Images of Old Hawaiʻi

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Kilauea Masonic Lodge

Hawai‘i was first visited by Freemasons as early as the early-1790s, with the visit of George Vancouver (however, some suggest Captain Cook was a Freemason, but the records don’t substantiate that.) Over time, other Freemasons (mariners, merchants and professionals) visited the Islands.

However, it was a French mariner who introduced this British cultural export into Hawai‘i at a time when the Union Jack flew over the kingdom’s capital. On April 8, 1843, during the reign of King Kamehameha III (Kauikeaouli,) Freemasonry was formally established in Hawai‘i by Joseph Marie Le Tellier, Captain of the French whaling barque “Ajax” when he warranted Lodge Le Progres de l’Oceanie No. 124, of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of the Supreme Council of France.

This was the first Masonic Lodge to be instituted in the Islands; with it, Freemasonry became firmly established in the Sandwich Islands. In Honolulu, the original lodge members were European and American mariners, shopkeepers and farmers.

Membership in Masonic lodges has always served to facilitate business contacts, as well as social ones. By the late-1840s there were about thirty-five merchants and storekeepers in Honolulu, of whom about one third were Masons. Similar ratios existed for the other 150 skilled “mechanics” and professionals in town.

Later, in 1879, King Kalākaua (one of the most active members of the Craft in the Island Kingdom,) conducted a grand Masonic ceremony at the site of the new ‘Iolani Palace, using Masonic silver working tools specially crafted for the occasion.

Then, on the evening of Thursday, December 3, 1896, an informal meeting was held at the home of William Whitmore Goodale, at Papaikou, on the Island of Hawaiʻi. The needs were discussed and it was decided to take the necessary steps for a Masonic Lodge on the Island of Hawaiʻi.

On February 4, 1897, the Grand Master of Masons in California, Thomas Flint, Jr., issued a dispensation to open and hold a Masonic Lodge to be called, “Kilauea Lodge.” The Lodge, with a membership of 16, was granted its charter on October 15, 1897, and was constituted as Kilauea Lodge No. 330, F&AM (Free & Accepted Masons.) (Chausee)

“Andrew Brown, District Inspector, Jos. Little, Arch. Gilfillan and half a dozen other prominent Masons will leave by the next Kinau for Hilo to some work for the order at that place. Mr. Brown will deliver to Masonic Lodge at Hilo, its charter and will direct the installation of officers. The lodge there has been working under dispensation for a year, but will now be firmly attached the Grand Lodge of California.” (Hawaiian Gazette, February 11, 1898)

Kilauea Lodge became “a full fledged lodge, peaceful, prosperous, progressive, and is ably and faithfully fulfilling its mission of brotherly love, relief and truth. They have recently purchased a large lot on Waianuenue street and hope at an early date to see their way clear to follow in the footsteps of Hawaiian Lodge and build for themselves a suitable and comfortable home.” (Freemasons)

“The Masonic Hall Association at its meeting Saturday last decided definitely to built a fine brick and stone building upon their lot recently purchased of the Territory at the corner of Waianuenue and Bridge streets.”

“The building will be two stories in height with basement … The upper story will be used for lodge purposes, while the lower will be constructed for the use of business houses, etc”. (Evening Bulletin, January 18, 1906)

At about this time (1908,) Teddy Roosevelt who was a Freemason was President of the United States; the US Congress authorized the construction of Naval Station at Pearl Harbor; and the Navy’s sixteen new battleships made up the “Great White Fleet” and sailed.

In the local community, the simultaneous event of the completion of the rail link to Honokaʻa, connecting the sugar plantations, their products, and their large working population to Hilo and its port, and the completion of the new breakwater allowing all-weather use of Hilo harbor, provided an expansive business environment for entrepreneurs In the community and across the Island Territory.

Then, the Hilo Masons dedicated their new building. “We have met here today for a specific purpose, namely to solemnly dedicate our masonic hall. Ten or more years ago the Hilo Masonic Hall Association was formed and later on a site purchased, which was farther up Waianuenue street than we are today.”

“Still later negotiations were entered into with the then Governor of the Territory, George B Carter, with a view to making an exchange of sites, the government requiring our uptown lot for school purposes, and giving us in exchange the site that this building now stands on”. (Hawaiian Gazette, March 1, 1910)

“It was finally decided to accept the plans of HE Starbuck, of Oakland. … The cornerstone was laid February 18, 1909. We started out to build a $40,000 building, and have ended up by having one costing double the amount, as nothing but the best of everything would satisfy the boys.”

The structure, which occupies the entire site, consists of three floors and a full basement. The street-level commercial spaces have a reinforced concrete floor, sidewalk freight elevators into the basement and an ingenious natural ventilation system which carried throughout the building.

Though altered in most areas the interiors remaining indicate a high level of decoration, with arched column bays, decorative cast concrete and plaster ceilings and high display windows with operable transoms above. (NPS)

The extensive unbroken tenancy by the Masonic Order (1909-1985) resulted in the second and third floors remaining virtually unchanged (a fire stair was added in 1986.) From the Waianuenue Avenue level lobby an elaborate granite stair with its ornate grained Oak balustrade ascends to the second floor foyer, on to the third level offices, and on again to the former Roof Garden, lauded for its panoramic view of the City of Hilo. (NPS)

The Temple room was two-stories in height with coved ceiling, wainscot, extensive paneling and moldings surrounding the large arch-topped windows, and an Organ Gallery overlooking the room through arched openings; the original suspended lighting fixtures with faceted globes were encased and formed brass frames.

Though ownership of the building has changed hands several times since its construction, the Masonic Order retained its occupancy of the second and third floor spaces until about 1985 when the Issuance of a liquor license to a ground floor tenant forced them to vacate under the rules of the Order which does not allow joint occupancy with liquor establishments.

The Hilo Masonic Temple is among the Hilo’s most substantial and best preserved historic structures. Constructed in 1908-10 in the Renaissance Revival style of reinforced concrete and steel, the building was clearly intended to be a lasting monument to the Masonic Order whose dramatic Lodge Hall and Temple facilities were located on the second and third floors.

The Masonic Temple construction came to completion about the same time as the new Hilo Hotel building was completed, the Hackfeld building nearing completion and with the Volcano Block and S Hata buildings in the planning stages.

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Unexpected Partners

Lorrin Andrews Thurston was born on July 31, 1858 in Honolulu. His father was Asa Goodale Thurston and Sarah Andrews. On his father’s side he was grandson of Asa and Lucy Thurston of the Pioneer Company of missionaries; on his mother’s side, he was grandson of another early missionary, Lorrin Andrews.

Thurston was fluent in the Hawaiian language and gave himself the nickname Kakina. He attended Oʻahu College (Punahou,) and, later, law school at Columbia University.

He followed his father and became a member of the Hawaiʻi Legislature. In 1887, Thurston authored what became known as the Bayonet Constitution. He became the Minister of Interior.

In 1892, Thurston led the Annexation Club and participated in the revolution and overthrow of the constitutional monarchy (1893.) Thurston headed the commission sent to Washington DC for American annexation. (Smith)

A volcano enthusiast, in his childhood on Maui, he would act as an informal tour guide; Thurston first visited Kīlauea on the Island of Hawaiʻi in 1879 at the age of 21 with Louis von Tempsky. Thurston wrote that “we hired horses in Hilo and rode to the volcano, from about eight o’clock in the morning to five in the afternoon.” (NPS)

Ten years later Thurston’s first mark upon the Volcano landscape appeared. In 1889, using his position as Minister of the Interior, he oversaw the construction of an improved carriage road from Hilo to Volcano.

The road was completed in 1894 allowing four-horse stages to transport visitors from Hilo to Volcano in seven hours. This feat would greatly increase the number of people able to view the volcano at Kīlauea. (NPS)

In 1891, Thurston bought the Volcano House in the Island of Hawaiʻi.

George Lycurgus first left his native Sparta in Greece around 1876, when he was about 17 years old. He served in the Greek Army for 18 months. George sailed from Greece to Liverpool sometime in 1880 and from there docked in New York. Here the young boy, not knowing any English, started out by selling lemons.

The later found himself in San Francisco; however his brother John and a cousin, Peter Kamarinos, were in Hawaiʻi. By the fall of 1889, George was sailing on the ‘Australia’ to Hawaiʻi.

Lycurgus opened the California Wine Company in Honolulu. Another Lycurgus enterprise in Honolulu during those years was the Union Grill. He then got in the hotel business, with the ‘Sans Souci’ in Waikiki. (Maggioros)

“In 1893 Sans Souci was a rambling hostelry, nestled among the coconut and palm trees of Waikiki Beach. The guests occupied small bungalows, thatched-roof affairs about ten by twelve, the bed being the principal article of furniture. It was in one of these bungalows that Stevenson had established himself, propped up with pillows on the bed in his shirt-sleeves.” Scribner’s Magazine, August, 1926.

Lycurgus was a royalist and was implicated with other counter-revolutionists in supplying arms (1895.) He was arrested, thirteen counts of treason were filed against him and he was held at ‘The Reef’ (Oʻahu Prison) for 52-days. (Chapin)

Later, Thurston sold the Volcano House to Lycurgus. (Smith)

Starting in 1906, Thurston, a revolutionist, and Lycurgus, a counter-revolutionist, started to work together to have the volcano area made into Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.

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

Thurston and Lycurgus were instrumental in getting the volcano recognized as Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park. 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 Kīlauea 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 Kaʻu Desert, the rain forest of Olaʻa and the Kalapana archaeological area of the Puna/Kaʻu Historic District.

The National Park Service, within the federal Department of Interior, was created on August 25, 1916 by Congress through the National Park Service Organic Act.

In 1916, Thurston, recognizing the long tradition of soldiers and sailors who had visited the area, proposed the establishment of a military camp at Kīlauea. Thurston promoted his idea and was able to raise enough funds through public subscription for the construction of buildings and other improvements. By the fall of 1916, the first group of soldiers arrived at Kīlauea Military Camp (KMC.) (NPS)

Later, in the 1930s, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) built research offices, hiking trails and laid the foundations for much of the infrastructure and roads within the Hawaiʻi Volcanoes and other parks across the country.

On, July 1, 1961, Hawaiʻi National Park’s units were separated and re-designated as Haleakalā National Park and Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park.

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by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Haleʻakala

Orphaned when young and with only an 8th grade education, Charles Reed Bishop arrived in the Islands on October 12, 1846 and became an astute financial businessman, and one of the wealthiest men in the kingdom from banking, agriculture, real estate and other investments.

In early 1847, Bishop met Bernice Pauahi Paki (she was still a student at the Chiefs’ Children’s School;) despite the opposition of Pauahi’s parents who wanted her to marry Lot Kapuaiwa (later, Kamehameha V,) Bishop courted and married Pauahi in 1850.

For the first few months of their marriage, Pauahi and Charles lived in homes of Judge Lorrin Andrews, first in his downtown residence, and later in a cottage in upper Nuʻuanu Valley, opposite the site of the present Maunaʻala (Royal Mausoleum.)

Like many Hawaiian homes of the time, this one had a name, Wananakoa, for the grove of koa trees in the yard. This was only temporary – they were building a home on property Bishop bought on the Diamond Head/Mauka corner of Hotel and Alakea Streets.

Meanwhile, Pauahi’s father, Paki, had completed the construction of his new residence on King Street (between Fort and Alakea.) (Bishop Street had not been built, yet, the property would be on the ʻEwa/Mauka corner of what is now Bishop and King Streets.)

This new home replaced Paki’s prior modest, thatched-roof home he called ʻAikupika (‘Egypt’) that had been on the same piece of property. (ʻAikupika is where Pauahi was born.)

The name Paki gave his new home has been translated by some as ‘House of the Sun’ or Haleakala, but he probably meant it to be Haleʻakala or the ‘Pink House,’ after the color of the stone used in its construction. (Kanahele)

By the standards of the day, Haleʻakala was a splendid structure that was probably the equal of any of the better homes and gardens in town.

It was a large two-story stone-and-frame building with lanai (porches), supported by pillars on both first and second floors, extending around at least three sides of the house. Its extensive gardens combined shrubbery, flowers and trees and included the special tamarind tree planted at Pauahi’s birth.

Clarice B Taylor stated that he really built the house “hoping Pauahi would marry Prince Lot and make her home with her parents.” It was bigger than he and his wife needed; Paki had sold his lands at Mākaha to raise the money for its construction. (Kanahele)

Paki and his wife Laura Konia raised Pauahi there. When Liliʻuokalani was born, she was hanai (adopted) to Paki and Konia. The two girls attended the Chief’s Children’s School (Royal School,) a boarding school, together, and were known for their studious demeanor.

The history of the home goes beyond the Paki family living quarters; some other interesting bits of Hawaiian history happened here.

Liliʻuokalani and John Dominis were married at Haleʻakala, “I was engaged to Mr Dominis for about two years and it was our intention to be married on the second day of September, 1862. … our wedding was delayed at the request of the king, Kamehameha IV, to the sixteenth of that month”.

“It was celebrated at the residence of Mr and Mrs Bishop, in the house which had been erected by my father, Paki, and which … is still one of the most beautiful and central of the mansions in Honolulu.”

“To it came all the high chiefs then living there, also the foreign residents; in fact, all the best society of the city. My husband took me at once to the estate known as Washington Place, which had been built by his father, and which is still my private residence.” (Queen Liliʻuokalani)

“There was a Baptism at the Residence of the Honorable CR Bishop, “Haleʻakala;” baptized was the child of the honorable (Princess Ruth) Keʻelikolani and JY Davis, and he was called, “Keolaokalani Paki Bihopa.”

The Honorable CR Bishop and Pauahi were those who bestowed the name, and Rev C Corwin is the one who performed the baptism.” (Hoku o ka Pakipika, February 2, 1863) (Keolaokalani was hanai to Pauahi; unfortunately, he died later that year.)

Duke Kahanamoku was born at Haleʻakala on August 24, 1890. (With respect to his name “Duke,” he was named after his father. The elder Kahanamoku was born during the Duke of Edinburgh’s visit to the islands in 1869 and was named after him.)

Haleʻakala was converted to Arlington Hotel.

On the afternoon of January 16, 1893, 162 sailors and Marines aboard the USS Boston in Honolulu Harbor came ashore. The property that Liliʻuokalani was raised in (Haleʻakala) served as ‘Camp Boston,’ the headquarters for the USS Boston’s landing force at the time of the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy, January 17, 1893.

In 1901, Honolulu had three high-class hotels, the Hawaiian Hotel (in downtown Honolulu, now the State Art Museum on Hotel Street,) the Arlington Hotel and the Moana Hotel (in Waikiki.)

“The Arlington Hotel has, for its principal building, a house once occupied by a Hawaiian princess, by whose estate it is now leased to the hotel proprietor (Thomas E Krouse.”) (Chipman, 1901) Krouse, unfortunately, committed suicide at the Arlington the next year.

“A Mrs Dudoit ran the place for a while as a boarding house, and she was followed by a Mr Hamilton Johnson. Both these houses were, however, on a small scale. Just seven and a half years ago it became known as the Arlington, six cottages were attached, the aviary and the cages of animals so familiar to us all were added.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, September 6, 1900)

“The place was maintained as a chief’s residence for many years. It can only have been turned to other uses during the past fifteen years at the outside. Mrs Bernice Pauahi Bishop left the estate to her husband, who turned the property over to the Kamehameha estates.” (Sereno Bishop; Pacific Commercial Advertiser, September 6, 1900)

“(Haleʻakala) has a most unique and interesting history. It is one of the most historic spots in all Honolulu, embracing as it does the scenes of joyousness under royalty, through the stirring days of ’93 … the pettinesses of a boarding house and down to the present day as the Arlington Hotel.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, September 6, 1900)

“The estate which had been so dear to us both in my childhood, the house built by my father, Paki, where I had lived as a girl, which was connected with many happy memories of my early life, from whence I had been married to Governor Dominis,”

“I could not help feeling ought to have been left to me. … This wish of my heart was not gratified, and at the present day strangers stroll through the grounds or lounge on the piazzas of that home once so dear to me.” (Liliʻuokalani)

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Honolulu’s General Store

In 1806, Focke and Melchers, a shipping and trading company, was founded in Bremen, Germany by Carl Melchers and Carl Focke. Its business was centered on emigration to the US and transportation of goods from Cuba, Mexico and the US.

Three brothers, Heinrich (1822-1893,) Georg (1827-1907) and Gustav (1830-1902) formed branches of Melchers Company, first in Mazatlán, Mexico (1846,) then seven years later in Honolulu (1853.) In 1854, with the death of founder Carl Melchers, eldest son Laurenz Henrich Melchers took over; the company was renamed to C Melchers & Co and started to expand into the Asian market.

That year, Gustav Cornelius Melchers and Gustav Reiners completed their building on Merchant Street in downtown Honolulu. Once the main street of the financial and governmental functions in the city, Merchant Street was Honolulu’s earliest commercial center. (Melchers building is still there and today is the oldest commercial building in Honolulu.)

Melchers and Reiners were German importers, commission merchants, and ship chandlers (retail dealers who specialize in supplies or equipment for ships.) Their store was on Merchant Street back then, what is now known as Queen Street was actually the water’s edge.

The store was officially opened on February 20, 1854, with a celebratory luncheon. The structure was fitted with koa counters and glass-enclosed shelving. It sold mostly European goods, items found in most dry goods stores of that time, including fabrics, cigars and china goods. It served as Honolulu’s general store.

On April 26, 1856, RC Wyllie, through the Polynesian, Melchers was acknowledged as Consul of Bremen, Germany for the Hawaiian Islands and later (1858) Lubeck, Germany. Gustav Reiners served as Royal Prussian Consul (and appointed Melchers to that position when Reiners was away.)

It appears Melchers returned to Germany in the late-1850s. Reiners returned to Germany in 1861, leaving the business in the hands of Frederick August Schaefer.

In 1867, Schaefer, who had been a clerk of the store in the 1850s, purchased the firm from Melchers and Reiners and continued to operate the business. Schaefer was Consul of the Kingdom of Italy. (HABS)

Schaefer was born in Bremen, Germany in 1836 and came to Hawaii in 1857, to work for Melchers & Co in Honolulu. He became a partner in the firm in 1861 and bought out his partners in 1867, continuing the business as FA Schaefer & Co. on the same premises.

On the 50th anniversary of Shaefer’s company, the newspaper noted, “Mr. Schaefer has resided In Honolulu all of these years, and now has a beautiful home in Nuʻuanu (the former residence of R. C. Wyllie (foreign minister in the 1850s-1860s.)) He still comes down to his office each morning although he is getting along in years. The firm itself has long been one of Hawaiʻi’s substantial assets.” (Honolulu Star-bulletin, July 18, 1917)

Upon Schaefer’s relocation in 1920, Melchers’ building became the home office of Hawaiian Dredging Company, Ltd, an engineering and construction firm with seven branches elsewhere in the islands. Hawaiian Dredging, in turn, sold the building on April 6, 1954 to the City and County of Honolulu. (Greer)

The original structure was a three-by-four-bay building, its Merchant Street facade being the longer, the Kaʻahumanu Street facade the shorter. The structure has a basement, which was unusual at that time for a building so close to the ocean. The coral stone building was topped by a hipped roof above a simple cornice.

Probably in 1937-38, the Building was significantly enlarged (by about 75%) by the addition to the west/ʻEwa of another two bays, each with two windows at the second level. The connecting bay has a wide door at the lower floor. The lower level of the corner bay has no doors. These two bays may be conversions of the earlier alley and one-story warehouse-style structure.

Stucco and paint now cover most of the building. However, take the time to check the back of the building (makai side) to see the coral blocks. A good way is to take the breezeway down through Harbor Court (you’ll be walking on what once was Kaʻahumanu Street (also called Laulau Lane, due to the products sold along the former street.))

Here are a couple other Melchers mementos – the site where the Melchers building sits was the center of controversy in the early-1840s.

April 25, 1825, Richard Charlton arrived in the Islands to serve as the first British consul. A former sea captain and trader, he was already familiar with the islands of the Pacific and had promoted them in England for their commercial potential (he worked for the East India Company in the Pacific as early as 1821.)

In 1840, Charlton made a claim for several parcels of land in Honolulu. To substantiate his claim, Charlton produced a 299-year lease for the land in question, granted by Kalanimoku. There was no disagreement over the parcel, Wailele, on which Charlton lived, but the adjoining parcel he claimed, Pulaholaho, had been occupied since 1826 by retainers and heirs of Kaʻahumanu (a portion of which is where the Melchers Building is situate.)

In rejecting Charlton’s claim, Kamehameha III cited the fact that Kalanimoku did not have the authority to grant the lease. At the time the lease was made, Kaʻahumanu was Kuhina Nui, and only she and the king could make such grants. The land was Kaʻahumanu’s in the first place, and Kalanimoku certainly could not give it away. (Hawaiʻi State Archives) The dispute dragged on for years.

This, and other grievances purported by Charlton and the British community in Hawai‘i, led to the landing of George Paulet on February 11, 1843 “for the purpose of affording protection to British subjects, as likewise to support the position of Her Britannic Majesty’s representative here”.

Following this King Kamehameha III ceded the Islands and Paulet took control. After five months of British rule, Queen Victoria, on learning the injustice done, immediately sent Rear Admiral Richard Darton Thomas to the islands to restore sovereignty to its rightful rulers. On July 31, 1843 the Hawaiian flag was raised. The ceremony was held in area known as Kulaokahuʻa; the site of the ceremony was turned into a park, Thomas Square.

Here’s another Melchers memento; in the Hawaiian legislature of 1878, Walter Murray Gibson, then a freshman member from Lahaina, Maui, proposed a monument to the centennial of Hawaiʻi’s “discovery” by Captain James Cook. The legislature approved and he chaired the monument committee.

At the request of the monument committee, a bronze statue of ‘heroic size’ (about eight-and-a-half-feet tall) of King Kamehameha was designed, depicting the King at about 45-years old.

The statue was shipped on August 21, 1880, by the bark ‘GF Haendel,’ and was expected about mid-December. On February 22, 1881, came word that the Haendel had gone down November 15, 1880, off the Falkland Islands. All the cargo had been lost.

The statue had been insured for 50,000 marks (about $12,000) with Gustav C Melchers of Bremen through FA Schaefer of Honolulu. With the proceeds, a replica was ordered.

Ultimately, the original was recovered and repaired and set in Kapaʻau, Kohala on the Island of Hawaiʻi (May 8, 1883.) The duplicate was set in front of Aliʻiolani Hale on King Street in Honolulu (February 14, 1883.

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Metropolitan Meat Market

As early as 1871, Metropolitan Market appears to have been started as a beef marketing operation on O‘ahu by Gilbert Waller (Bergin); he had a “branch store”, Family Market (formerly the Rose Cottage Market), on the corner of Union and Hotel (that he bought at auction in 1875). (HSA and Tourist Guide, 1880-1881)

In 1872, his nephew, Gilbert Johnson Waller, acquired the Metropolitan meat company and eventually took in as partners James Campbell, James Dowsett, and Thos R Foster, prominent ranch owners on the Island of O‘ahu. (Bergin)

This meat purveying operation grew rapidly over the next two decades, with Parker Ranch being its main supplier of beef. In July 1900, the original partnership was transformed into a limited liability stock company and incorporated as the Metropolitan Meat Company, Ltd, with Gilbert J Waller serving as manager/treasurer. (Bergin)

The Metropolitan Meat Company flourished at its King Street location, with forty-seven employees providing processing  and  delivery  of  slaughtered  beef throughout Honolulu. The company eventually added a tannery as part of its broad diversification. (Bergin)

To distribute beef to ships anchored at Honolulu, in 1901. Metropolitan Meat Market purchased the ‘Fun’; the launch was operated by Young Brothers to deliver supplies. Young Brothers had a delivery contract with Metropolitan, so eighteen-year-old Jack Young had the job of getting up at 4 am to make the meat deliveries.

By 1902, the brothers were able to buy the eight-horsepower boat and take over the contract to deliver meat and other fresh supplies to ships anchored in the harbor. (YB, 100 Years)

With respect to beef suppliers, Alfred Wellington “AW” Carter (Parker Ranch Manager) sought that Metropolitan Meat company allow greater ownership interest by the actual ranchers – many of whom were neighbor island ranchers who shipped their market cattle to this consortium.  (Bergin)

Parker Ranch and other neighbor island ranchers had legitimate concerns with Metropolitan Meat Company’s autocratic and monopolistic way of doing business. Without notice, the price could drop as much as a penny per pound, or Metropolitan Meat would cancel cattle shipments to O‘ahu at the last minute. (Bergin)

A federal antitrust lawsuit was filed October 2, 1906 (and decided in 1917) to restrain the operation of alleged unlawful combinations in restraint of trade in beef and beef products.

The suit charged Metropolitan Meat (and other defendants) with “an unlawful combination, trust and conspiracy … in restraint of the trade and commerce of the Territory of Hawaii in violation of an act of Congress of July 2nd, 1890, entitled ‘An act to protect trade and commerce against restraints and monopolies’”.

During the proceedings, it was determined that “[a]bout 3,667,105 pounds weight of beef cattle produced in the Territory, of the value of $317,178.25 in money of the United States, are consumed annually by such people …”

“… and about ninety (90%) per cent of such beef cattle has been, is now and will continue to be produced and dealt in by [Metropolitan Meat] in the Territory as an object of trade and commerce therein.” (United States v Metropolitan Meat Co)

“All of such beef cattle are produced in the Territory. The defendants comprise nearly all the wholesale dealers in the Territory, who produce and deal in beef cattle and fresh beef to consumers and dealers in the Territory, and if combined together they can and do control the prices charged for fresh beef produced in the Territory.” (United States v Metropolitan Meat Co)

Under the leadership of Carter, with the participation and support of other neighbor island ranchers such as the Greenwells of Kona, the Maguires of Hu‘ehu‘e, Homers of Kuka’iau, Kohala Ranch Company, and WH Shipman, Parker Ranch announced plans to build a slaughterhouse on O’ahu (in competition with Metropolitan).

In March of 1909, Hawai‘i Meat Company was born, with the articles of incorporation signed by Carter, Robert Leighton Hind Sr., Albert Horner, JA Maguire, Maud WH Greenwell, JD Paris, JF Woods, A Morrow, and RA Cooke. Gilbert J. Waller was named manager of the new company.

Metropolitan suggested that Carter purchase the stock of the company. Carter noted: “I said I would appoint someone, they should appoint someone, both of these men to appoint a third, to put a price on the business and we would pay it.”

“That is how we got the Metropolitan Meat Co. I went to Hawaii and got the graziers together, outlined my plan and arranged with the bank to borrow $100,000. All the fellows who came in endorsed that note. No one put up a cent.” (Carter; Bergin)

The retail meant facility expanded … “Everything conceivable for perfect sanitation, convenience, attractiveness and service is embodied in the appointments of the recently remodelled Metropolitan Meat Market”.

“Situated in the heart of the city of Honolulu, at 50 King street, between Fort and Bethel streets, this thoroughly modern market, with its beautiful marble, glass and tile work would delight the heart of the most particular housewife of famous ‘Spotless Town’ itself.”

“There are larger establishments of the kind in the greater cities, to be sure, but it is absolutely safe to assert that nowhere in the world is there a cleaner, neater, more attractive, more pleasing or more wholesome appearing headquarters for the purchase of choice meats, poultry, butter, eggs, cheese, hams, bacon, sausages, delicatessen and what else one may want to procure in a well-stocked market.”

“Sanitary improvements and the utmost convenience were the main objects in the reconstruction. Rapid increase in business called for enlargement, too, and the change that has been wrought fulfills these plans to the last degree. Marble and tile finish insure perfect sanitation, so marble and tile finish were provided.”

“The same architect and builder who originated the Washington and Long’s markets in San Francisco was obtained to carry out the work for the Metropolitan Meat Market, Frank Loehr of Oakland.”

“The front of the new building is of terra cotta, the first of its kind to be used in Honolulu. The decorations are modelled after those on one of the buildings at the San Francisco Exposition, afterwards sold and used in the ornamentation of a millionaire’s new home on Knob Hill.”

“An extensive refrigerating system of coiled pipes fed by calcium chloride brine, pumped from a tank at the rear, keep a large number of rooms, as well as the show cases and windows at the required temperature.” (Paradise of the Pacific, Dec 1917)

No longer a packing house, Metropolitan Meat Company continued as a retailing concern on King and Bethel Street and finally closed its doors in 1950, a victim of the cash and carry trend. (Bergin)

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