Economy | Page 132 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

October 30, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

College Hill

In 1829, Hiram Bingham was given the lands of Kapunahou – he subsequently gave it to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) – to establish Punahou School.

Founded in 1841, Punahou School (originally called Oʻahu College) was built at Kapunahou to provide a quality education for the children of Congregational missionaries, allowing them to stay in Hawaiʻi with their families, instead of being sent away to school. The first class had 15 students.

The land area of the Kapunahou gift was significantly larger than the present school campus size. Near the turn of the last century, the Punahou Board of Trustees decided to subdivide some of the land – they called their subdivision “College Hills.”

Inspired by the garden suburb ideals then becoming popular both in North America and Europe, and especially England, College Hills was initiated as a way of raising revenue for the school.

College Hills was one of several enclaves for Honolulu’s wealthier residents and marked the true beginning of park-like suburban developments in Hawaiʻi.

Following upon earlier subdivisions, such as the 1886 Seaview Tract in the area now known as “lower Manoa,” the College Hills Tract was an important real estate development in the history of Honolulu.

Using nearly 100 acres of land previously leased out as a dairy farm, Punahou subdivided the rolling landscape into separate parcels of from 10,000- to 20,000-square feet.

The “Atherton House” was built on one of the most attractive of these parcels (actually six lots purchased together.) Situated on a slight rise, and protected by the hillside of Tantalus rising to the west (Ewa) side, the Atherton House, part of the new wave of Mānoa residences. It represented the move of one of Hawaiʻi’s elite families into an area thought before to be countryside.

College Hills soon became a desirable residential area served by a streetcar, which traveled up O‘ahu Avenue and made a wide U-turn around the Atherton home on Kamehameha Avenue.

The Atherton House was the residence of Frank C Atherton and his wife Eleanore from 1902 until his death in 1945. (Mrs. Atherton continued living in the house until the early-1960s.)

Designed by architect Walter E Pinkham, the shingled two-story wood-framed house reflects the influence of the late Queen Anne, Prairie and Craftsman styles, but its lava rock piers, ʻōhia floors and large lanai denote it as Hawaiian.

The house was a gift to Atherton from his father, Joseph Ballard Atherton, the family patriarch in Hawaiʻi, who was one of a small group of North Americans and Europeans that became prominent in Hawaiʻi’s business and political life toward the end of the 19th century.

Arriving in Honolulu from Boston in 1858, JB Atherton worked first for the firm of DC Waterman, before taking a position with the larger company of Castle and Cooke.

In 1865, JB Atherton married Juliette Montague Cooke, a daughter of the Reverend Amos Starr Cooke, one of the islands’ early missionaries. Together they had six children (including Frank.)

JB Atherton became a junior partner of Castle and Cooke; by 1894, as the sole survivor of the firm’s early leadership, he became president.

He worked closely with the Pāʻia Plantation and the Haiku Sugar Company on Maui, and in 1890 was one of the incorporators of the ʻEwa Plantation Company. Together with BF Dillingham, he organized the Waialua Agricultural Company, Ltd and became the first president

Atherton served for many years the president of Castle and Cooke, one of the “Big Five” companies in Hawaiʻi. At Castle and Cooke, he distinguished himself as an energetic and progressive leader, who helped transform Hawaii’s economy away from the single agricultural crop of sugar toward greater diversity.

Eventually, Frank C Atherton would become vice-president and then president of Castle and Cooke.

For 60 years the “Atherton House” was the home of the Atherton family; the Atherton’s children donated it to the University of Hawaiʻi in 1964 to serve as a home for the University of Hawaiʻi president – the University named the home “College Hill.”

While it is the designated home for the University of Hawaiʻi president, and now bears the name “College Hill,” it didn’t get its name because the UH president lives there. (The Mānoa residence was built five years before the University was founded.)

Oʻahu College – as Punahou School used to be called – was located nearby. Thus, the Mānoa Valley section where Frank and Eleanore Atherton had their country home was called “College Hills Tract.”

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College-Hill-Miyamoto-Collection-Oct.-1964

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Aerial photograph,(UH_Manoa)-04-04-26-noting College Hill

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October 29, 2019 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Waiāhole Ditch

In 1897, the Oʻahu Sugar Company established a large-scale sugar plantation on the dry, southwestern side of Oʻahu. Irrigation water for the sugar-cane plantation was initially pumped from the Pearl Harbor aquifer.

Because of the high pumping cost, the Oahu Sugar Company constructed the Waiāhole Ditch System to transport, by gravity, surface water from the northeastern side of the Koʻolau Range. The Waiāhole Ditch collection and delivery system was initially constructed during 1913-1916.

The system intercepts large amounts of dike-impounded ground water at high altitudes (above approximately 700 to 800-ft) that previously discharged to Waiāhole (and its tributaries Waianu and Uwao), Waikāne and Kahana Streams through seeps and springs.

The main tunnel through the Koʻolau Range was primarily designed as a transmission tunnel. The success of this tunnel in intercepting large amounts of dike-impounded ground water in the Koʻolau Range led to the construction of additional high-level ground-water development tunnels.

Between 1925 and 1935, six tunnels with headings directed into the Koʻolau Range were added to the ditch system to develop ground water stored in dike compartments. Four development tunnels (Uwao, Waikāne 1, Waikāne 2 and Kahana) were considered successful.

For nearly a century, the Waiāhole Ditch System has diverted an average of approximately 27-million gallons per day of water from the wet, northeastern part of windward Oʻahu, to the dry, central part of the island to meet irrigation needs.

This diverted flow consists of ground water gained from the connecting tunnels, the four development tunnels, and the trans-Koʻolau tunnel and of surface water gained primarily from Kahana Valley.

The flow diversion through the tunnel is pretty low tech; a redwood board determines the flow direction and amount. Depending on which marker the board is raised or lowered to, more or less water flows to leeward or windward areas.

If the board is raised, more water flows to the leeward side. Conversely, the more the board is lowered, the greater the amount of water that flows to Waiāhole stream.

The Waiāhole Ditch collection and delivery system is a 26.5-mile-long system, also called “the ditch,” extending from Kahana Valley on the Windward side to the Kunia area on the Leeward side.

The effects of Waiāhole Ditch diversions received significant attention in 1993, when it became known that large amounts of diverted water were not being used for irrigation and instead were being released into streams on the leeward side of Oʻahu. This coincided with the Oʻahu Sugar Company announcement of the closure of its sugar-plantation operations.

Windward stream water for leeward uses initiated a legal proceeding (Waiāhole Ditch Contested Case) before the Hawaiʻi Commission on Water Resource Management (CWRM) over rights to the water.

The Waiāhole case arose from the efforts of small family farmers and Native Hawaiians, led by citizen groups Hakipuʻu ʻOhana, Ka Lahui Hawaiʻi, Kahaluʻu Neighborhood Board, Makawai Stream Restoration Alliance and a coalition of supporters (collectively the “Windward Parties”), to restore streams originally diverted by Central O`ahu sugar plantations.

But large scale agricultural and development interests, including Campbell Estate, Robinson Estate, Kamehameha Schools, Dole/Castle & Cooke, and others, joined by the State, pushed to continue the flow of Windward water to leeward lands to subsidize golf course irrigation, short-term corporate agriculture, and housing development.

After seven months of administrative hearings, the Water Commission issued its first decision in 1997, which both the Windward and Leeward parties appealed to the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court.

The Windward Parties argued that not enough water had been restored to the streams, while Leeward interests complained that too much water had been returned.

In August 2000, the Hawaiʻi Supreme Court issued a landmark decision in the first appeal. Although the Court acknowledged the Commission’s efforts at stream restoration, it vacated the Commission’s decision and sent the case back to the Commission.

After holding more hearings, the Commission issued a second decision in December 2001, which the Windward Parties again appealed.

The Court ruled that much of the decision failed to comply with the State Water Code and public trust principles, and the Commission had failed to make sufficient findings, based on evidence in the record, to support its various rulings.

It ordered the Commission to reconsider the amount of water the Windward streams need to support native stream life and community uses, vacated permits the Commission had issued to Leeward interests, and ordered the Commission to make a new decision on the permits that followed from the evidence.

On July 14, 2006, the Hawaiʻi State Commission on Water Resource Management issued a split decision in the landmark water rights litigation over the stream flows diverted by the Waiāhole Ditch System on O`ahu.

Four members of the Commission (a majority) voted to largely maintain the allocations the Commission approved in its original 1997 decision, including extensive diversions for Leeward uses, such as corporate agriculture and golf courses.

However, two Commissioners issued a dissent criticizing the majority for failing to give more protection to Windward stream resources and uses.

As Water Commission Chair, I was happy to have authored the dissent (with significant assistance from the Attorney General’s office) and pleased that Chiyome Fukino, state Department of Health Director, joined me in the dissent.

In 2010, the Intermediate Court of appeals vacated the water use permit issued in the 2006 decision and remanded the case back to the Water Commission. (Lots of information here from USGS and EarthJustice reporting on the ditch system and Waiāhole Ditch case.)

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Byron Alcos, superintendent of the Waiahole Irrigation Co., shines a light pon the source of the Waiahole water-(star-bulletin)

Monument at the Waiahole Ditch announces the completion date and names of contractor Mizuno, his surveyor, stonemason, and workers-(hawaii-gov)

Waterfall at one of the water sources of Waiāhole Stream, windward O‘ahu, Hawai‘i-(USGS)

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Waiahole Ditch-Land-use and land cover-(USGS)

Waiahole Ditch-generalized geology-(USGS)

October 28, 2019 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Bradley, Voorhees & Day

“At one time hoop skirt manufactories were numerous, and a large capital was engaged in the business. Since the hoop skirt went out of fashion, the factories have nearly all disappeared, and the capital has gone into other enterprises.”

“The New York Sun reports Mr Bradley, of Bradley, Voorhees & Day, as saying:

“‘It was in 1857 that hoop skirts first came into use. I remember the first article, of the kind which were imported from Europe. They were cumbrous affairs, the hoops made of bamboo, cane or rattan. Iron was considered too heavy a material.’”

“‘Steel hoops were introduced by American makers. It was a long process to get the right quality of steel. If made too hard the steel would snap, and if too soft the hoop would bend in wear and lose its shape.’”

“‘Now the steel is so well tempered that the hoop skirt retains its shape and at the same time conforms to changes of attitude in the like a woven fabric.’”

“‘The weight of a wearer skirt like that now coming into fashion is less than one-fourth of that of the old style of skirt, and the new skirt will wear four times as long as the old.’”

“‘I recollect the time when we employed 1,200 hands, and our product was 10,000 skirts a day. That was during the war, but about 1868 the hoop skirt went out of fashion and the trade died out.’”

“‘There was a transient revival in 1870, but it disappeared, and from then until now the hoop skirt trade has been a very small part of our business.’”

“‘We have always continued the manufacture to some extent, getting orders every now and then, mostly from the South and West.’” (Yorkville Enquirer, August 4, 1881)

The company then got into ‘union suits;’ reportedly they were the first. The union suit involves the combination of both a shirt and pants (drawers) in a one piece suit. The garment commonly included a drop seat. This term began to be used in the 1890s.

A spokesperson for the company was Johnny Weissmuller; in 1924, he and Duke Kahanamoku raced in the Olympics. Weissmuller beat Duke (Duke was 2nd) in the 100-meter freestyle final. (Duke’s brother Sam came in 3rd.)

After becoming one of the most famous swimmers in the world, Weissmuller translated his success into being a spokesperson for Bradley, Voorhees & Day.

In 1929, he signed a 5-year contract that paid him $500 per week. He was to tour the country giving swimming exhibitions.

Weissmuller then turned that into a long series of hit films playing first Tarzan, King of the Jungle (it was Weissmuller’s films that debuted the legendary ‘Tarzan yell.’)

At the beginning of the 1930s, Bradley, Voorhees & Day was purchased by the Atlas Underwear company located in Piqua, Ohio.

During the Great Depression they were successful in manufacturing swimsuits for men, women and children. They patented their own fabric, Sea Satin, a rayon woven satin backed with latex for stretch.

Later, in the 1940s and 50s, Bradley, Voorhees & Day, using Rayon, started to make Hawaiian Aloha Shirts; sometimes with island-related themes, sometimes not.

They also used knits of cotton, wool and Rayon, and cellophane. Their swimsuits were featured in major fashion magazines and high fashion stores. In 1951, the brand was purchased by Superior Mills.

Bradley, Voorhees & Day were first to start packaging underwear in plastic bags for the mass market. In the 1960s and 1970s, they started introducing sportops, a pocket T-shirt, and fashionable underwear made of nylon.

In 1976, Bradley, Voorhees & Day was purchased by Fruit of the Loom, which brought the brand to a worldwide market. On April 9, 2002, Berkshire Hathaway purchased Fruit of the Loom.

Over time, the products were simply known as BVD (using the first letters of founders’ names;) ‘BVDs’ became a genericized trademark in reference to any brand of underwear.

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BVD Flying Fish Shirt

BVD Aloha Nui

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October 27, 2019 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Kewalo

The modern urban district of Kaka‘ako is comprised primarily of the ‘ili (land section) of Kaʻākaukukui, Kukuluāeʻo and Kewalo, all part of the ahupua‘a of Honolulu.

A typical ahupuaʻa (what we generally refer to as watersheds, today) was a long strip of land, narrow at its mountain summit top and becoming wider as it ran down a valley into the sea to the outer edge of the reef. If there was no reef then the sea boundary would be about one and a half miles from the shore.

Some ahupuaʻa were subdivided into units (still part of the ahupuaʻa) called ʻili. Some of the smallest ahupuaʻa were not subdivided at all, while the larger ones sometimes contained as many as thirty or forty ʻili, each named with its own individual title and carefully marked out as to boundary.

Occasionally, the ahupuaʻa was divided into ʻili lele (“jumping strips”.) The ʻili lele often consisted of several distinct pieces of land at different climatic zones that gave the benefit of the ahupuaʻa land use to the ʻili owner: the shore, open kula lands, wetland kalo land and forested sections.

Like adjoining makai lands of Kaʻākaukukui and Kukuluāe’o, Kewalo, is an ʻili lele. It was awarded to Kamakeʻe Piʻikoi, wife of Jonah Piʻikoi (grandparents of Prince Kūhiō;) the award was shared between husband and wife. The lower land section extended from Kawaiahaʻo Church to Sheridan Street down to the shoreline.

The ʻIli Lele of Kewalo had a lower coastal area adjoining Waikīkī and below the Plain (Kulaokahu‘a) (270+ acres,) a portion makai of Pūowaina (Punchbowl) (50-acres, about one-half of Pūowaina,) a portion in Nuʻuanu (about 8-acres) and kalo loʻi in Pauoa Valley (about 1-acre.)

The makai portion of the Kewalo region was described by missionary Hiram Bingham, as he stood atop “Punchbowl Hill” looking toward Waikīkī to the south, as the “plain of Honolulu” with its “fishponds and salt making pools along the seashore”. (Bingham)

Another visitor to Honolulu in the 1820s, Capt. Jacobus Boelen, gives similar insight to the possible pre-contact character of the Kewalo area:

“It would be difficult to say much about Honoruru (honolulu.) On its southern side is the harbor or the basin of that name. The landlocked side in the northwest consists mostly of tarro (kalo, taro) fields. …”

“From the north toward the east, where the beach forms the bight of Whytetee (Waikīkī,) the soil around the village is less fertile, or at least not greatly cultivated.” (Cultural Surveys)

The undeveloped natural condition of the Kewalo area once consisted of low-lying marshes, tidal flats, fish ponds, reef and limited areas of dry land.

However, during pre-contact times, Hawaiians used it for salt making and farming of fishponds along with some limited wetland taro agriculture, and this supported habitation sites clustered around the mauka (inland) boundary up to King Street.

The salt marshes were excellent places to gather pili grass for the thatching of houses, which may have led to the area’s name: Kaka‘ako (prepare the thatching.)

Beginning in the late-nineteenth century, these low-lying areas were filled in and then developed, which permanently changed the area into its present fully-urbanized character. (Cultural Surveys)

The Kaka‘ako area has been heavily modified over the last 150 years due to historic filling for land reclamation. During the first half of the twentieth century, the marshlands, kalo and rice fields, and reefs were filled to accommodate the expanding urbanization of Honolulu.

The original foot path at the edge of the former coastline has been transformed through time to a horse path, buggy and cart path, and finally to the widened Ala Moana Boulevard.

It continued to be outside Waikīkī and Honolulu during the post-Contact era and served as a place of the dying and the dead, of isolation and quarantine (leper, smallpox, cholera and bubonic patients,) of trash (the city’s dump) and wastelands, and the poor and the immigrant (Japanese, Chinese, Filipino and Portuguese.)

Kewalo literally means “the calling (as an echo).” Outcasts (kauwā) intended for sacrifice were drowned in a pond here as the first step in a sacrificial ritual known as Kānāwai Kaihehe‘e or Ke-kai-he‘ehe‘e, which translates as “sea sliding along,” suggesting that the victims were slid under the sea. (Cultural Surveys)

The priest holding the victim’s head under water would say to her or him on any signs of struggling, “Moe malie i ke kai o ko haku.” “Lie still in the waters of your superiors.” From this it was called Kawailumalumai, “Drowning waters.” (Cultural Surveys)

Today, Kewalo and the district of Kakaʻako are an important link between Honolulu and Waikīkī and are undergoing tremendous commercial and residential redevelopment and is well on its way as a vibrant place to live, work, play and learn, within easy distance between the two commercial centers.

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October 24, 2019 by Peter T Young 2 Comments

Kainalu

This spot was formerly called Kalehuawehe. The surf break ‘Castles’ is named after the Castle family’s four-story beachfront home.

In 1837, Samuel Northrup Castle arrived in Honolulu as a missionary. He left Hawaiʻi for a short time then returned as a businessman for the mission. With Amos Cooke, he founded Castle & Cooke Company in 1851 – it grew into being one of Hawaiʻi’s “Big Five” companies.

One of his ten children would surpass him as a businessman. James Bicknell Castle was born November 27, 1855 in Honolulu to Samuel and Mary (Tenney) Castle. He attended Punahou School 1867–1873, and then Oberlin College.

Castle acquired property in Waikīkī; it had been the home of Boki, the governor of O’ahu, and his wife Liliha. In 1899, James B. Castle built his Waikīkī home and called it ‘Kainalu.’ It was a lavishly furnished four-story mansion with extensive grounds, an ocean pier and other amenities.

In business, he greatly expanded Castle & Cooke in the sugar and railroad industries. One of his first moves was in 1890 when Lorrin Thurston and others joined to create the Kahuku Plantation Company on land subleased from Benjamin Dillingham.

Castle is credited with winning control of the Hawaiian Commercial & Sugar Company from Claus Spreckels in 1898, which he sold to Alexander & Baldwin for a large share of their stock. He later bought large amounts of land, such as Kāneʻohe Ranch.

He then moved to his next phase of his work, which was to connect the Dillingham’s Oahu Railway & Land Co. (OR&L) in Kahuku with the proposed street railway system in Honolulu by way of the Windward Coast.

His plan was to extend his Koʻolau Railroad Co. south of Kahana Bay through Kāneʻohe and Kailua, and on to Waimanalo where it would go through a tunnel and into Manoa Valley and connect with the Rapid Transit & Land Co.

Unfortunately, he died in 1918 before the project could be completed; however, he ran the line from Kahuku to Kahana Bay and extended his plantation and used this railway to haul it to the Kahuku mill. The train service completely closed down by 1952.

When Castle died, his widow found the beachfront property more than she wished to keep up. Mrs. James B. Castle was impressed by the charitable work being done by the Elks (the Honolulu Elks Lodge 616 was established on April 15, 1901) and in 1920 sold them 155,000 square feet on the beach at Waikīkī complete with lavish home, for $1 a square foot.

For decades, the Elks membership and officers worked to raise funds to pay off the mortgage. Every possible method of raising funds was tried. Elks held carnivals, “smokers,” baseball matches, boxing matches, theatricals, auctions, circuses, concerts and dances.

Funds were raised for charity, and a bit set aside to retire the mortgage. Finally, on March 3, 1943, as members sang “Auld Lang Syne;” the mortgage was burned with great ceremony.

Several times since 1920 the sale of the property was proposed and even authorized, but motions were defeated or rescinded. Most prominent was a protracted discussion with the Outrigger Canoe Club, which was looking for a new home.

Between 1954 and 1956, Outrigger Canoe Club made several offers to purchase about half the Castle property. All were refused. Eventually, in 1955, the Elks agreed to lease property to Outrigger. Negotiations continued, and a lease was signed effective November 17, 1956.

In 1958 the Lodge determined to raze Kainalu and rebuild a new lodge. After an April gala aloha event, the old Lodge was demolished in June of 1959. Ground breaking for the new building took place on August 17, 1959. On June 20, 1960, the first meeting was held in a new building, the present lodge building.

In the sand, constantly washed by the waves, are 6 flat-topped black basalt rocks set in cement. The rock is said to come from the Kaimuki Quarry. Also visible is one round, bowl-shaped object. These are the last remnants of the James Castle home.

The multi-sided stones were the footings for pillars holding up the Castle home’s dining room. Facing the ocean, 9 tubular wooden pillars sat on the round cement footings, and in the rear a second row of heavier pillars sat on the lava rock.

In 2007, a rent dispute between the Elks Lodge and Outrigger Canoe Club was settled by a three-member arbitration panel. Terms of the new rent between the next-door neighbors were not disclosed because of a confidentiality agreement (the Elks Lodge, the landowner, was seeking up to $1 million or more a year in rent from the canoe club for a 99-year lease that was renegotiated midway through the term.)

James Castle and his wife had one child, Harold Castle; in the form of various gifts, Harold Castle is the man behind Castle Hospital, Castle High School, Kainalu Elementary, Central Union Windward Church and the Windward Branch of Hawaiʻi Pacific University.

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