Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Lot Kapuāiwa

December 11, 1830, Lot Kapuāiwa was born. His mother was Kīnaʻu, the daughter of Kamehameha I (she became the Kuhina nui, in 1832.) His father was Mataio Kekūanāoʻa, a descendent of the Chiefs of the Island of Oʻahu (he was governor of Oʻahu, as well as a member of the House of Nobles and the Privy Council.)

Lot Kapuāiwa was hānai to Chief Hoapili of Lāhainā and Princess Nāhiʻenaʻena.  (Kapuāiwa means mysterious kapu (taboo) or sacred one protected by supernatural powers.)

He was 9-years-old when he entered the Chiefs’ Children’s School. The aliʻi wanted their children trained in Western, as well as Hawaiian traditions and Kamehameha III asked missionaries Amos and Juliette Cooke to teach the young royals.

In 1849, Lot and Alexander Liholiho (his brother) began their year-long trip to the United States and Europe. When he returned he was appointed a member of the House of Nobles and began government service.

He ascended to the throne as Kamehameha V on November 30, 1863, on the death of his brother.  “He was a master in the beginning, & at the middle, & to the end.  The Parliament was the “figure-head,” & it never was much else in his time. … He hated Parliaments, as being a rasping & useless incumbrance upon a king, but he allowed them to exist because as an obstruction they were more ornamental than rival.”  (Twain)

“He surrounded himself with an obsequious royal Cabinet of American & other foreigners, & he dictated his measures to them &, through them, to his Parliament; & the latter institution opposed them respectfully, not to say apologetically, & passed them.”  (Twain)

Kamehameha V modeled his leadership after that of his grandfather, Kamehameha I, believing that it was the right and duty of the chiefs to lead the common people. He refused to support the Constitution of 1852. By supporting the controversial Constitution of 1864, he expected to regain some of the powers lost by previous kings.  (ksbe)

“He was not a fool.  He was a wise sovereign; he had seen something of the world; he was educated & accomplished, & he tried hard to do well for his people, & succeeded.  There was no rival nonsense about him; he dressed plainly, poked about Honolulu, night or day, on his old horse, unattended; he was popular, greatly respected, & even beloved.”  (Twain)

In 1865, a bill to repeal the law making it a penal offense to sell or give intoxicating liquor to native Hawaiians was brought before the legislature.  Strongly supported by some, Kamehameha surprised the supporters saying, “I will never sign the death warrant of my people.” The measure was defeated in the second reading.  (Alexander)

Kamehameha V founded the Royal Order of Kamehameha on April 11, 1865 in commemoration of his grandfather, Kamehameha I. The stated purpose of the order was “to cultivate and develop, among our subjects, the feelings of honour and loyalty to our dynasty and its institutions and … to confer honorary distinctions upon such of our subjects and foreigners as have rendered, or may hereafter render to our dynasty and people, important services.”  (Royal Order)

Hansen’s Disease was rapidly spreading on Oʻahu.  In response, the legislature passed “An Act to Prevent the Spread of Leprosy” in 1865, which King Kamehameha V approved. This law provided for setting apart land for an establishment for the isolation and seclusion of leprous persons who were thought capable of spreading the disease.  The first shipment of lepers landed at Kalaupapa January 6, 1866, the beginning of segregation and banishment of lepers to the leper settlement.

By 1866, the need for a new courthouse government building in the Hawaiian Kingdom was apparent.  The legislature appropriated funds towards a new palace and a new government building. Delays ensued.  Plans for a new palace were postponed, but the new courthouse moved forward.  On February 19, 1872, Kamehameha V laid the cornerstone for Aliʻiolani Hale (now home to the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court.)

King Kamehameha V encouraged the revival of native practices. On Maui, a group of eight Hawaiians founded the ʻAhahui Laʻau Lapaʻau.  In 1868, the Legislature established a Hawaiian Board of Health to license kahuna laʻau lapaʻau. Kahuna practices including lomilomi massage and laʻau kahea healing remained legal for the next twenty years.  (princeton-edu)

Later, his summer home in Moanalua Gardens became the home of the annual Prince Lot Hula Festival, the largest non-competitive hula event in Hawai‘i.  It honors Lot Kapuāiwa who helped to revive hula by staging pāʻina (parties) at his summer home.  (Save the date, July 19, 2014, for the 37th annual event at Moanalua Gardens.)

The Kamehameha V Post Office (built in 1871, one of the oldest remaining public buildings in Hawaiʻi, and so named because it was built at the direction of Kamehameha V) was the first post office building in Hawaiʻi. For many years, it also housed the publishing and printing office of the Hawaiian Gazette and other small companies and organizations needing office space.  (NPS)

December 11, Lot Kapuāiwa celebrated the first Kamehameha Day in 1871 as a day to honor his grandfather; the first celebration fell on Lot’s birthday.  Because the weather was better in the summer, the decision was made to move the Kamehameha I celebration six months from the King Kamehameha V’s birthday (so it was moved to June 11 – the date has no direct significance to Kamehameha I.)  The 1896 legislature declared it a national holiday.  (Kamehameha Day continues to be celebrated on June 11.)

He had a law passed by the Legislative Assembly in 1872 that funded and authorized the acquisition of the hotel on the corner of Hotel Street and Richards Street by the Hawaiian government, which he named the Royal Hawaiian Hotel.  (The “Pink Palace” in Waikīkī was a different/subsequent Royal Hawaiian, built in 1927.)

Bernice Pauahi was betrothed to Lot Kapuāiwa; but when Mr Charles R Bishop pressed his suit, Pauahi “smiled on him, and they were married. It was a happy marriage.”  (Liliʻuokalani)  Lot Kapuāiwa never married.

“On the 10th (of December, 1872,) (Liliʻuokalani and her husband) were summoned to the palace to attend the dying monarch; one by one other chiefs of the Hawaiian people, with a few of their trusted retainers, also arrived to be present at the final scene; we spent that night watching in silence near the king’s bedside. The disease was pronounced by the medical men to be dropsy on the chest (hydrothorax, accumulation of fluid in the chest.”)  (Liliʻuokalani)

“Although nearing the end, the mind of the king was still clear; and his thoughts, like our own, were evidently on the selection of a future ruler for the island kingdom, for, turning to Mrs. Bishop, he asked her to assume the reins of government and become queen at his death.”  She declined. “… he relapsed into unconsciousness, and passed away without having named his successor to the throne.”  (Liliʻuokalani) (Lunalilo was shortly after elected King of Hawaiʻi.)

December 11, 1872, Lot Kapuāiwa died; it was his 42 birthday.

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

The Reef

In the mid-1850s, Honolulu had approximately 10,000-residents. Foreigners made up about 6% of that (excluding visiting sailors.) Laws at the time allowed naturalization of foreigners to become subjects of the King (by about that time, about 440 foreigners exercised that right.)

The majority of houses were made of grass (hale pili,) there were about 875 of them; there were also 345 adobe houses, 49 stone houses, 49 wooden houses and 29 combination (adobe below, wood above.)

The city was regularly laid out with major streets typically crossing at right angles – they were dirt (Fort Street had to wait until 1881 for pavement, the first to be paved.)

Sidewalks were constructed, usually of wood (as early as 1838;) by 1857, the first sidewalk made of brick was laid down on Merchant Street.

At the time, “Broadway” was the main street (we now call it King Street;) it was the widest and longest – about 2-3 miles long from the river (Nuʻuanu River on the west) out to the “plains” (to Mānoa.) What is now known as Queen Street was actually the water’s edge.

To get around people walked, or rode horses or used personal carts/buggies. It wasn’t until 1868, that horse-drawn carts became the first public transit service in the Hawaiian Islands.

Honolulu Harbor was bustling at that time. Over the prior twenty years, the Pacific whaling fleet nearly quadrupled in size and in the record year of 1846; 736-whaling ships arrived in Hawai‘i.

At the time, Honolulu Harbor was not as it is today and many of the visiting ships would anchor two to three miles off-shore – cargo and people were ferried to the land.

To accommodate the growing commerce, from 1856 to 1860, the work of filling in the reef to create an area known as the “Esplanade” (where Aloha Tower is now situated) and building up a water-front and dredging the harbor was underway.

The legislature adopted a resolution directing the minister of the interior to remove Fort Kekuanohu (Fort Honolulu – then serving as a prison) and use the material obtained thereby “in the construction of prisons, and the filling up of the reef.”

However, it could not be removed until a new prison was built; construction for the new prison began in 1855, but not entirely completed until more than two years later. The Fort was then removed in 1857. (Kuykendall)

Prisoners from Molokai (“nearly every man in the village”) who were implicated in a cattle-stealing program; they were tried and sentenced to jail. These, along with other prisoners, cut the coral blocks and constructed the prison. (Cooke)

On the opposite side (ʻEwa) of Nuʻuanu stream was a fishpond, identified as “Kawa” or the “King’s fish pond.” Iwilei at that time was a small, narrow peninsula, less populated than the Honolulu-side of Nuʻuanu stream.

The new prison was on a marshy no-man’s land almost completely cut off from the main island by two immense fishponds. The causeway road (initially called “Prison Road,” later “Iwilei Street”) split Kawa Pond into Kawa and Kūwili fishponds.

Sometimes called the “Oʻahu Prison,” “King’s Prison,” “Kawa Prison” or, simply, “The Reef,” it was a coral block fortress built upon coral fill at the end of a coral built road over the coral reefs and mudflats of Iwilei.

“As one enters the heavy front gates one stands in a long, but narrow, inclosure that forms the front yard of the prison proper. Here a few of the prisoners are sometimes allowed to take their exercise.”

When one enters the prison building the first thing that strikes one is the absolute cleanliness of everything. The cells are all whitewashed and look as though they did not know the meaning of the word dirt, and a meal could be eaten off the floors without offending one.”

“Each cell is mosquito proof, and the doors of most of them open into a big court yard that reminds one of the patio of a Mexican rancho, with its immense banyan tree, the largest in the islands and its sanded floors.”

“Each male prisoner is supplied with a canvas hammock and two blankets. During the day the hammock must be tightly rolled up and hung in its place in a corner of the little cell. The blankets and hammock are washed once a month, and a new coat of whitewash given the cells at the same time. … The prisoners get up about 4 o’clock. They go to bed about 5:30 in the afternoon.”

“There are at present only three women prisoners … The women occupy, during the day, a good-size d room in one end of the building, which is used as their workroom. Here they make all the prisoners’ clothes.”

“The only difference in the cells occupied by the women is that they have a mattress on the floor instead of a hammock to sleep on. They wear blue denim dresses, while the men wear a combination of brown and blue.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, March 15, 1894)

In 1886, Mark Twain visited the prison and wrote: “… we presently arrived at a massive coral edifice which I took for a fortress at first, but found out directly that it was the government prison.”

“A soldier at the great gate admitted us without further authority than my countenance, and I supposed he thought he was paying me a handsome compliment when he did so; and so did I until I reflected that the place was a penitentiary”. (Twain)

“When I was at Honolulu, I had occasion to visit the reef. That is, the island prison of Oahu, where all classes of offenders, murderers, felons, and misdemeanants are confined at hard labor.”

“While I was there my attention was drawn to thirty-seven Galicians, subjects of Austria, who were confined because they had refused to fulfil their contracts to labor for the Oʻahu plantation. They were dressed in stripes like the other prisoners.”

“They were made to do the same labor in the quarries and on the roads. They were conveyed about the islands in a public vehicle, accompanied by armed guards.” (Dr Levy; Atkinson, 1899)

The Reef was about where the Love’s Bakery was in Iwilei, now the Salvation Army Building, next to what used to be K-Mart.  The Prison was later relocated to Kalihi (1916) and renamed O‘ahu Jail; this is now known as O‘ahu Community Correctional Facility.

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Joseph Paul Mendonça

Joseph P Mendonça was born in the Azores Islands (1,500 miles off the coast of Portugal) on May 19, 1847; serving as a galley hand on a whaling vessel, he arrived in Hawaiʻi at about the age of 17 – he jumped ship.

He started working with his uncle, Jason (Jacinto Pereira) Perry (1826-1883 – the father of Antonio Perry, who would later serve on the Hawaii Supreme Court from 1900-1934.)

He met and lived with Mary Anehe Sylva (1870-1962.) She was part Hawaiian her father a British sea captain with at least some Portuguese ancestry.

They had not yet married and had six children; each took the last name Sylva. The children included Dr Francis K Sylva, a dentist who also served in the Territorial legislature (1939-1945;) Edward N Sylva, an attorney and graduate of Harvard Law School, who was Territorial Attorney General from 1953-1956 …

… Joseph L. Sylva, who served in the Territorial legislature (1931-1937) and was also a member of the Honolulu Board of Supervisors; Dr Henry Sylva, a dentist; Rose Anehe Sylva and Mrs. Alice (Sylva) Ackerman. (HHF)

The couple later married in the 1920s and Mary Sylva became Mrs Mary A Mendonça.

Mendonça became active the Annexation Party. On January 14, 1893, he became a member of the party’s Committee on Public safety, which soon afterward moved to overthrow the Hawaiian Kingdom.

Mendonça helped seize the government offices at Ali‘iolani Hale, an act that later led to the Queen Liliʻuokalani’s forced abdication. (Chinatown)

In 1894, Mendonça participated in the constitutional convention for the then Republic of Hawaiʻi. After that, Mendonça left politics. (Punawaiola)

Mendonça had practical training as a carpenter and mason, and went into the construction trade. He also started to acquire land, lots of it.

His leases and other acquisitions included property in Chinatown, the North Shore and the Windward side.

As early as 1890, Mendonça and his partner C Bolte had been leasing the former Kāne‘ohe Ahupua‘a lands of Queen Kalama. (MCBH)

A journal entry on June 1, 1893, noted “We commenced today doing business under the name of Kāneʻohe Ranch”. (Mendonça and Bolte formed Kāneʻohe Ranch.)

They started with the herd with imported Angus cattle, purchased from James I Dowsett, one of the founders of the ranching industry in Hawai‘i. Horses, sheep, and goats rounded out the livestock assets.

A couple years later, the ranch was incorporated, with JP Mendonça and C Bolte as the only shareholders. (MCBH) Mendonça was one of the most successful ranchers on the island.

The future of that ranch was noted in an October 31, 1905 article in the Hawaiian Gazette, “James B Castle has great plans for the future of the Koʻolau side of Oahu.”

“He has bought the one-half interest of JP Mendonça in the Kāneʻohe ranch and has secured an option on the other half interest, which is owned by C Bolte, and on the entire Heʻeia plantation, also owned by Mr. Bolte. These properties cover a considerable amount of real estate and a complete sugar mill at Heʻeia.”

“It is Mr. Castle’s intention at an early date to join the two properties which formerly constituted the Kaneohe and Heeia sugar plantations, and to add thereto a large area of fertile land not heretofore under cultivation, which will be reached by pumping, and turn the whole into a sugar plantation.” (Hawaiian Gazette, October 31, 1905)

Mendonça was ready for a change. In anticipation of getting out of Kāneʻohe Ranch, the Ranch ledger entry for December 31, 1899 stated, “Joe Mendonça is ‘pau ke aloha’ with Kaneohe, he wants to sell out or do something, he does not exactly know what; he has bought about 20 acres land in Kalihi and is now in town … about 5 days every week.” (MCBH)

It seems he diverted his interest to Chinatown.

“(Mendonça) owned a lot of property in Chinatown, all of which had windows with either red frames or red brick around them. That was his building identity, to let everyone know how many properties he owned.”

“At one time there were more than 10 buildings in Chinatown with that signature red trim.” (Leineweber; HHF)

Two devastating fires swept through Chinatown in 1886 and 1900, reducing the majority of its wooden structures to ashes. (HHF)

Mendonça was one of the first landowners to rebuild after the 1900 fire. He hired architect Oliver G Traphagen to design his new building, sited on a block that consolidated many of his small landholdings. Traphagen was at the time working on the Moana Hotel, which was completed at the same time as the Jos P Mendonça Building in 1901. (HHF)

On the North Shore, Mendonça had property less than a mile from the Oʻahu Land and Railway Company’s Mokuleʻia train station (it was also accessible by automobile;) the family had a beach house there.

He sold some of the beach front land to CC Crozier, who created the Mokuleʻia Beach Lots subdivision. (The path of the original train track was on the immediate mauka side of Crozier Drive.) (HHF)

He also had an H-shaped, 2-story Mediterranean Revival Style house, designed by Robert Miller, on Judd Hillside Road on the slopes of Pu’u ‘Ualakaʻa in lower Manoa Valley (built in 1927.) Mendonça died in 1927.

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young 7 Comments

Club Jetty

“No Tank Tops, No Shorts, No Bare Feet.”

“Club Jetty resembles the scene from an old Bogie flick. There are places like it in Singapore and Hong Kong and Macao. Fans spin overhead. Guests dine of Formica-topped tables.”

“And once a week when the liner Oceanic Independence tied up outside, Mama’s cafebar is swamped.” (Sarasota Herald-Tribune, November 1, 1981)

Club Jetty opened in 1946; it evolved from ‘Hale Aina’ (Kauai’s first steak house,) a restaurant located a Nāwiliwili Transportation Company building at the bottom of the hill that leads up to Kaua‘i High School.

The restaurant moved to a Nāwiliwili Yacht Club building in about 1950 in part to help cater meals for “Pagan Love Song,” Kaua‘i’s first color feature Hollywood film.

Later Tom King of the Territorial Harbors Division moved it to a larger building along the jetty at Nāwiliwili Harbor … it became Club Jetty. (TGI)

“Mama” Emma Ouye started it; she was born in Hanalei on October 13, 1907, to Chee Chong Hing and Pepe Malia.

Ouye graduated from Kaua‘i High School and was helped in gaining an education through the support of GN Wilcox, a friend of her father. She married Manji James Ouye in 1927. (TGI)

Club Jetty became a leading Kaua‘i night spot, with entertainers coming from Las Vegas, Honolulu and other locales to perform, in addition to Hawaiian, jazz and rock musicians from Kaua‘i during several eras from the 1950s through the 1980s when Nāwiliwili served as the center of nightlife in Līhuʻe and the rest of Kaua‘i.

One notable, Kui Lee, who had been performing on the mainland for about 10-years, returned to Hawaiʻi and came to Club Jetty, in 1961. Then, he became a part-time performer and doorman at Honey’s nightclub in Kaneohe (owned by Emily “Honey” Ho, mother of Don) – launching pad of Don Ho.

Besides a local favorite, Club Jetty also attracted notable celebrities.

One time, in the early 1960s, filming was going on for John Ford’s Donovan’s Reef, with John Wayne, Lee Marvin and others.

During filming of Donovan’s Reef on Kauai the cast stayed at the Kauai Inn on Nāwiliwili Bay. John Ford also had his yacht anchored in Nāwiliwili Harbor. John Wayne and Lee Marvin were reported to be bunking on the yacht.

“John Wayne would swim in, and try to hide the fact that he was all dripping wet. Grandma said she was trying to stop him from doing that.”

“She had him come by when she fed the shark (who frequented the waters off the club.) She would chant at night, to attract shark. John Wayne saw the shark, he was petrified and never swam into the club again.” (Pono Ouye; TGI)

Club Jetty “became a must for visiting celebrities from Washington, DC, to Hollywood and beyond. They were all charmed by Mama and her casual Aloha, returning again for the wonderful food and the good times.” (KHS;TGI)

“If you help people with their life, you will receive help with yours.” (Ouye; TGI)

Unfortunately, like other iconic remnants of the past (as in Coco Palms,) Club Jetty was destroyed in 1992 by Hurricane Iniki.

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

The Donna

“Honolulu is to have a new family hotel – ‘The Donna’ – at Beretania and Piikoi streets. The four cottages owned by Col CJ McCarthy are to be made into a hotel, having about thirty rooms, and the opening will take place next month. Mrs CJ McCarthy will manage the enterprise.”

“During recent months there have been many visitors unable to get the sort of accommodations they wanted. Several of the local hostelries have had the experience recently of turning away applicants for room and board, and visitors have had difficulty in finding places at all suited to them.”

“The McCarthy cottages are located in a fine residence district and have attractive grounds.” (Hawaiian Star, Feb 17, 1910)  “It was run by the McCarthy family and Mr. [Charles J] McCarthy at one time was governor of Hawai’i. [1918-1921] Mr. and Mrs. McCarthy ran this hotel.” (Nell Kahululani Conant Porter, Watumull Oral History)

Charles James McCarthy “was born in Boston, August 4, 1861, and came to San Francisco with [his] parents in 1866. [He] was educated in the grammar schools of that city also attended the Pacific Business College. [He came] to Hawaii in March, 1881, as an employee of a wholesale fruit house, which shipped tropical fruits to San Francisco .”

In 1889 he married Margaret Teresa Morgan. “Mrs. McCarthy was born in Honolulu on October 30, 1865, the daughter of Robert Dalton Morgan and Catherine Ward Morgan. Both her parents were born in Dublin, Ireland, and had lived in New York City before coming to Hawaii. Her father came to the islands three years before his wife and family followed”.

“A native of Honolulu, Mrs. McCarthy was intensely interested in the islands and beloved by the Hawaiian people of whom she was a true and understanding friend. She spoke Hawaiian fluently and did much in the interests of these people.”

“As a member and for several years an officer of the Outdoor Circle se took a leading part in the organization’s work to preserve the natural charm of the islands. She was also a member of the Sons and Daughters of Warriors, the Daughters of Hawaii and the Guild of Francis Hospital.”  (Hnl Adv, March 19, 1934)

After several elected public service positions, CJ McCarthy “was appointed Governor of Hawaii on April 18, 1918, for a term of four years. On March 4th, 1921 , [he] tendered [his] resignation to President Harding to take effect June 1st, [1921, because he had] been appointed by the Honolulu Chamber of Commerce to represent them in Washington, DC.”  (Charles J McCarthy Autobiographical Sketch, American Irish Historical Society)

“Mrs. McCarthy’s life was a busy one.  In addition to the task of rearing her family of five daughters and seconding her husband’s public activities, she successfully established and maintained the Donna Hotel on Beretania street and also managed other apartment holdings at Waikiki.” (Hnl Adv, March 19, 1934)

[T]here was a large house, two or three stories high, and it was the home of Governor [Charles J] McCarthy. He was governor here [June 22, 1918 to 1921.] And his wife had the hotel and it was her private project.”

“He had nothing to do with it and she wanted it understood that it was hers and she ran it and they had the best food in the city that you could buy, you know, at a restaurant and she did catering for big parties if the people wanted to pay for really nice food, nice catering. And the rooms weren’t so good.”

“She owned, I think, three buildings – could have been only two – there on Beretania and they owned the land right straight through to the street behind it, Kinau.”

“Their big house was where Schuman Carriage Company is and then these smaller houses, where they had roomers, were Waikiki side. And then they had the dining room–main dining room. That was the style of practically all the hotels here then.” (Margaret Way, Watumull Oral History)

It was originally advertised as “Home-Like in its surroundings and comforts and with all the conveniences and ease of the most approved hotel” “The Donna The new Apartment Hotel” at “1262-70-76-86 Beretania Avenue” ((PCA, Jun 1, 1910)

“The Donna Hotel, 1286 S. Beretania, is delightfully situated within ten minutes’ ride from the center of Honolulu. Here, amidst the surroundings of a subtropical park, one may enjoy all the comforts of home.”

“The rooms in the main buildings or in one of the attractive screened cottages are cheery, well-furnished, and have hot and cold running water. The delicious home cooked meals are served at little cozy tables which are grouped about an artistically decorated open lanai. Permanent rates are $65 a month or $3.00 a day and up.” (Mid-Pacific Magazine, Feb 1928)

“Although located amidst quiet and restful surroundings, The Donna is only a few minutes’ walk from the business portion of the city. Electric cars, which transfer to all parts of the city and the beach, have a station in front of the house.  The Donna has many unique and pleasing features that will irresistably appeal to visitors to Honolulu.” (The Courtland Guide, Jan 1917)

“C. & M. McCarthy, Ltd., was a corporation organized under the laws of the Territory of Hawaii. In 1944 it owned (and presumably operated) in Honolulu the Donna Hotel and the Waikiki Apartments.” The company was dissolved on February 15, 1945.  (US Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit, Oct 10, 1957, 248 F.2d 765)

The hotel operation and apartment rentals “was her business. She may have had it before he was governor and she kept it quite a long time afterward too.” (Margaret Way, Watumull Oral History) The Donna Hotel was situated on property now occupied by Times Super Market. (Yardley, Hnl Adv, Apr 10, 1985)

“The home and the hotel properties ran back to Kinau Street, but a high wooden fence separated the rear part of the hotel grounds. Behind the fence were the staff quarters, known as Japanese Camp.”

“It was a community unto itself with its own stores and baths. The waiters, maids, dish washers, cook, yard men and laundresses all lived there and to and from work through a door in the fence.”

“The hotel building on the on the Kaimuki end consisted of rooms upstairs and the office, parlor, public rooms and a dining room on the lanai of the first floor. An inviting lanai with rockers ran the length pf the front of the building.”

“The rooms were simple, clean and always cool. Floors were covered with sturdy lauhala mats, the dining tables covered with white linen cloths (with linen napkins tucked in the guest’s own napkin ring), and the quest rooms had comfortable iron and brass bedsteads covered with heavy white counterpanes.”

“Mrs McCarthy was a fabulous Island cook and her recipes and menus were referred to as the Kitchen Bible. … Unfortunately, the era of boarding houses in lovely residential districts is a thing of the past, but how nice it would be to have them revived.” (Yardley, Hnl Adv, Apr 10, 1985)

An interesting aside … “Governor McCarthy was the fifth territorial governor but the first to live at Washington Place. In 1918, he leased Washington Place privately. In 1921, the Territorial government purchased Washington Place from the Liliʻuokalani Estate.” (Washington Place)

© 2025 Ho‘okuleana LLC