotted with pink water lilies, and statues found here and there, added to the charming grounds.

Mango trees were plentiful, and everywhere one could catch the scent of sweet smelling pīkake and gardenias. Proud peacocks strutted through the grounds displaying their beautiful feathers. Thousands of trees, shrubs and vines grew in this huge garden estate.

Today, ʻĀinahau is no more. The Governor Cleghorn Condominium stands at the entrance to the driveway which led to the house. (Likelike ES)

‘ʻĀinahau,’ the most famous of Likelike’s compositions, was written about the Cleghorn residence in Waikiki, the gathering place for Sunday afternoon musical gettogethers. She wrote most of her compositions there, and supported the musical education of her daughter, Princess Kaʻiulani. (HMHOF)

Click here, then the link, to hear a performance of ʻĀinahau (1914, LOC)

Not in very good health, Princess Likelike died at the early age of 36 on February 2, 1887. She will be long be remembered for her kindness to children, her pleasing manners, her many charities, her never failing hospitality, and her beautiful songs. (Likelike ES)

“Princess Likelike was generally beloved for her amiable and kindly disposition her cordial and gracious manners. Her late Royal Highness will long be remembered for the deep interest she took in the welfare of her race and in many worthy objects of a religious and benevolent nature.”

“Although a leading member of St Andrews Cathedral she held a lively concern for the prosperity of native churches outside of the Anglican communion. This was strikingly manifested in her attendance on last Saturday week although in a weak physical condition at a festival in aid of the Kaumakapili Church building fund.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, February 4, 1887)

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January 31, 2016 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

“Great and Good Friend”

“I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families – second families, perhaps I should say.”

“My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks…. My father … removed from Kentucky to … Indiana, in my eighth year…. It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up….” (Abraham Lincoln; White House)

He married Mary Todd, and they had four boys, only one of whom lived to maturity. In 1858 Lincoln ran against Stephen A Douglas for Senator. He lost the election, but in debating with Douglas he gained a national reputation that won him the Republican nomination for President in 1860.

On November 6, 1860, Abraham Lincoln was elected President of the US, becoming the first Republican President to win the presidency. It was a time when the country was divided.

Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: “In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war.”

“The government will not assail you…. You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it.” (White House)

On December 20, 1860, South Carolina became the first state to secede from the Union. By the time of Lincoln’s inauguration on March 4, 1861, seven states had seceded, and the Confederate States of America had been formally established, with Jefferson Davis as its elected president.

When the first shot of the American Civil War was fired at Fort Sumter off the coast of South Carolina on April 12, 1861, nearly six thousand miles away, the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi was a sovereign nation.

On August 26, 1861, five months after the outbreak of hostilities and four months after the news of Civil War arrived in Honolulu, Kamehameha IV issued a Proclamation that, in part, stated, “hostilities are now unhappily pending between the Government of the United States, and certain States thereof styling themselves ‘The Confederate States of America.’”

On January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy. Later that year, at 5:30 am on the morning of July 1, the first skirmish of the Battle of Gettysburg took place.

After three days of fighting, while both armies were badly impacted (with an estimated 51,112 casualties (23,049 Union and 28,063 Confederate,)) it was considered a decisive victory for the Union. On November 19, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln delivered what is now referred to as the Gettysburg Address.

The Civil War continued until the spring of 1865 when the North won the war. Throughout 1864 and 1865, President Lincoln worked to pass the 13th Amendment, which declared that slavery and involuntary servitude were no longer allowed in the US and gave Congress the power to enforce this law.

In the Islands, a little over a week after the Gettysburg Address (November 30, 1863,) Kamehameha IV, after serving approximately 9-years as King, died of chronic asthma in Honolulu at the age of 29. His brother, Lot Kapuāiwa, became King Kamehameha V.

Shortly thereafter, King Kamehameha V received a letter from President Abraham Lincoln, addressed to “Great and Good Friend,” expressing his “feelings of profound sorrow” of his brother’s death.

“Not only I, but the whole American People are deeply moved by the intelligence of the event with which God in His infinite wisdom has afflicted your Majesty and the Hawaiian Nation; for whom this Government and people have ever entertained sentiments of almost paternal regard, as well as of sincere friendship and unchanging interest.”

“It is gratifying to know that His Majesty’s place on the Throne and in the hearts of the Hawaiian people is occupied by one who was allied to him by the closest ties of blood, and by a long participation in the affairs of the Kingdom.”

“Your Majesty may ever firmly rely upon my sincere sympathy and cordial support and upon the abiding friendship of the people of the United States in the execution of the lofty mission entrusts to you by Providence.” (Lincoln, February 2, 1864)

Lincoln closed the letter noting, “I remain Your Majesty’s Good Friend.” (Lincoln, February 2, 1864)

Hawaiʻi’s neutrality did not prevent many of its citizens from enlisting in either Union or Confederate forces. One, a Hawaiian from Hilo, was Henry Hoʻolulu Pitman, son of Kinoʻole O Liliha, a Hawaiian high chiefess of Hilo. He enlisted in the Union Army and later died of disease in Richmond, Virginia’s infamous Libby Prison.

A dozen Hawaiians (possibly from captured ships) also served as Confederate sailors aboard the famous raider CSS Shenandoah which circumnavigated the globe and sank or captured nearly forty Union and merchant vessels throughout the Pacific. (Captured sailors could be put in chains below deck, marooned on an island or be given the chance to join the crew of the Southern vessel – many chose the latter.)

About 40 individuals who were born and raised in Hawaiʻi served in the Civil War. As many as 200-immigrants to Hawaiʻi who were living here at the outbreak of the war in 1861 may have served in the conflict.

Lincoln won re-election in 1864, as Union military triumphs signaled an end to the war. On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, Lincoln was shot at Ford’s Theatre in Washington by John Wilkes Booth. Lincoln died at 7:22 am on April 15, 1865, at the age of 56.

On May 11, 1865, Ka Nupepa Kuokoa (noting the death of Abraham Lincoln) noted “No words of ours can do justice to our grief. … “

“All over the world the friends of liberty and justice, the poor, the oppressed everywhere, will weep for him, the Savior of his country, the Liberator of four million slaves, the People’s friend. … His name will forever be revered … The Nation still lives.”

In 1868, three years after the Civil War ended, a group of Union veterans established “Decoration Day” on May 30 as a time to remember and decorate the graves of service members with flowers, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. By the end of the 19th century, Memorial Day ceremonies were being held on May 30 throughout the nation.

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January 30, 2016 by Peter T Young 4 Comments

ʻAilāʻau

The longest recorded eruption at Kilauea, arguably, was the ʻAilāʻau eruption and lava flow in the 15th century, which may be memorialized in the Pele-Hiʻiaka chant. It was the largest in Hawaiʻi in more than 1,000-years.

The flow was named after ʻAilāʻau was known and feared by all the people. ʻAi means the “one who eats or devours.” Lāʻau means “tree” or a “forest.”

ʻAilāʻau was, therefore, the forest eating (destroying) fire-god. Time and again he laid the districts of South Hawaii desolate by the lava he poured out from his fire-pits. (He was the fire god before Pele arrived at Hawaiʻi Island.)

He was the god of the insatiable appetite; the continual eater of trees, whose path through forests was covered with black smoke fragrant with burning wood, and sometimes burdened with the smell of human flesh charred into cinders in the lava flow.

ʻAilāʻau seemed to be destructive and was so named by the people, but his fires were a part of the forces of creation. He built up the islands for future life. The flowing lava made land. Over time, the lava disintegrates and makes earth deposits and soil. When the rain falls, fruitful fields form and people settled there.

ʻAilāʻau still poured out his fire. It spread over the fertile fields, and the people feared him as the destroyer giving no thought to the final good.

He lived, the legends say, for a long time in a very ancient part of Kilauea, on the large island of Hawaii, now separated by a narrow ledge from the great crater and called Kilauea Iki (Little Kilauea).

The ʻAilāʻau eruption took place from a vent area just east of Kilauea Iki. The eruption built a broad shield. The eastern part of Kilauea Iki Crater slices through part of the shield, and red cinder and lava flows near the center of the shield can be seen on the northeastern wall of the crater.

The eruption probably lasted about 60 years, ending around 1470 (based on evaluation of radiocarbon data for 17 samples of lava flows produced by the ʻAilāʻau shield – from charcoal created when lava burns vegetation.) The ages obtained for the 17 samples were averaged and examined statistically to arrive at the final results.

The radiocarbon data are supported by the magnetic declination and inclination of the lava flows, frozen into the flows when they cooled. This study found that these “paleomagnetic directions” are consistent with what was expected for the 15th century.

Such a long eruption naturally produced a large volume of lava, estimated to be about 5.2 cubic kilometers (1.25 cubic miles) after accounting for the bubbles in the lava. The rate of eruption is about the same as that for other long-lasting eruptions at Kilauea.

This large volume of lava covered a huge area, about 166 square miles (over 106,000-acres) – larger than the Island of Lānaʻi. From the summit of the ʻAilāʻau shield, pāhoehoe lava flowed 25-miles northeastward, making it all the way to the coast.

Lava covered all, or most, of what are now Mauna Loa Estates, Royal Hawaiian Estates, Hawaiian Orchid Island Estates, Fern Forest Vacation Estates, Eden Rock Estates, Crescent Acres, Hawaiian Acres, Orchid Land Estates, ʻAinaloa, Hawaiian Paradise Park and Hawaiian Beaches. (USGS)

After a time, ʻAilāʻau left these pit craters and went into the great crater and was said to be living there when Pele came to the seashore far below.

When Pele came to the island Hawaiʻi, she first stopped at a place called Keahialaka in the district of Puna. From this place she began her inland journey toward the mountains. As she passed on her way there grew within her an intense desire to go at once and see ʻAilāʻau, the god to whom Kilauea belonged, and find a resting-place with him as the end of her journey.

She came up, but ʻAilāʻau was not in his house – he had made himself thoroughly lost. He had vanished because he knew that this one coming toward him was Pele. He had seen her toiling down by the sea at Keahialaka. Trembling dread and heavy fear overpowered him.

He ran away and was entirely lost. When he came to that pit she laid out the plan for her abiding home, beginning at once to dig up the foundations. She dug day and night and found that this place fulfilled all her desires. Therefore, she fastened herself tight to Hawaii for all time.

These are the words in which the legend disposes of this ancient god of volcanic fires. He disappears from Hawaiian thought and Pele from a foreign land finds a satisfactory crater in which her spirit power can always dig up everlastingly overflowing fountains of raging lava. (Westervelt)

The ʻAilāʻau flow was such a vast outpouring changed the landscape of much of Puna. It must have had an important impact on local residents, and as such it may well be described in the Pele-Hiʻiaka chant.

Hiʻiaka, late on returning to Kilauea from Kauaʻi with Lohiau, sees that Pele has broken her promise and set afire Hiʻiaka’s treasured ʻōhiʻa lehua forest in Puna. Hiʻiaka is furious, and this leads to her love-making with Lohiau, his subsequent death at the hands of Pele, and Hiʻiaka’s frantic digging to recover the body.

The ʻAilāʻau flows seem to be the most likely candidate because it covered so much of Puna. The timing seems right, too – after the Pele clan arrived from Kahiki, before the caldera formed (Hiʻiaka’s frantic digging may record this), and before the encounters with Kamapuaʻa, some of which probably deal with explosive eruptions between about 1500 and 1790. (Information here is from USGS and Westervelt.)

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January 29, 2016 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Plantation Camps

“I want (my children) to remember that the parents, grandparents were part of that company, the sugar company. The parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents, you know, down the line, the older generation.”

“I want (my children) to think about the older generation, what they gone through for make you possible, as a young generation coming up, eh? That the sugar made you a family, too.” (John Mendes, former Hāmākua Sugar Company worker; UH Center for Oral History)

A century after Captain James Cook’s arrival in Hawaiʻi, sugar plantations started to dominate the Hawaiian landscape. A shortage of laborers to work in the growing (in size and number) sugar plantations became a challenge. The only answer was imported labor.

Starting in the 1850s, labor shortages were eased by bringing in contract workers from Asia, Europe and North America. There were three big waves of workforce immigration: Chinese 1852; Japanese 1885 and Filipinos 1905.

Several smaller, but substantial, migrations also occurred: Portuguese 1877; Norwegians 1880; Germans 1881; Puerto Ricans 1900; Koreans 1902 and Spanish 1907.

The different languages and unusual names created problems; because of this, sugar plantation owners devised an identification system to keep workers sorted out. Upon each laborer’s arrival, a plantation official gave them a metal tag called a bango.

The bango was made of brass or aluminum and had a number printed on one side. It was usually worn on a chain around their neck. Bangos came in different shapes. The shape you wore was determined by your race. Every plantation used bangos. (Lassalle) “They never call a man by his name. Always by his bango, 7209 or 6508 in that manner.” (Takaki)

Plantation camps, developed to house workers and their families, were once scattered among the cane fields. The plantation camps were segregated by ethnicity as well as by occupational rank. Most had the “Japanese camp,” “the Puerto Rican camp,” “the Filipino camp.” (Merry) “There was one called ‘Alabama Camp.’ “Alabama?” “Yeah; we used to have Negroes working on the plantation.” (Takaki)

Supervisors, called lunas, were generally haole (white,) native Hawaiian or Portuguese until the early twentieth century, or Japanese by midcentury. They lived in special parts of the plantation housing, divided from those of other backgrounds by roads and by rules not to play with the children across the street.

The plantation manager typically lived in the “big house” across the street, and although his children might sneak out to play with the workers, his social life revolved around visits with other haole manager families. (Merry)

After cane railroads came into use, field camps were discontinued almost entirely and everyone lived close to the mill. (MacDonald)

While the emigration of Japanese women during the picture bride era changed the composition of the plantation camps there still remained a large community of single male laborers. In 1910 men outnumbered adult women 2-to-1 in the Territory and in some communities, the sex ratio was even more skewed. (Bill)

The canefields were a social space as well as worksite. With families to care for, women had little free time and fieldwork offered daily contact with other women. The companionship of others is what women most often remember about their field work days. (Bill)

The camps were self-sufficient and resources, hours, and pay were tightly controlled by the plantation management. As their contracts expired, members of these ethnic groups either moved back to their home countries, or moved to “plantation towns” and began mercantile business, boarding houses bars, restaurants, billiard halls, dance halls and movie theaters. (Historic Honokaa Project)

Company towns with schools, churches, businesses, hospitals, and recreational facilities emerged as workers raised families on the plantations. (Bill)

“We bought most of our food and clothing from the plantation stores and, if our families were short of cash, credit would be provided. Some children were born at home, but most of us were born in and treated for our illnesses at the plantation hospital.”

“We were entertained (in a) recreational building provided by the plantation. Our young people, especially the males, enjoyed the ballparks provided – again – by the plantations. … (W)e worshiped in church building provided by plantation management for the large groups who worshiped and conducted religious instruction in the language of their members.” (Nagtalon-Miller)

While the public schools in the rural areas of Hawaii were not under direct control of plantation management, they were looked upon as an extension of the plantation because virtually every child had parents who worked on the plantation.

School principal and teachers were often included in the social milieu of the plantations hierarchy, and school program tended to represent middle-class American values of hard work and upward mobility, which have motivated second generation children from the early 1930s to the present.

Although immigrants did not own their own homes or lots (everything was owned by the plantations, which provided for most of their needs), our families were largely content with this economic support system. In any case, for most people there was no alternative.

Most laborers had little or no schooling. We lived in groups where language and cultural values were shared. While wages were meager, women took in laundry, made and sold ethnic foods, and did sewing to supplement their husbands’ pay, and many people were able to send money regularly to parents, siblings, or wives and children who remained in the Philippines, enabling them to buy property or finance an education. (Nagtalon-Miller)

“The plantation took care of us. The plantation was everybody’s mom over here. They held us. I mean, you had plantation life, and then you get the real world. And we were so sheltered.” (Dardenella Gamayo, Pa‘auhau resident; UH Center for Oral History)

Make no mistake; life on the plantation was hard.

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Sugar plantation at Hana, Maui-S00030-1885

Sugar mill at Wailuku, Maui-S00028-1880s

Portuguese family HC&S Co.’s Spanish B Camp in Pu’unene in the 1930s-Adv

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Onomea sugar plantation, Hamakua Coast, Hawaii Island-PP-28-11-008-1935

McGerrow Camp in Pu’unene (circa 1960) was home to HC&S workers-Adv

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C. Brewer’s Honolulu plantation mill (1898-1946) Aiea, Oahu, ca. 1910

Japanese sugar plantation laborers at Kau, Hawaii Island-S00039-1890

Sugar Plantation workers eating lunch from their Kau Kau Tin

Puerto Ricans in the fields on Maui, circa 1920

University of Hawaii students sit together to show the ethnic differences of Hawaii’s population in 1948-NPR

January 26, 2016 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Nutridge

For at least 40,000 years, Australian Aborigines have lived in macadamia heartland. As hunters and gatherers, they had an intimate understanding of their environment.

The wild macadamias usually grew in dense rainforests, with competition from other trees and absence of light resulting in their producing few nuts.

However, trees growing at the edge of the rainforest or where the Aborigines had encouraged them by burning around each tree generally produced annual crops.

Macadamia nuts were a treasured food but a very minor part of the Aboriginal diet due to their rarity. (McConachie)

In 1828, Alan Cunningham (explorer and botanist) was the first Western person to record the macadamia. Other names for Macadamia Nuts are Bush nut, Queensland nut, Queen of nuts, Macadamia, Bauple nut, Boombera, Jindilli and Gyndl.

In 1857, German-Australian botanist Ferdinand von Mueller gave the genus of this plant the scientific name Macadamia – named after von Mueller’s friend Dr John Macadam (although, allegedly, Macadam had not seen a macadamia nut tree, or even tasted the macadamia nut.)

Macadamia seeds were first imported into Hawaiʻi in 1882 by William Purvis; he planted them in Kapulena on the Hāmākua Coast. A second introduction into Hawaii was made in 1892 by Robert and Edward Jordan who planted the trees at the former’s home in Nuʻuanu Honolulu. (Storey)

“Brought in ‘solely as an addition to the natural beauty of Paradise’ (Hawaiian Annual, 1940,) it was not until ES (Ernest Sheldon) Van Tassel started some plantings at Nutridge in 1921 that the commercial growing of the plant began. On June 1, 1922, the Hawaiian Macadamia Nut Company Ltd. was formed.” (NPS)

The Van Tassel plantings were at ʻUalakaʻa on a grassy hillside of former pasture land. Mo‘olelo (Hawaiian stories) indicate that Pu‘u ‘Ualaka‘a was a favored locality for sweet potato cultivation and King Kamehameha I established his personal sweet potato plantation here.

‘Pu‘u translates as “hill” and ‘ualaka‘a means “rolling sweet potato”, so named for the steepness of the terrain. (It’s above Makiki and also called Round Top.) Within the valley is a quarry where the basalt outcrop was chipped into pieces to make octopus lures. That is believed to be the origin of the word ‘makiki’ – a type of stone used for weights in octopus lures.

Historical attempts at cultivation in the Makiki-Tantalus area included a coffee plantation by JM Herring along Moleka Stream in the late-1800s (valley conditions proved too wet for coffee beans to flourish) and Hawai‘i’s first commercial macadamia nut plantation along the west side of Pu‘u ‘Ualaka‘a.

“Van Tassel, President of the Hawaii Macadamia Nut Company, Ltd, became interested in the possibilities of this nut for creating a new industry and had so much faith in its future that he organized in 1922 the present company for the purpose of commercial production and has been its guiding spirit ever since.” (Mid-Pacific, October 1933)

“At the present time, the Hawaiian Macadamia Nut Company has about 7,000 trees in its groves at Keauhou, Kona District, Hawaii, which are now coming into profitable bearing. The company has also approximately 2,000 trees growing and producing in the Nutridge grove on Round Top, Honolulu, or a total of 9,000 trees.” (Mid-Pacific, October 1933)

Nutridge was the name for Van Tassel’s home and grove. In 1925, Mr. Van Tassel commissioned architect Hart Wood to design his residence at Nutridge.

Wood was at the forefront of the movement to create a style of architecture in Hawaii which would appropriately reflect a sense of place.

One story high, the house is essentially devoid of ornate embellishment and follows an extremely original layout with the lanai (porch) serving in the capacity of a hallway, providing direct access to the bedrooms. Such an arrangement accentuates the sense of outdoor living.

Also by placing the rooms in a serial manner, the architect provided each room with cross-ventilation taking advantage of the trade winds. The dwelling’s double-pitched hipped roof would become a common feature in the evolving ‘Hawaiian style’ of architecture, and adds to the building’s low profile. (NPS)

In order to stimulate interest in macadamia culture, beginning January 1, 1927, a Territorial law exempted properties in the Territory, used solely for the culture or production of macadamia nuts, from taxation for a period of 5 years.

That year, the Territory granted Van Tassel a 50-lease on Nutridge. By 1934, there were about 25-acres planted on Tantalus. (CTAHR)

Commercial processing of macadamia nuts began in 1934 at Van Tassel’s new factory in Kaka‘ako. The nuts were shelled, roasted, salted, bottled and marketed there as “Van’s Macadamia Nuts.” (Schmitt)

Nuts went from the farm on Round Top down through the flumes into trucks to his processing warehouse in Kakaʻako, where they were then sold. This plantation remained in operation until the 1970s and discontinued when the Honolulu processing plant suspended operations. (NPS)

In its heyday, celebrities such as Clark Gable, Carlo Lombard, Frank Sinatra and Dina Merrill visited and stayed at the Nutridge House.

The macadamia nut trees and the remnants of the historic flume system used to collect and transport the nuts remain on the slopes of ‘Ualakaʻa today. In 1981, the house was nominated and placed on the National Register of Historic Places and is part of the Hawaii State Park System, Pu‘u ‘Ualaka‘a State Wayside in Tantalus.

For approximately 30-years, the historic house has been cared for and occupied under a permit by Rick Ralston, the founder and former owner of retail icon Crazy Shirts.

Ralston invested significant sums of money and devoted considerable time and energy in meticulously restoring the historic house which might have otherwise been lost due to years of neglect. The house had been quietly maintained and used as a residence. (DLNR)

Recently (2013,) DLNR issued a revocable permit to Discovering Hidden Hawaiʻi Tours, Inc for commercial events at the Nutridge property, including luaus (‘The Big Kahuna Luau’) and other similar events, tours and special, small scale events and non-profit and community use purposes.

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