Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

“The sound of the waves on the beach at Waikiki”

Webley Edwards was born November 11, 1902 in Corvallis, Oregon.  He attended Oregon Agricultural College (OAC – it was later named Oregon State University) where he became the first student manager of campus radio, KOAC.

As an OAC student, Webley “made good grades, was a popular athlete, and became the best ukulele player on campus, in an era when skill with the instrument was considered a sure way to a woman’s heart.”  (Corvallis Gazette-Times)

After graduating from OAC in 1927, Webley moved to Hawaiʻi in 1928 to work as a car salesman and play semi-pro football. Fascinated with the local music, in 1935, he arranged for a two-week trial run for a radio show of “authentic” Hawaiian music.

On July 3, 1935, Edwards created and first aired a radio program called “Hawaiʻi Calls” featuring Hawaiian music and entertainment.

The first show reached the West Coast of the continental US through shortwave radio.  Although the program enjoyed a growing popularity on the mainland, Edwards initially had a hard time making ends meet and solicited support from the Hawaiʻi Tourist Bureau.

Hawaiʻi was calling, he seemed to suggest, and to the home-bound listener freezing through an Iowa or Montana winter, making a vow to one day visit the Islands became irresistible.

From about 40,000 visitors annually in the 1930s, the number had grown to 500,000 by the time the show ended its run more than 35 years later.  (Corvallis Gazette-Times)

Except for an apparent break during World War II, the radio program aired continuously since its inception.

Edwards was the first to broadcast news of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.  In his own words, “the real McCoy. All army, navy and marine personnel report to duty.”  (Corvallis Gazette-Times)

During the war, Edwards worked as a reporter for CBS Radio and landed exclusives including an interview with Colonel Paul W Tibbetts (the pilot of the B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay, who dropped the atomic bomb over Hiroshima.)

He had been chosen by lottery to be the chief announcer for the shipboard ceremony that ended hostilities between the United States and Japan and aboard the USS Missouri reported on the surrender ceremony that brought the conflict to its close.  (Ankeny)

“Attention, peoples of the world! World War II is about to come to its official closing, three years, eight months and 25 days since the attack on Pearl Harbor.  The Japanese delegation has just arrived.”

“Lined up before us are officers and men with high-ranking stars and gold braid. The deck of the Missouri stretches out before us … its great guns pointed skyward to allow for more room …”   (Corvallis Gazette-Times)

From the time of inception until January of 1972, Webley Edwards was Hawaiʻi Calls’ announcer and leading personality.

Each show opened with the sounds of the pounding surf and the enthusiastic bounding voice of Webley Edwards proclaiming “The sound of the waves on the beach at Waikiki.”

Usually that radio program was broadcast to the Mainland at about sundown. The announcer always described the beautiful sunset including the words, “and now the beautiful sun is a ball of fire, sinking, sinking, ever so slowly over the edge of the ocean–there it goes.”    (Green)

The weekly program was typically taped before a live audience at the Moana Hotel in Waikiki.  Periodically, they took the show on the road and broadcast from a neighbor island.

In its heyday, the show was heard on over 600 radio stations in North America and scores of others in Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, South America, Africa and the Far East.  It was also heard on the Voice of Freedom (the predecessor to the Voice of America) and on Armed Forces Radio throughout the world.    (Hula Records)

Throughout the 1950s, Edwards compiled and produced a series of Hawaiian music collections for Capitol Records.  He even wrote songs under a pseudonym, John Kalapana.

In all, Hawaiʻi Calls spanned 40-years, along the way popularizing tunes including “Lovely Hula Hands,” “Beyond the Reef,” “Little Brown Gal” and “The Hawaiian Wedding Song.”

“Sweet Leilani,” which Edwards debuted in 1936, won an Academy Award after Bing Crosby’s powerful, yet gentle, rendition from the movie ‘Waikiki Wedding’ thrilled people throughout the world.  (Hula Records)

In addition, he helped promote local performers, including Alfred Apaka, George Kainapau, Haleloke, and Simeon and Andy Bright.  (Ankeny)  In addition, Al Jolson and Arthur Godfrey were among the many guests featured on the program.

After Edwards left the program, Danny Kaleikini, a well-known Hawaiʻi entertainer and singer, was the announcer and a performer for the program.  (US District Court Records)  The program ended August 16, 1975.

Late in his career, Edwards made a successful run at politics, serving for more than 14-years in Hawaiʻi’s territorial legislature and then the state legislature.

Spending his last few months in a Honolulu assisted-living facility, he died October 5, 1977, after suffering a heart attack.

On October 3, 1992 there was a temporary return of Hawaiʻi Calls, taped at the Hilton Hawaiian Village’s beachside Tropics Showroom, then transmitted via satellite to affiliates.  It ran for about a year, but it failed to attract enough financial support to continue.

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Kimo Pelekane

James Isaac Dowsett was born to Samuel James Dowsett (born in Rochester, Kent, England 1794 – lost at sea in 1834) and Mary Bishop Dowsett (Rochester, Kent, England; 1808 – 1860) in Honolulu, December 15, 1829 (said to have been the first white child, not of missionary parentage, born in Hawaiʻi.

Samuel and Mary married in Australia. A ship captain, Samuel did shipping business in Australia and was into whaling. Samuel first arrived in Hawaiʻi in 1822 when he was first officer of the “Mermaid,” accompanying the “Prince Regent,” a gift-ship from King George IV of England to King Kamehameha I, promised to the King by George Vancouver.

Samuel returned with his wife on July 17, 1828, arriving on the brig Wellington; they set up their home in Hawaiʻi at that time.  Samuel and Mary had 4 children, James, Samuel Henry, Elizabeth Jane and Deborah Melville.

“The house in which (James) first saw the light of day and which was built by his father, still stands and is occupied. It is the 2-story building in Union street, next to the old bell tower fire station.”  (Hawaiian Gazette, June 17, 1898; the house is now gone)

During his youth, Dowsett was a playmate of Kamehameha IV, Kamehameha V and future King Lunalilo.  James was less than five years old when in 1834 his father sailed away on a pearl fishing expedition and was lost at sea.

In his school days Dowsett was associated with Romualdo Pacheco (who later became Governor California; Pacheco was sent to Hawaiʻi from California to be educated in the islands, a custom followed extensively in early days by parents who sought the best schools for their children.)

Dowsett was hardly more than twelve when he was hired by the Hudson’s Bay Co, but continued his schooling on the side. (His mother refused offers of remarriage and remained a widow until her death.)  In the early-1860s he entered the whaling business, owning a fleet of whaling ships.

“He did not care for public office. Had he yearned for political preferment, any office was at his disposal for many years. He was appointed a Noble of the Kingdom by Kamehameha III and was friend and confident of Kamehameha IV and V.”

“His advice was often sought by the monarchs and was given as one entirely disinterested and be held the trust of those in the highest positions as well as the implicit confidence of the common people. He was a great favorite with the native Hawaiians and spoke their language beautifully.”  (Hawaiian Gazette, June 17, 1898)  The Hawaiians called him “Kimo Pelekane” (Jim the Englishman.)

Besides his whaling activities, Mr. Dowsett engaged in the lumber business and owned a fleet of schooners and small steamers operating between the islands.

Dowsett also had extensive ranching interests; properties now occupied by Schofield Barracks, Fort Shafter, Wheeler Army Airfield and Lualualei were once pastures for Dowsett’s cattle and horses.  He also once owned ʻUlupalakua Ranch.

He was engaged in ranching as early as 1850, and a medal was awarded him at the Agricultural Fair at the time for the best pair of “working oxen.” Dowsett was the first rancher to import Aberdeen Angus stock to Hawaiʻi.

Puʻuloa Salt Works (property of Dowsett) “are at the west side of the entrance to Pearl River, and the windmill is a prominent object in the landscape as we enter. It is also one of the guides in steeling vessels inward.  On the eastern side and opposite to the Puʻuloa buildings, is the fishery, where are a number of buildings inhabited by Chinamen.”  (Daily Bulletin, January 6, 1889)

Dowsett married Annie Green Ragsdale of Honolulu and they were the parents of thirteen children, James Isaac, Jr, Alexander, Phoebe K, Edward Ragsdale, Mary K, Alexander Cartwright, Annie K, Elizabeth Jane, David A, Rowena N, Samuel Henry K, Marion C and Genevieve N.

“Mr. Dowsett was a man of kindly, genial disposition. It was a habit of his for a number of years to make a trip to Waikiki each evening in a street car. It was genuine treat to be a passenger with him.”

“It was a study for one not acquainted with him to watch him in the car and to see all the natives and even the Chinese pay their respects to him on entering the car. Everybody knew who he was and strangers liked him in advance, while those who came to speaking terms with him valued the privilege.”

“He was a quick thinker and an excellent reasoner and while not a talkative man was always willing to supply any information from his great storehouse that might be useful to another or that might interest an inquirer.”

“He knew the town, the people and the country. He never left the Islands but once in his whole life and then four days in San Francisco was enough of life in foreign parts. He was a perfect encyclopedia of history and biography not only of Honolulu and Oahu, but of the entire group.”

“The common suggestion to one in search of obscure historical data was to go to Mr. Dowsett and he never failed. He could always supply day and date and all required details.”   (Hawaiian Gazette, June 17, 1898)

Dowsett was one of the founders of the British Club, now the Pacific Club of Honolulu, and was a trustee of The Queen’s Hospital from its establishment.

Dowsett took on Chung Kun Ai as his protégé, allowing Ai to use a portion of his warehouse, and Ai started importing cigars, tea, peanut oil, shoe nails and other items. Ai and others later started City Mill, a rice milling and lumber importing business in Chinatown, Honolulu.  The City Mill building on Nimitz was dedicated to Dowsett.

“Dowsett saw the grass hut replaced by the stone business block and the taro patch filled up for mansion site. He saw the little paths become fine streets and the broad and barren plains thickly populated districts. He saw the life of a nation change. … Through all this he was a close observer and always on the side of what was right and just.”   (Hawaiian Gazette, June 17, 1898)

Dowsett died on June 14, 1898; “news of the death of Mr. Dowsett had been sent all over the Island and the Hawaiians in large numbers joined the throng of haoles calling to pay respects and offer consolation.”

“The older Hawaiians could not restrain themselves at all and gave vent to floods of tears and to strange wailings. They were overpowered and overcome by the thought that no more would they have the friendly greeting, the certain and reliable advice or the material assistance of the one who had been their reliance at all times and upon all occasions for so many years.”     (Hawaiian Gazette, June 17, 1898)

Subsequent Dowsett generations were also generous; in 1930, Herbert M. Dowsett, Llewellyn F Dowsett and Aileen Dowsett White donated 7-acres and their family estate on Punahou Street to the Shriners Hospital.  Dowsett Avenue and Ragsdale Place in Dowsett Tract and Highlands in Nuʻuanu are named after James and Annie.

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Coral Gardens

When I was growing up, we called them the ‘mud flats’ – mauka runoff covered the fringe reefs in Kāneʻohe Bay.  That’s not how it used to be …

The early twentieth century was a time when some parts of Kāneʻohe Bay were clear and clean with healthy coral reefs and a host of colorful fishes still apparent.  The southern region near Kāneʻohe town became known for its ‘coral gardens.’

Around 1911, the Coral Gardens Hotel was built in the vicinity of what is now Makani Kai Marina.  This resort’s featured attraction was a glass-bottom boat tour of the nearby reefs.

A brochure printed in 1919 described the underwater scenery: “Only those who have seen the Gardens can appreciate the marvelous beauty of their marine growth and the variety of undersea life they hold.”

“Looking through the glass-bottom boat, one sees a natural aquarium of vast extent, set in an undersea forest of strange trees and crags, valleys and Hills.”

These enthusiastic remarks were written by then-territorial governor CJ McCarthy.  They may be the first promotion of an underwater tourist attraction in Hawai‘i.

The Coral Gardens Hotel, once located above the mouth of Kea‘ahala Stream, operated glass bottom boats which visited the famed ‘coral gardens’ of south Kāneʻohe Bay. The coral bottom was once regarded as among the most beautiful in Hawai’i.  (Hawai‘i Coral Reef Inventory)

Arthur Loring MacKaye, the eldest son of the playwright/actor James Steele MacKaye, was the proprietor of the Coral Gardens.  He was born in New York in 1863 and was a newspaper man in New York and Los Angeles.  He came to Hawaii in 1910 and was the city editor for the Pacific Commercial Advertiser. (Mid-Pacific Magazine)

MacKaye wrote in the February 1916 issue of Mid-Pacific Magazine, “One of the most fascinating sights on the Island of Oahu, and within twelve miles of the Honolulu post office, over the Pali, are the Coral Gardens of Kaneohe Bay.”

“Here can be viewed in comfort through the glass bottom boats which ply from the Coral Garden Hotel, a strange and wonderful world, one which is a revelation to those who see it with its …”

“… strange marine life, its ‘painted’ fishes, curious coral formations, beautiful sea plants and ferns, fantastic water-snakes, so-called, of varied hues, and combination vistas of corrugated mountains and a typical South Sea Island with its palm-fringed sandy beach.”

“Since last winter over two thousand visitors, the majority of them tourists, have visited the Coral Gardens and have departed enthusiastic over the wonders of the under-water world seen there.”

“Many of these tourists have visited the marine gardens of Catalina Island, off the coast of Southern California, also the marine gardens of Bermuda and the West Indies, yet all have declared that nowhere else have they seen such a varied and beautiful scene of color and marine life as at the Coral Gardens of Kaneohe Bay.”

“[W]e board the big glass-bottomed boat in command of the local Admiral, who will pilot us to the beauty spots along the coral reefs.”

“Away we go, headed for Moku o Loe, (Coconut Island), which has been made famous by photographers and color artists, views of the island on glass being on exhibition at the San Francisco Exposition where they have attracted all art-lovers at the Hawaiian Building.”

“Within a few minutes the boat glides over the first reef, but this is a dead reef and illustrates the manner in which land is built up upon the coral reefs of the Pacific; here all is dark-colored silt with patches of coarse seaweeds and pieces of dirty coral.”

“A moment later we glide over another deep channel, for Kaneohe Bay is full of these channels radiating between the reefs, in fact the word ‘Kaneohe’ in ancient Hawaiian means ‘deep, still channels.’”

“From this spot is secured a wonderful view of the Koolau Mountains with their corrugated sides, which lift their heads to the clouds with their emerald green peaks shining in the morning sun, or standing out like bluish green silhouettes in the late afternoon, or when the setting sun crowns them with halos of rose flames. It is a sight to be remembered.”

“And here we come to the second reef, one which is partly dead on one side, but alive on the other, showing as we cross it in water only two or three feet deep, the changes in a coral reef-top from muddy silt to white coral sand, interspersed with crimson sponges and green seaweeds.”

“As we pass over the outer rim of this reef we take a peek through the covered plate-glass box which runs through the center of the boat.”

“It gives you an eerie sensation as we pass from the shallow reef into water fifty feet deep; and as the boat glides out you catch a glimpse of a coral precipice along the steep sides of which strange fish are swimming, and a moment later the boat seems to be floating in space of a bright green hue.”

“And then the fish! My, what a lot! Swarms of manini, yellowish green with vertical black stripes; kikakapus, yellow with black spots on their tail and a black rim around their heads; the aawa, ohu, pilani, and many other “painted” varieties.”

“But it is the rainbow fish which calls forth enthusiasm.  This is a rare species which has never been seen in the aquarium, nor is there a specimen in the Bishop museum.”

MacKaye noted, “Probably no other one spot in the Territory of Hawaii can show such a wonderful variety of coral as the waters of Kaneohe Bay and the surrounding reefs on Windward Oahu.”

“Considerably over one hundred varieties of corals are known to exist in Kaneohe Bay, where lie the famous Coral Gardens, the sheltered formation of the encircling shores being advantageous to the propagation of nearly all the species inhabiting the Hawaiian waters.”

The original Coral Gardens resort and its tours persisted until shortly before World War II.  Then more than a decade of massive dredging and removal of whole reefs for primarily military purposes obliterated the coral gardens in the calm, sheltered southern bay.

Prior to 1930, the coral reefs of Kāneʻohe Bay were still in excellent condition. Then, the area of the south basin was subsequently impacted by dredging, sedimentation and sewage discharge.

Much of the dredged reef mass, at least 15 million cubic yards, went into landfill and runway construction at the Marine base on Mokapu Peninsula. Many of the south bay’s pedestal-formed patch reefs were blasted apart and the rubble dredged up to clear landing zones for seaplanes. (Culliney, Islands in a Far Sea)

After a lot of hard work by a lot of people over a long time, Kāneʻohe Bay is recovering; while not yet back to being a ‘coral garden,’ invasive algae has literally been sucked off the coral, coral is recolonizing and the Bay and reefs are recovering.

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Dole Came to Hawai‘i to Grow Coffee

The only place in the United States where coffee is grown commercially is in Hawaiʻi.

Don Francisco de Paula y Marin recorded in his journal, dated January 21, 1813, that he had planted coffee seedlings on the island of Oʻahu.  The first commercial coffee plantation was started in Kōloa, Kauai, in 1836.

Coffee was planted in Mānoa Valley in the vicinity of the present UH-Mānoa campus; from a small field, trees were introduced to other areas of O‘ahu and neighbor islands.

John Wilkinson, a British agriculturist, obtained coffee seedlings from Brazil. These plants were brought to Oʻahu in 1825 board the HMS Blonde (the ship also brought back the bodies of Liholiho and Kamāmalu who had died in England) and planted in Mānoa Valley at the estate of Chief Boki, the island’s governor.

In 1828, American missionary Samuel Ruggles took cuttings from Mānoa and brought them to Kona.   Henry Nicholas Greenwell grew and marketed coffee and is recognized for putting “Kona Coffee” on the world markets.

At Weltausstellung 1873 Wien (World Exhibition in Vienna, Austria (1873,)) Greenwell was awarded a “Recognition Diploma” for his Kona Coffee.  Greenwell descendants continue the family’s coffee-growing tradition in Kona. (Greenwell Farms) 

Writer Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) seemed to concur with this when he noted in his Letters from Hawaiʻi, “The ride through the district of Kona to Kealakekua Bay took us through the famous coffee and orange section. I think the Kona coffee has a richer flavor than any other, be it grown where it may and call it what you please.”

Hermann Widemann introduced the ‘Guatemalan’ variety (known as ‘Kona typica’) to Hawaiʻi in 1892. He gave seeds to John Horner, who planted an orchard of 800 trees in Hāmākua, comparing 400 trees of this new variety with 400 of the then-current variety known as ‘kanaka koppe,’ the so-called ‘Hawaiian coffee’, probably from 30 plants brought from Brazil by Wilkinson.  (CTAHR)

“’Coffee-trees are often planted with a crowbar,’ it is said. Strange as this may seem, it is nevertheless true. A hole is drilled through the rock, or lavacrust, and the soil thus reached; the tree, a small twig dug up from the forest, is planted in this hole, and it grows, thrives, and yields fruit abundantly.”  (Musick, 1898)

In 1892 it was estimated there were probably 1,000-acres in old coffee throughout North and South Kona; 150-acres new set out by the two companies then under way there, with expectation of setting out fifty more; 170-acres in the Hāmākua and Hilo districts and about 100 in Puna.  (Thrum)

“Hardly a mail arrives from abroad but brings further enquiry for coffee lands and information as to area; how obtainable; situation; prices, etc., and the usual multitudinous questions pertaining thereto, all of which gives evidence of the readiness of foreign capital to come in and push forward the reviving industry with vigor.”  (Thrum, 1892)

In 1893, Joe Marsden, agricultural commissioner of the recently inaugurated revolutionary government of Hawaii, sent out some examples of promotion literature which were rosy beyond the wildest dreams of a Los Angeles publicity man.

The material related especially to coffee and back in Boston, James D Dole  (who graduated in 1899 in agriculture at Harvard’s Bussey Institute (now the Arnold Arboretum)) read the publicity and made up his mind that Hawaii and coffee offered the greatest possible attraction for him.

Arriving in Honolulu, he found that the coffee business left much to be desired. His capital was limited and learning that a small homestead near Wahiawa had relinquished his land, went out to look over the prospect. (Heenan, Canning Age)

“Following my inclination toward an agricultural pursuit and the lure of Hawaii, then recently annexed to the United States, I landed in Honolulu on November 16, 1899; and within two weeks found the town quarantined for six months by an outbreak of bubonic plague.”

“During that winter I saw the fire department, with the timely aid of a stiff trade-wind, burn down all of Chinatown (the intention having been to disinfect in this thorough manner only one or two blocks).”

“In July, I bought a government homestead of sixty-four acres, twenty-three miles from Honolulu, and on August 1, 1900, I took up my residence thereon as a farmer – unquestionably of the ‘dirt” variety.”  (Dole, Harvard)’

At the time coffee turned out not to be a viable crop, so he switched to pineapples.  He incorporated Hawaiian Pineapple Company on December 4, 1901.

Exporting fresh pineapples to the continental United States resulted in a high level of wastage in the era before modern refrigerated sea and air transportation. So Dole decided to process the fruit before it was exported.

At the time fruit was often preserved in glass containers and one of his fellow pineapple growers at the settlement adopted this method of preserving his fruit. However, Dole chose to preserve his fruit in tin cans.  This proved to be a wise choice. (Hawkins)

In the 1930s Dole went into business with Castle & Cooke as principal shareholders in Hawaiian Pineapple Company and beginning in 1933 the Dole name was affixed to the company’s products. (Dole)

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by Peter T Young 4 Comments

Hawaiʻi Youth Correctional Facility

American and English heritage found those members of society who either cannot care for themselves or who do not fit societal expectations have been the subject of ‘parens patriae’ (parent of the nation,) whereby the state acts as the parent of any child or individual who is in need of protection (i.e., destitute widows, orphans, abused and neglected children and law violators of minority age.)

In 1850, the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi passed its first legislation towards the care and training of Hawaiʻi’s delinquent youth.

Then, the legislature, on December 30, 1864, approved “An act authorizing the board of education to establish an industrial and reformatory school for the care and education of helpless and neglected children, as also for the reformation of juvenile offenders”.

“The only object of the said industrial and reformatory schools shall be the detention, management, education, employment, reformation, and maintenance of such children as shall be committed thereto as orphans, vagrants, truants, living an idle or dissolute life, who shall be duly convicted of any crime or misdemeanor”.  (Hawaiian Commission, Annexation Report, 1898)

In 1864, Kamehameha V created, and placed administratively under the Kingdom’s Board of Education, the Keoneʻula Reformatory School, an industrial and reformatory school for boys and girls in Kapālama.  The first juvenile facility of its kind in the Islands. (The site is now home to the Princess Victoria Kaʻiulani Elementary School on King Street.)

The Board had authority to establish other industrial schools across the Islands. (Jurisdiction shifted from the Board of Education to the Board of Industrial Schools in 1915, then to the Territorial Department of Institutions in 1939.)

The Industrial School model was in response to the belief that segregation in an institutional setting was the most effective way to address the needs of neglected and delinquent youth. Major characteristics of this congregate-care facility included strict regimentation, harsh punishment, unequal treatment for boys and girls, a poor education system and an emphasis on work.

Initially, the board leased nine-acres in Kapālama, initially for 15-boys and 2-girls, and had them grow taro, vegetables and bananas.  In 1903, with the growing population, 75-boys were relocated from Keoneʻula to farmland in Waialeʻe on the North Shore, where wards could learn “habits of industry.”

Farming activities were intended as much to make this facility self-supporting as to provide therapy and training for the wards. Reports about the Waialeʻe institution refer to conditions as always overcrowded.

Meanwhile, female wards moved from Kapālama to Mōʻiliʻili, then in the 1920s to the Maunawili Training School on the mauka side of Kalanianaʻole Highway in Kailua, Koʻolaupoko.

The girls’ Maunawili complex included five major buildings sited on approximately 430-acres on the slopes of Olomana.  All the buildings (primarily designed by CW Dickey) were constructed between 1927 and the opening of the school in February 1929, with the exception of the gymnasium which was built in 1938.

According to an early Honolulu Star-Bulletin report, “the buildings are scattered about over the hillside, each different from the other in architectural detail. The effect is pleasing; there is no air of the reform school about the place.”  (NPS)

In 1931, the boys’ facility underwent a name change from Waialeʻe Industrial School to the Waialeʻe Training School for Boys; that year, the girls’ Maunawili complex became known as the Kawailoa Training School.

These were Territorial institutions, in rural Oʻahu, formerly under the Department of Public Instruction but from 1915 were under a Board of Industrial Schools.  (Report of Governor’s Advisory Committee on Crime, 1931)

Delinquent or dependent children under 18 years of age may be committed to these schools by the juvenile courts in proceedings not to be deemed criminal in nature; no child under 14 may be confined in any jail or police station either before, during or after trial, and no child under 18 may be confined with any adult who shall be under arrest, confinement or conviction for any offense.  (Report of Governor’s Advisory Committee on Crime, 1931)

Then, in succeeding decades, various types of facilities and locales were used to house, train and educate the youths.

In 1950, three “cottages” for boys (named, Olomana, Kaʻala and Maunawili) were built on the makai side of Kalanianaʻole Highway from the girls’ Kawailoa Training School in Kailua.  Then, all operations at the Waialeʻe Training School for Boys (111-boys and 45-staff members – the entire population from Waialeʻe) transferred to the new facility and the name changed to the Koʻolau Boys Home.

In 1961, all operations came under a combined administrative unit (including housing both male and female youths) with a new name, the Hawaiʻi Youth Correctional Facility (HYCF,) a branch of the Corrections Division of the reorganized Department of Social Services and Housing.

HYCF is the state’s sole juvenile facility. It’s comprised of two separate facilities with three housing units: two boys’ housing units and a girls’ housing unit (with certain exceptions, HYCF houses boys confined for long terms at the main secure custody facility (“SCF.”)

The SCF is comprised of a central courtyard surrounded by three housing modules, with ten cells and a common area in each module, a school, a gymnasium, kitchen facilities, offices for administrative and medical staff, and two isolation cells.

The Olomana School, Olomana Hale Hoʻomalu and Olomana Youth Center were established since 1985 and provide support services to alienated students throughout the State of Hawaiʻi.

Olomana School (operated by the DOE) offers three main educational programs:  incarcerated youth are served at HYCF; the Olomana Hale Hoʻomalu program is to provide educational and support services to students who are temporarily confined to the juvenile detention facility; and The Olomana Youth Center serves at-risk students from Windward Oahu’s secondary schools and also HYCF students who are in transit.

Due to the pending litigation in 1991 against the State regarding conditions of confinement for women, the temporary Women’s Community Correctional Center (in what was the Koʻolau Boys Home on the makai side of the highway) was remodeled and completed in 1994 as the State’s primary women’s all-custody facility.

Women’s Community Correctional Center (WCCC) is the only women’s prison in Hawaii. It also serves the needs of pre-trial and sentenced female offenders. The facility houses female offenders who are of maximum, medium and minimum custody levels.

The facility is comprised of four (4) structures; Olomana, Kaala, Maunawili and Ahiki Cottages. Every cottage operates in accordance with specific programs and classification levels.  WCCC also offers a 50-bed gender responsive, substance abuse therapeutic community called Ke Alaula.  (Lots of information here from reports from the Auditor, Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice, Office of Youth Services and NPS.)

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