General | Page 108 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

May 27, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Communists in the Union in the Islands in the 1930s and 40s

In 1951 in Washington, DC, Jack Kawano (former President of ILWU) gave a US House Congressional Committee On Un-American Activities details on the Communist Party activities in Hawai’i. Kawano stated, in part:

I am not a Communist. However, I was a member of the Communist Party. I joined the Communist Party because some individual Communists were willing to assist me inorganizing the Waterfront Union.

I decided to quit the Communist Party because I found that the primary existence of the Communist Party was not for the best interests of the workingman but to dupe the members of the union, to control the union, and to use the union for purposes other than strictly trade-union matters.

The Communists play rings around the rank and file members of the union and their union’s constitutions, by meeting separately and secretly among themselves and making prior decisions on all important union policy matters, such as the question of strikes, election of officers, ratification of union agreements, the question of American foreign policy, and all other important matters of the Union.

Primarily all of these decisions are made on the basis of what is good for the Communist Party and not what is good for the membership of the union.

In 1934, on the water front, when I was first employed there, there was no union; and in order for one to get a job and be able to hold on to it, it was almost an impossibility unless he brought gifts and bribes to his foreman.

Discrimination, favoritism, no job security, low wages, speed-ups, dangerous working conditions were all part of a daily routine. The workers’ need for a union was so great that it was not funny.

In October 1935, when the West Coast Firemen’s Union opened a hiring hall in Honolulu, and later when the same hiring hall was shared by the Sailors’ Union of the Pacific, the officers of both the Firemen’s Union and the Sailors’ Union of the Pacific paid for and reserved a small space in the same hiring hall for an organizing committee.

This organizing committee was headed by Maxie Weisbarth, who was then agent for the Sailors’ Union of the Pacific, and Harry Kealoha, a member of the Marine Fireman, Oilers, and Water Tenders Union at that time.

The first organizing drive among longshoremen was launched by Weisbarth and Kealoha, aided by others like Charlie Post, and so forth. However, I did not join the union at that time because they did not permit workers of oriental descent to become members of that organization.

I joined the Longshoremen’s Association of Honolulu in November 1935, when the organizers changed their policy and made it possible for workers of oriental extraction to become members of the union.

Several organizational meetings were called, and they were fairly well attended. However, then efforts in organizing was defeated when the water-front employers offered Thanksgiving turkey to the workers on Christmas, and the workers were told that the turkey was a present to them from the company, and if they did not listen to the radical agitators from Sailors’ Hall they would be getting better things from the company in the future.

I was one of the few who ignored the company’s advice, and continued my membership in the union until I got fired in 1936. I was not fired long before I talked my way back on the job.

When I was reemployed, I got fired again because the company found that I did not quit the union. This time I was fired until the end of the 1936-37 Pacific coast maritime strike, which ended in February 1937.

At the end of that strike, with the aid of some members of the sailors’ union and the firemen’s union, I managed to get my job on the water front back again.

So I went back to work on the water front in early February 1937. However, because I could not get transferred to my former sugar gang, I left the water-front job in July 1937 to work full time as a water-front organizer for the union without pay.

Organizing in those days was very difficult. I used to talk to workers on then way to and from work; visited them at their homes and talked to them; signed up and collected dues from some of them; but because we were not able to show any encouraging results, these people gradually dropped out of the union.

I used to borrow Willie Crozier’s p. a. system (public-address system) to organize mass meetings along the water front in the mornings.

I used to make leaflets and distribute them among workers on the water front in the mornings and afternoons.

But because the employers had organized a company union, sports clubs, and so forth, to divert the attention of the workers elsewhere, and because they used the leaders of this company union to discriminate and threaten organizers and members of the union …

… and because through their company union they raised the wages from 40 to 50 cents during the 1936-37 strike, we were never able to get the majority of the employees into the union at any one time during those days.

This situation continued from 1935 on until we finally got organized and won our first agreement on the water front in the spring of 1941.

There were many enthusiastic organizers in the beginning, but as time went on, and no organizational results showed, these organizers and union leaders gradually dropped out of existence. Some of these organizers and leaders were: Maxie Weisbarth, Harry Kealoha, Edward Berman, Levi Kealoha, Jack Hall, to mention a few.

However, Frederick Kamahoahoa and I kept plugging until we finally organized the water front with the aid of some of the more active union men on the water front.

Some of the more active union men who played an important part in assisting us organize the water front were Takeshi Yamanchi, Chujiro Hokama, Kana Shimiabakuro, Naoji Yokoyama, Kiheji Nishi, Daniel Machado, Jr, Francis Perkins, Ben Kahaawinui, Lefty Chang, William Halm, William Piilani, John Akin, Solomon Niheu, and a few others.

While we were organizing, there was a strike of sugar workers on the Puunene plantation in 1937. The strike lasted for 2 to 3 months. When the strike began, Maxie Weisbarth sent a man by the name of Ben Shear from Honolulu to assist the sugar workers in their strike and to help them along. The idea was to try to get them to join the HLA, Honolulu Longshoremen’s Association.

These plantation strikers and their leaders seemed to be very interested, but because we were not able to give them any substantial financial assistance the strikers decided to stay independent from HLA and did not affiliate themselves with HLA, Honolulu Longshoremen’s Association.

Just about the same time the longshoremen in Port Allen, Kauai, went on strike. They demanded recognition of their union, adjustment of grievances, and better wages.

Ben Shear, who was at that time in Maui, was pulled out from Maui, and he, together with George Goto, was assigned to go to Kauai and assist the strikers in Kauai. Ben Shear and George Goto did a great deal in building up the strength of the longshore union in Port Allen und in Akukini.

Meanwhile, Bill Bailey, a Communist, was sent from Honolulu to Maui, to assist the strikers there. He stayed with the strikers until the strike, was finally settled without any written agreement, and as a result of that the Plantation Union was broken after the end of the strike.

Now comes my first Communist meeting. The first Communist meeting that I attended was held. I believe, in the room on Emma Street near Beretania Street occupied by William Bailey.

I was escorted to this meeting by Edward Berman, who was at that time a nominal organizational head of the union in Honolulu. At this meeting, Bailey gave a lecture that lasted anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour.

He issued us membership cards in the Travelers’ Club, otherwise known as a Communist card. He told us that as long as we carried that card we would be respected by all good union men from the mainland, and we could count on Harry Bridges to help us. He also asked us to volunteer in the Spanish Loyalist Army, but no one volunteered.

From what I understand, [the Travelers Club] was a membership book signifying that you are a member of the Communist Party. I understood there is a slight difference between those people who carry Communist Party book offshore and inshore.

In this case it was an offshore group, and it was impossible for them to belong to one unit, because seamen travel all over the country, so to make them eligible to attend meetings wherever they go, in every port, they have one unified card system, and I think that was supposed to be this Travelers’ card system.

A man carrying a Travelers’ card from New York would be eligible to attend a meeting in Honolulu, and vice versa.

[At the meeting,] the general trend of thought was like this – that the bosses are no good; that workers can live without the bosses, and we should try to get rid of the bosses by forming an organization and fighting the bosses, first through the union and later through the revolution, or something like that.

I think everybody signed up in the Communist Party through the Travelers’ Club who attended that meeting ….

[Kawano noted, as a union organizer, he attended a Communist Party school stating,] Around the latter part of the summer of 1938, Jack Kimoto [an Japanese language interpreter and the one who set up the Communist Party in the Islands] urged me to consider going to San Francisco to study labor economics at one of the special schools conducted by the Communist Party of the USA in California.

He told me that it was only a 5-week course, and that I could learn a lot, and I would be able to do a more effective job of organizing after I returned from school. …

The following year, 1939, Ichiro Izuka and Jack Hall also attended a Communist Party school in California. They went from Honolulu. Robert McElrath also attended the school, from California, but by using Hawaii’s credit.

Oh, it wasn’t only Kawano who told of the Communism-Union link …

Dan Inouye noted in his 1967 biography, “No one with any sense of political reality denied that there were probably some Communists in the ILWU. … There were those who felt that the Democrats’ Party, by logical extension, was also controlled by Communists.” (Dan Inouye (former US Senator); reported by Borreca, Star Bulletin)

“Later, in 1975, Governor John Burns, who in the 1950s was a Democratic Party organizer and delegate to Congress, would reflect that perhaps there were Communists within the union …”

“‘Every guy in the ILWU was at one time or another a member of the Communist Party of America. This is where they got their organizational information and how to organize, and how to bring groups together and how to create cells and how to make movements that are undetected by the bosses and everything else. … I know what they were about. I said this is the only way they are going to organize.’” (John Burns (former Hawaii Governor); reported by Borreca, Star Bulletin)

To be clear, neither Kawano nor anyone else said all union leaders and members were communists.

But, as Kawano stated, “In view of the world situation, where our country is at war with communist forces in Korea, I cannot see myself assisting Communists or community in any way, particularly when you consider them to be enemies of our country. Therefore, I feel I owe it to my country to bring to light all I know about Communist activities in Hawaii.”

Read Kawano’s full testimony here (all here, except the Borreca quotes, are quoted from his testimony):

Click to access hearingsregardinhaw1951unit.pdf

After Kawano’s testimony, seven Hawai‘i residents – Jack Hall, John Reinecke, Dwight James Freeman, Charles Fujimoto, Eileen Fujimoto, Jack Kimoto and Koji Ariyoshi were arrested under the Smith Act in August 1951.

They were charged with conspiracy for their communist way of “thinking.” They were called the ‘Hawaii Seven’ and they were convicted and sentenced to prison. They appealed.

The Ninth Circuit Court in San Francisco overturned the convictions on January 20, 1958 on the basis of a previous Supreme Court decision that the abstract teaching of communism did not constitute conspiracy to overthrow the government by force as defined by the Smith Act. (Tagaki-Kitamura)

May 21, 2022 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Haraguchi Rice Mill

The Royal Hawaiian Agricultural Society was formed in 1850 to develop Hawaiʻi’s agricultural resources. It was then that rice made its mark in the Hawaiʻi economy. The group purchased land in the Nuʻuanu Valley and rice seed from China and planted in a former taro patch.

At first the Society offered the rice seed to anyone in Hawaiʻi who wanted to plant it. King Kamehameha IV also offered land grants for cultivation of rice. Because there were no proper milling facilities in Hawaiʻi, it didn’t take off as a viable crop right away.

Then, in 1860, imported rice seed from South Carolina proved very successful and yielded a fair amount of crop. This, combined with the collapse of the taro industry in 1861-1862 (as the Hawaiian population declined, the demand for taro also declined,) added value to the numerous vacant taro patches and a boom in the rice industry.

In 1899, Hawaiʻi’s rice production had expanded so that it placed third in production of rice behind Louisiana and South Carolina.

The Agricultural Extension Service of the University of Hawaiʻi encouraged rice production, primarily in Hanalei. As a result the acreage planted in rice on the island rose from 759 acres in 1933 to 1,058 in 1934.

For areas like Hanalei Valley, such efforts, coupled with the valley’s general remoteness and absence of competing demands for the land, allowed rice cultivation to continue as a regional activity.

The Hanalei Valley of Kauaʻi led all other single geographic units in the amount of acreage planted in rice. The valley was one of the first areas converted to this use and continued to produce well into the 1960s.

The Commercial Pacific Advertiser noted on October 3, 1861, “Everybody and his wife (including defunct government employees) are into rice – sugar is nowhere and cotton is no longer king. Taro patches are held at fabulous valuations, and among the thoughtful the query is being propounded, where is our taro to come from?”

When the Japanese immigrants arrived in Hawaiʻi, their tastes preferred a shorter grain rice than the Chinese long-grain variety. With the decline of the Chinese population and increase in the Japanese population, more of the Japanese rice was being imported from Japan.

As the Japanese left the plantations, they started their own farms and cultivated their own staple rice.

It was at Hanalei where some Chinese built a rice processing facility; it as later purchased by the Haraguchi family in 1924. At one time, the Haraguchis cultivated about 75-acres in Hanalei Valley.

Fire destroyed the original wooden mill in March of 1930; a new mill consisted of a 3-foot thick concrete foundation with corrugated iron for its roof and siding. Interior spaces included engine room, milling area, and storage area for both finished and unprocessed rice.

This main engine operated all the mill machinery by turning a main shaft that connected all the other machines by a pulley system. The rice in a pit would be delivered up by cups on a belt located on a “triple chute” system. One chute served the belts going downward, another chute for the belts returning upwards and a third to suck the dust up which traveled to the blower.

The cups carried the rice over the wall onto another chute and into the strainer. This strainer would shake the rice and separate any rubbish or stones to prevent it from entering the husking machines. From the strainer, the rice would proceed to the first husker that removed part of the husk.

About 80% of the husks would be removed by this husker. The husks would travel up the air ‘chute to the blower which blew the husks out the back of the mill into a ditch that carried the husks into the river.

The partly husked rice would exit the first husker and was taken up a chute by belted cups and dropped onto another chute into the second husker. The second husker would remove the rest of the husks and the grains would continue up another “triple chute” which would carry it up and over into the polishing machine.

The fine dust from the second husker was collected in a basket under the machine and also taken up the chute into the blower. Cowhide was used to polish the rice which prevented the grains from cracking which ensured high quality rice. The rice would exit the polisher and taken up another chute to the grader.

The grading machine constantly shook to move the rice to the three different grades of rice. The whole grain would bypass the grading holes and a trowel was used to push the rice onto a small trough into the rice bag which hung at the end of the funnel. From there the bags were scaled, sewn by hand and then stacked.

Despite the competition from the California grown rice, the Japanese farmers continued to produce on a smaller scale than the Chinese farmers. By the early 1950s there were about 50 growers cultivating 170 acres of rice on Kauaʻi. Hanalei Valley held 90 acres, 48 acres in Wailua and the rest was split between Hanapepe and Waimea valleys.

In addition to the staple rice, “mochi rice,” used for traditional Japanese cake on New Year’s and other special occasions, was grown.

The mochi rice from Hanalei Valley was noted for its quality throughout the Islands. It was largely a luxury crop and most of it was consumed in the Islands; about 200-bags were shipped to the Mainland.

Some mochi rice was imported from the Mainland but local buyers preferred the local crop since it was said to produce a larger yield of mochi per pound.

In 1959, Hurricane Dot left the mill intact except for an air vent at the roof peak that was torn off and not replaced. The mill ceased operating in 1960 when Kaua`i’s rice industry collapsed. Hurricane Iwa on November 23, 1982 toppled 85% of the building onto the machinery; then came Hurricane Iniki in 1992.

The Haraguchi Rice Mill was the last mill to operate in Hanalei Valley and the only remaining rice mill in the State of Hawaiʻi. A nonprofit organization was formed to preserve and interpret the mill; the organization is guided by an unpaid Board of Directors (many of them are members of the Haraguchi family.) The Haraguchi family now farms taro on the adjacent lands that once supported rice.

Today, the Hoʻopulapula Haraguchi Rice Mill is an agrarian museum located in the taro fields of Hanalei Valley. The Rice Mill Kiosk is open to the public, Monday through Saturday, 11 am – 3 pm. No Public access into the farm & Rice Mill unless through guided tours, available Wednesdays at 10 am (reservations are required.) (Lots of information here from NPS.)

May 17, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Lord Byron’s 1825 Trip to Pearl River

In 1824, Liholiho (King Kamehameha II), his wife, Kamāmalu, and a group of retainers and foreign advisors, traveled from Hawai‘i to England. Liholiho and his wife died in England and in May of 1825, their bodies were returned to Hawai‘i by Lord Byron.

While in the islands, James Macrae, a botanist, traveling with the Lord, traveled to various locations in the company of native guides, where he took observations and collected biological samples.

One of Macrae’s journeys along with Lord Byron and party took him to Pu‘uloa, the Pearl River, where he described the scene and scenery. (Maly)

“May 17. Joined Lord Byron’s party, with Mantle carrying my traps. We did not embark until noon. After two hours sailing along the coast, we entered the mouth of the Pearl River, which divides itself into several branches, forming two islands.”

“One which is smaller than the other is called Rabbit island [Moku‘ume‘ume], from a person, the name of Marine [Marin], a Spaniard, residing at Hanarura, having put rabbits on it some years ago. The rabbits have since increased in numbers.”

“It became so calm, that his Lordship, Mr. C., and the Bloxoms left us in the launch, and rowed in the small boat in tow, and soon disappeared from sight.”

“We waited in suspense, hour after hour, not knowing the several branches of the river, nor where we were to spend the night.”

“The boat party pulling into one branch of the river, the other in which I was tacking about from bank to bank till the boaters hauled their boat ashore and we cast anchor.”

“Both parties were opposite each other on Rabbit Island, but ignorant of the fact, till on walking about the island, the parties met.”

“One hut was noticed, and those on the island made for it, but the launch having the ladies and some others on board, got up anchor and sailed round to the hut, where with the help of canoes, they all landed.”

“The ladies were somewhat discontented, but after a good dinner partaken sitting on mats spread on the grass, harmony was restored.”

“At dusk we embarked to cross to a larger hut. Landed at 8 p.m. At ten o’clock two old men entered our hut to play the hura dance on a couple of bottle shaped gourds. They took a sitting posture, beating time on the gourd’s with the palms of their hands, accompanied by a song made up about the late king.”

“About 11, we all retired to rest, lying down beside each other on mats, some with pumpkins or what else they could get for a pillow. The ladies got themselves screened off in a corner with a flag without any other accommodation.”

“Pearl River is about seven miles west of Hanarura, and is improperly called a river, being rather inlets from the sea, branching off in different directions. There are three chief branches, named by the surveyors, the East, Middle and West Lochs.”

“The entrance to Pearl River is very narrow and shallow, and in its present state it is fit for very small vessels to enter, but over the bar there is deep water, and in the channel leading to the lochs there are from 7 to 20 fathoms. The lochs themselves are rather shallow.”

“The coast from Hanarura to the west of Pearl River possesses no variety of plants beyond two or three species, such as Argemones (kala, beach poppy), Portulacas (‘ihi, yellow purslane), and a few other little annuals, intermixed with the common long grass so plentiful everywhere on the coast round the island.”

“The oysters that are found in Pearl River are small and insipid and of no value or consequence.”

“May 18. Got up at 4 a.m., after a restless night, having been tormented with fleas. Departed with my man Mantle, leaving the rest yet asleep. But after travelling about three miles, the path which we had first struck terminated, and the grass became longer and more difficult to travel over.”

“At last, after another three miles, we got so entangled with creeping plants running a little above the ground beneath the grass, that Mantle, who was stockingless, shed tears, complaining of his ankles, and refused to go on.”

“Being yet five miles from the woods, and not having sufficient provisions for two days, we were forced to return to the town by a path leading through taro ponds, some distance inland from the coast.”

“On the path we had left near the Pearl River, we saw several thickly inhabited huts, situated on the side of a ravine stocked with bananas, taro and healthy breadfruit trees just forming their fruit. Here we met with an old Englishman, who told us there was on the opposite side of the ravine a large river coming out under the ground.”

“We went to the place and found that what he had told us was correct, and stood admiring the subterranean stream of fine, cool water. Its source was rapid, forming a cascade nearly 20 feet in height, having ferns and mosses on its sides.”

“In the grounds of the natives, I saw plenty of the awa plant (piper) mentioned in the history of these islands, as being destructive to the health of the natives when used to excess, owing to its intoxicating qualities. I obtained several specimens of it in flower.”

“The old man informed me that he had been on the island over sixteen years, and that the grounds we were then upon, belonged to Boki, and had been in his charge for ten years.”

“Upon Boki going to England with the king, another chief had turned him away, and taken all his little ground from him, so that he had been forced to live on the charity of the natives.”

“The neighbourhood of the Pearl River is very extensive, rising backwards with a gentle slope towards the woods, but is without cultivation, except round the outskirts to about half a mile from the water.”

“The country is divided into separate farms or allotments belonging to the chiefs, and enclosed with walls from four to six feet high, made of a mixture of mud and stone.”

“The poorer natives live on these farms, also a few ragged foreigners who have a hut with a small spot of ground given them, for which they must work for the chiefs a certain number of days besides paying an annual rent in dogs, hogs, goats, poultry and tapa cloths, which they have to carry to whatever spot their master is then living on the island.”

“On the least neglect to perform these demands, they are turned away and deprived of whatever stock, etc., they may possess. Such is the present despotic or absolute law in the Sandwich Islands.”

“This is corroborated by all foreigners met with at different times, who, on our arrival, hoped that Lord Byron would render them their little property more secure in future. Unfortunately they must wait till the British Consul helps them, as we have no authority to interfere with the laws of the country.”

“On our way home we noticed that the country on the side towards the woods still remained uncultivated, also towards the sea coast, except the lower ends of the small valleys which are cultivated with the taro in ponds, which much resemble peat mosses that had been worked and afterwards allowed to get full of stagnant water.”

“There is no convenient road to travel anywhere on the island. We met with another subterranean river at the side of one of the hollows, larger than the other, but of no great fall after its appearance from underground.”

“By 4 pm we gained the summit of a high hill, thickly covered with tufts of long grass. It lies within three miles of Hanarura. There is a burying ground of the natives at the top, which was formerly where the chiefs of high rank had a morai.”

“At the bottom towards the sea, there is a circular salt pond, nearly two miles in circumference, surrounded by low conical hills. In places on the sides of a valley leading to the pond from the interior, are several huts of the natives with taro ponds and a large grove of coco-nut trees, apparently very old from their height and mossy appearance.”

“We reached town about six o’clock having travelled twenty miles since morning without much success, being too near the coast to meet with a variety of plants. We learnt, however, a good deal about the present mode of life of the natives, and the manner in which they continue to cultivate their grounds, differing but little, if any, from the descriptions given Capt. Cook and others.” (Macrae)

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May 15, 2022 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Hālawa Shaft

The Hawaiian Islands are made up of one or more shield volcanoes that are composed primarily of extremely permeable, thin basaltic lava flows (within the flows are a few ash beds.) Ordinarily, basalts are among the most permeable rocks on earth.

When rain falls on the Islands, it does one of three things: (1) wets the land surface, shallow infiltration saturates the uppermost soil layer and replaces soil moisture used by plants and then is absorbed by the vegetation and/or evaporates (evapotranspiration;) (2) runs off, eroding the land, forming valleys and gouges in the mountain slopes (and also creates some spectacular periodic waterfalls;) or (3) percolates into the ground (slowly sinks into the ground and becomes groundwater.)

The latter contributes to the groundwater recharge of the area (in the Koʻolau, it takes about 9-months for the rain, now groundwater, to seep down through cracks and permeable materials in the mountain.) Other recharge components include cloud drip (moisture condenses on the trees and leaves as clouds/fog drift through) and irrigation of an area helps add to the recharge.

Rainfall percolating through the ground may accumulate in three principal types of groundwater bodies: (1) high-level bodies perched on relatively impervious soil, ash or lava layers; (2) high-level bodies impounded within compartments formed by impermeable dikes that have intruded the lava flows; and (3) basal water bodies floating on and displacing salt water.

The principal source of fresh ground water in the Hawaiian Islands is the roughly lens-shaped basal water body floating on and displacing denser sea water. (It varies by area, sometimes there is high-level confined water.) Recharge of the basal water body results directly from percolating rain water or by underground leakage from perched-water bodies and bodies impounded by dikes.

The Ghyben-Herzberg principle applies to this basal water that suggests the top of fresh water above sea level should be balanced by a thickness of fresh water below sea level about 40 times as great. That generally means, for every foot of fresh water above sea level, there is 40-feet of fresh water below it.)

Water resources were becoming a challenge in the growing Honolulu community. “From the outset it was the Board’s major problem to supply the City of Honolulu with water from sources within its own boundaries as long as that remained possible.”

“The Board’s long range plan, however, contemplated the eventual necessity of going outside the boundaries of the District of Honolulu for additional artesian water but it had been thought that the time when this would have to be done was far in the future. However, when the emergency arose it was possible to advance this phase of the program by deferring the infiltration projects.”

“Bond moneys that would have been applied to infiltration were transferred to a new project through which additional artesian water will be brought into the city from a 284-foot inclined shaft and electrically-operated underground pumping station in North Hālawa Valley.”

“War has delayed the completion of the North Hālawa project and has greatly increased its cost. Army and Navy authorities have given us splendid cooperation on this project, and, although we cannot be certain how soon all the materials and equipment required for completion of the installation will reach us, progress on its construction has been satisfactory, and it should be completed within the year 1943.” (Report of the Board of Water Supply, Ohrt’s Report, January 28, 1943)

North Hālawa Valley overlies the Pearl Harbor aquifer, an important source of potable water for the island of Oʻahu. Freshwater in the Pearl Harbor aquifer is part of a large, lens-shaped body of ground water that is thickest in the central part of Oahu and thins toward the coastline.

This lens of freshwater, known as the ‘basal lens,’ floats on saltwater that penetrates from the ocean into the basalt flows of which the island is composed. (Izuka, USGS)

In some early installations, vertical wells were drilled in the tunnels to develop additional water. Hālawa was different; it is referred to as a skimming tunnel. It’s commonly called the Hālawa Shaft.

Skimming tunnels consist essentially of a vertical or inclined shaft constructed from the ground surface down to about the water table and one or more horizontal, or nearly horizontal, tunnels constructed laterally at, or just below, the water level to collect water. (Peterson)

The fundamental advantage of the skimming tunnels over conventional wells is their capability to produce large quantities of fresh water from lenses so thin that drilled wells would recover only brackish water.

For this reason, skimming tunnels are especially useful in some of the dry leeward coastal areas of Hawaiʻi, as well as on many small oceanic islands with extremely thin fresh-water lenses.

Owing primarily to economic considerations and also to the greater flexibility of modern deep-well pumping stations, no new major skimming tunnels have been constructed in Hawaiʻi since the early 1950s. (Peterson)

The Hālawa Shaft facility is at an elevation of 165 feet above sea level; it’s one of five main shafts operated by the Honolulu Board of Water Supply. (The other main shafts include Wai’alae, Kalihi, Makaha and Pearl City.)

Approximately 15-million gallons of pure water is pumped every day from the Hālawa shaft by three pumping units which have a capacity of 18 to 20-million gallons per day.

The water pool is a ‘hole’ at the top of a 919-foot long water development tunnel below. The Hālawa Shaft was put in operation on August 22, 1944. (Papacostas)

The completion of the Hālawa Shaft made possible the importation of water from the Pearl Harbor area to Honolulu permitting a reduction in draft from the Honolulu aquifer.

This change in draft has raised the water levels in Honolulu to the extent that this aquifer now appears to be functioning well within the limits of its safe yield. (Ground Water Development, 1958)

While I was at DLNR, I had the opportunity to have a private tour of the Hālawa Shaft. The lack of a key to unlock a gate on the stairs leading down the shaft caused quite an embarrassment to the Water staff.

Rather than turn back, we climbed over the gate and were able to view the shaft and water pool.

May 11, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

KGU

What is thought to have been the earliest broadcast of music and speech in the Territory occurred around October 1920 when Marion Mulrony and TC Hall transmitted nearly an hour of talk and records from the Electric Shop in downtown Honolulu to the Pacific Heights home of their only known listeners, Tong Phong and his family. (Schmitt)

Mulrony came to the Islands after a stint in Australia where he initially was the wireless operator on the RMS Makura. In April 1910, Mulrony claimed a record transmission from the RMS Makura of 2,080 miles to North Vancouver. He was later general Manager of Maritime Wireless.

On the continent, Westinghouse, one of the leading radio manufacturers, had an idea for selling more radios: It would offer programming. Radio began as a one-to-one method of communication, so this was a novel idea.

Dr Frank Conrad was a Pittsburgh area ham operator. He frequently played records over the airwaves for the benefit of his friends. This was just the sort of thing Westinghouse had in mind, and it asked Conrad to help set up a regularly transmitting station in Pittsburgh.

On November 2, 1920, station KDKA made the nation’s first commercial broadcast (a term coined by Conrad himself). They chose that date because it was election day, and the power of radio was proven when people could hear the results of the Harding-Cox presidential race before they read about it in the newspaper. (PBS)

Then, “Hello, hello” was blurted out over KGU at 10:57 am, May 11, 1922 – it was the first commercial radio broadcast in the Islands. (Territorial Airwaves)

The first scheduled program on KGU was a concert aired from 7:30 to 9:00 that evening. It began with a violin solo by Kathleen Parlow, Ave Maria, and closed with selections by Johnny Noble’s jazz orchestra. (Schmitt)

Mulrony had obtained the first license to construct a commercial radio station in the Hawaiian Islands. He was the first to broadcast over KGU. KDYX was the second, getting on the Hawaiian airwaves at 11:12 am with “Aloha.” (Territorial Airwaves)

Back then, radio stations were owned by the newspapers. KGU was owned by the Advertising Publishing Company and its transmitter was located in the Honolulu Advertiser newspaper building; the Star-Bulletin’ radio went by the KDYX call letters. (KDYX later became known as KGMB.)

KGU and KGMB were the only commercial broadcast stations on O‘ahu until after World War II. Within a few months of the war’s end, KHON, KPOA and KULA came on the air using surplus military radio equipment. (Sigall)

Call letters were originally created so telegraph operators could send messages to ships and other parties without having to spell out the entire name of the recipient with every communication. With the advent of radio, they became an easy way to carve out a station’s identity.

The international assignment of call letters was codified in 1912 at the London International Radiotelegraphic Conference. German channels would begin with A or D (for Deutschland) or use KAA to KCZ. British stations would start with a B or M, while French channels would use the letter F.

The United States received the letters KDA to KZZ, as well as N (used for Navy and Coast Guard stations), and W. In 1929, it received the rest of the K combinations, which had originally been allocated to Germany. (New York Times)

When the US began licensing radio stations in late 1912, from the start the policy has been that stations in the west normally got K calls, while W calls were issued to stations in the east. (Initially ship stations were the reverse, with W assignments in the west, and K in the east.)

The original K/W boundary ran north from the Texas-New Mexico border, so at first stations along the Gulf of Mexico and northward were assigned W calls. It was only in late January, 1923 that the K/W boundary was shifted east to the current boundary of the Mississippi River.

With this change, Ks were assigned to most new stations west of the Mississippi, however, existing W stations located west of the Mississippi were allowed to keep their now non-standard calls.