Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Fire Power … to Fired Power

Camp Malakole (originally called Honouliuli Military reservation) was an anti-aircraft and anti-tank artillery training facility … later, Kalaeloa’s Chevron fuel refinery took over the site (they later sold); just down the road is HECO’s oil-burning 651-Megawatt Kahe Power Plant.

Let’s look back.

On March 22, 1939, the North Shore’s Kawailoa military firing point was relocated to Honouliuli Military Reservation, on over 1,700-acres situated between Barbers Point and Nanakuli, Oʻahu; it then served as a Hawaiian Separate Coast Artillery Brigade.

Firing positions were prepared for six batteries along the shoreline and plans were prepared to add an additional three positions, allowing three battalions to conduct firing practice at the same time.

The location provided adequate space to exercise the searchlight and sound locator units to work with the guns in tracking targets that were towed off-shore by towing aircraft consisting mostly old bi-planes.  (Bennett)

The installation initially consisted of a tent camp on the southern half of the tract; officers were quartered on the east side with their mess, showers, and latrines. The post kitchen and bakery tents were located across the roadway from the officer’s encampment.

Closer to the beach were the ammunition storage tents. The camp’s primary observation station was located to the rear of the firing line atop a steel-frame tower.

The 251st Coast Artillery (AA,) California National Guard, was sent to Hawaiʻi in November 1940 and stationed at Honouliuli Military Reservation.  (army-mil) The facility’s peacetime strength was 1,200-men and the wartime strength was 1,800-men.

“(A)fter we’d been there for about a week or so, we had a tremendous rainstorm and the water got to be about two foot high and just washed us all out. And we had to move everything up on the higher ground because our foot lockers and our shoes, and everything else was pouring right down to the sea”.  (Anthony Iantorno)

As a result of the flooding, a large sand berm was built between the firing line and the beach that ran parallel to the beach.

With the 251st arrival came the plan to build more permanent facilities.  The regiment lived under canvas pending completion of their new quarters, which they were tasked to build under the supervision of engineers from Schofield Barracks.

The regiment spent every morning on the firing line, with the evenings reserved for clearing away the kiawe and building the camp improvements.  (Sebby)

Upon completion in early 1941, the camp consisted of temporary theater of operations-type structures.  There were 48 barracks structures (90 feet by 24 feet,) 12 mess halls, 9 magazines and storehouses, 5 officers’ quarters, 7 showers (equipped with only cold water) and latrines.

Other improvements included a dispensary, officers’ mess, headquarters building, post office, regimental day room, movie theater, laundry, motor repair shop, gasoline station, fire house, guard house, photo laboratory, quartermaster and engineers’ buildings. The majority of the buildings were built on piers with the footings buried in the coral ground.

With the improvements, on January 9, 1941, the facility’s name was changed to Camp Malakole.  (Bennett)  It was part of the growing presence in the Islands.

Back in 1941, the Hawaiian Department was the Army’s largest overseas department.  For more than three decades the War Department had constructed elaborate coastal defenses on Oahu.  The Hawaiian Department’s two main tasks were to protect the Pacific Fleet from sabotage and defeat any invasion.

The previous 18 months had seen the arrival of the Pacific Fleet, war scares, the start of selective service, numerous training exercises, the mobilization of the National Guard, and the doubling of the department’s strength to 43,000 soldiers (including Air Corps.)  (army-mil)

Besides carrying out extensive training (firing exercises, field maneuvers and gas attack drills,) several members of Camp Malakole participated in sports activities and entered the Hawaiian Department track meet on May 29, 1941, winning several first places and some second and third places.

Then, like other military installations in the Islands, things changed with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941.

Sgt Henry C Blackwell, Cpl Clyde C Brown and Sgt Warren D Rasmussen were the first American casualties of the Pearl Harbor attack; they were stationed at Camp Malakole, F Battery.  (Kelley)

Licensed pilots, that morning, they had gone on pass to Rodgers Airport (now Honolulu International Airport) and rented a couple of piper cubs to practice flying over the water.  The Cubs took off to the northeast, then flew parallel to Waikīkī Beach toward Diamond Head before reversing direction and heading west.  (Harding)

They were about two miles offshore at an altitude of between 500 and 800 feet, headed toward Camp Malakole.  (Harding) They were out over the water just as the Japanese attacked. They were shot down.  (Kelley)  Guards at Camp Malakole shot down a strafing Japanese plane at about 8:05 am with small arms fire.

Newly arrived coast artillery units on Oahu in 1942 were quartered at the camp during the early months of the war.  Later in the war, the Hawaiian Antiaircraft Artillery Command (HAAC) took over operation of the camp, which was used completely as the principal facility for training antiaircraft units on Oʻahu during the war.

Camp Malakole served as a base camp for anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons training, and staging and temporary lodging for troops preparing for deployment to the Pacific during the height of World War II. During its years of service, 43,350 troops were billeted to Camp Malakole for staging and training purposes.  (Dye)

Today, the fuel refining facility sites on the former Camp Malakole grounds.  A reminder of the prior use is a steel turreted machine gun pillbox; it’s still there (in the lawn area on Malakole Street at the entrance to the refinery facility.)

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

SPAM

In 1926, Geo. A. Hormel & Co. developed the world’s first canned ham. The transfer of leadership of Hormel from father to son Jay C. Hormel brought new products, including Dinty Moore beef stew, Hormel chili and in 1937 a new canned luncheon meat.

The goal of the new luncheon meat product was to produce an affordable canned meat item that was convenient enough to enjoy every day.

A contest was held in 1937 to give the promising new product a name. New York actor, Ken Daigneau, the brother of then Hormel Food vice president, entered with the name “SPAM.” Speculation indicates the name was a way to shorten “SPiced hAM.”

Daigneau won $100 for the contest and, his name is mostly unknown, he went down in the history books as the Bestower of Appellations of one of the most iconic pork product in the world. (HormelFoods)

First introduced on July 5, 1937, SPAM is made with Pork with Ham, Salt, Water, Potato Starch, Sugar and Sodium Nitrite. First, the pork and ham are pre-ground.

Then, salt, sugar and the rest of the ingredients are added and mixed, to reach the desired temperature. From there, the mixture is moved over to the canning line, where it’s filled into the familiar metal cans, 12 ounces at a time.

Once filled, cans are conveyed to a closing machine where lids are applied through vacuum-sealing. Next, the cans are cooked and cooled for about three hours. At this point they’re ready for labels and then they are off to be cased, where they await distribution. (SPAM)

With the passage of the Lend-Lease Act of 1941 (this was a pre-US entry into WWII act that set up a system that allowed the US to lend or lease war supplies to any nation deemed ‘vital to the defense of the United States’) the US gave needed supplies to Great Britain, while remaining ‘officially’ neutral.  (HormelFoods & National Archives)

Because of its shelf-stable status (and the fact that it wasn’t rationed like beef), Hormel Foods began shipping the stuff abroad during World War II.

By 1941, Minnesota-based Hormel Foods sent more than 100 million pounds of SPAM to allied troops; by 1944, more than 90% of the canned foods were shipped for government use. (HormelFoods)

The easy-to-pack product became a staple food for GI’s during the war. SPAM sales skyrocketed; by 1959 Hormel had produced their one-billionth can of SPAM. (TasteOfHome)

If you live in a part of the world where US troops were stationed during WWII, you’re probably pretty familiar with SPAM. The product is most popular in these areas, with the most extreme example being Hawai‘i.

Folks in the Islands completely adopted the ham-in-a-can product and consume nearly 7-million cans of SPAM products each year. You’ll find fried eggs and rice with spam for breakfast, SPAM fried wontons as a snack, and sushi-inspired SPAM musubi rolls at nearly every home and restaurant. You’ll even see SPAM on McDonald’s breakfast menu! (HormelFoods)

The product has sold more than nine billion tins since it was introduced on July 5, 1937. More SPAM is consumed per person in Hawai‘i than in any other state in the United States – almost seven million cans of SPAM are eaten every year in Hawai‘i.

SPAM is also a popular ingredient in various Asian cuisines, particularly Korean.  South Koreans consume more SPAM than the residents of any other country besides the United States.

Despite having only a sixth of the population of the US, South Koreans consume half as much SPAM each year.  The popular Korean dish ‘budae jjigae’ — which translates to ‘Army stew’ or ‘Army base stew’ — developed after the Korean War, when an economic downturn meant that meat was scarce and expensive.

A US Army base in the South Korean city of Uijeongbu had a surplus of various processed food, including SPAM — which ‘was totally new to Koreans’.

As of 2023, SPAM is available in 11 varieties: SPAM Classic, SPAM Lite, SPAM 25% Less Sodium, SPAM Maple Flavored, SPAM with Real HORMEL Bacon, SPAM Oven Roasted Turkey, SPAM Hickory Smoke Flavored, SPAM Hot and Spicy, SPAM Jalapeño, SPAM Teriyaki and SPAM with Tocino Flavoring. (Rousselle)

Another preparation is SPAM Musubi.  We can thank Barbara Funamura (from Kauai) for that.  Barbara graduated from Colorado State University with a degree in food sciences and nutrition and went on to Ames, Iowa for post-graduate study in institutional management.

“Her first job was as an extension agent at the University of Hawaii. She traveled all over, and when she came home, she was an extension agent until the kids came.”

When she started working after raising the kids, she became the first food supervisor for the Meals on Wheels program before joining Big Save as a supervisor for the Kauai Kitchens.

Barbara Funamura was the originator of the SPAM musubi – SPAM and rice are combined in a musubi (rice ball) wrapped in nori (sheets of dried seaweed.)

“The first one was triangular” her husband said – to differentiate it from the musuburrito, a similar rice-and-chorizo musubi.

Eventually the SPAM musubi was made using a box, morphing it into its now familiar shape.  “Barbara saw it and recognized that it was the way to go,” her husband said.

“The sushi would come out all uniform, and it just happens that it fits two slices of SPAM side by side.”  (The Garden Island and Kauai Hongwanji.

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Ship to Shore

The USS Lexington (CV-2) and sister-ship USS Saratoga (CV-3) were originally designed as battle cruisers.  During construction, the cruiser hull was fitted with a flight deck.  Instead of the typical 16-inch cruiser guns, they each received four twin turret 8-inch guns and other armament.

The Lexington, the first of the Lexington class carriers, launched December 14, 1925, was the US Navy’s first fleet aircraft carrier.  Lexington later served as flagship out of Pearl Harbor on January 11, 1942.  (Alex)

The Lexington-class carriers had one major design flaw – the inclusion of their four twin 8-inch/55 caliber gun mounts, which could only be fired in starboard broadsides.

On January 17, 1942, Rear Adm. William S. Pye, acting commander in chief Pacific Fleet, asked if the Hawaiian Department, US Army, was interested in 8-inch naval mounts and guns that might be removed from navy vessels. The Hawaiian Department immediately replied in the affirmative.  (Bennett)

Lexington and Saratoga underwent armament refitting.  Their original 8-inch guns were replaced with the correct weapon against the carrier’s true foe: enemy carrier aircraft.

In early-1942, these 8-inch guns and turret mountings were removed from Lexington and Saratoga and reused as coastal artillery on the island of Oʻahu.

When selecting locations for the naval turret (NT) batteries, commanders desired to extend fields of fire, chiefly for those areas in which current coverage was light, while placing the turrets far enough inland to function as second lines of defense and to reduce the difficulty of protecting them against small raiding parties.

Four battery sites were picked; on the North Shore were Battery Brodie (later renamed Battery George W Ricker) (775-foot elevation in Waialua;) Battery Opaeula (later renamed Battery Carroll G Riggs) (1,120-foot elevation above the Waialua Agriculture Company’s sugarcane fields near Haleiwa.)

On the South Shore were Battery Salt Lake (later renamed Battery Louis R Burgess) on Damon Estate land at Āliapaʻakai (Salt Lake) (170-190 foot elevation) and Battery Wilridge (later renamed Battery Lewis S Kirkpatrick) on Wiliwilinui Ridge (1,200-foot elevation mauka of Waiʻalae.)

Each 8-inch naval turret (NT) mount included a pair of guns mounted in one slide, both guns elevating and traversing as one unit.  The 8-inch gun-mount housings were lightly armored, only providing shelter from the weather and possibly flying splinters.

All 8-inch NT mounts were designed for 360° fire without interfering with each other. The batteries had a high rate of fire (12-16 rounds per battery per minute.)  Each gun could send a projectile over 18-miles.

The turrets and battery commanders’ stations were the major above-ground features.   All the batteries were constructed of reinforced concrete by cut and cover, with projectile and powder magazines, gas-proof plotting rooms, and bombproof generator rooms 15 to 40-feet below the surface.

Target data was plotted in 24 by 30-foot bombproof and gas-proof plotting rooms.  The rooms were equipped with a vertical escape shaft at one end. Metal staple ladders attached to the wall led to small housings on the roofs with steel-plate doors.

Each magazine contained a room for powder and a room for projectiles (holding 250 of each.)  An additional 600 projectiles were to be stored in racks in the open. Powder and projectiles were elevated to the turret mounts by the elevating mechanisms.

All four battery sites were extensively camouflaged, including dummy gun positions to make up for the lack of antiaircraft defenses.

Target practices were usually carried out once a week, firing one round from each gun at a hypothetical target off shore. Homes near the batteries occasionally suffered broken window glass during firing practices.

The North Shore batteries, Brodie and Opaeula, covered the waters to the north, east and west, and as far south as the Pearl Harbor entrance.  The South Shore batteries, Salt Lake and Wiliwilinui Ridge, covered the waters to the south, southeast and southwest, including the approaches to Honolulu and Pearl Harbors, and could also fire north.

This marked the first time NT mounts had been emplaced on shore as seacoast artillery for the US; it created an engineering and design challenge for the shore-based folks.   Upon completion, however, the batteries proved very successful, being rated four of the best seacoast batteries.  (Lots of information here from Bennett.)

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Flag Day

Flag Day is celebrated on June 14.

(It also marks the birthday of the US Army; Congress authorized “the American Continental Army” on June 14, 1775.)

Flag Day commemorates the date in 1777 when the Second Continental Congress approved a resolution to adopt a design for its first national flag –

“Resolved, that the flag of the United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white, that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation.”

Today, the American flag consists of thirteen equal horizontal stripes of red (top and bottom) alternating with white, with a blue rectangle in the canton (referred to specifically as the “union”) bearing fifty small, white, five-pointed stars arranged in nine offset horizontal rows of six stars (top and bottom) alternating with rows of five stars.

The 50-stars on the flag represent the 50-states and the 13-stripes represent the thirteen British colonies that rebelled against the British monarchy and became the first states in the Union.

The first flags were used to assist military coordination on battlefields.  National flags are patriotic symbols with varied wide-ranging interpretations, often including strong military associations due to their original and ongoing military uses.

Bernard J. Cigrand is considered by many to be the “Father” of Flag Day as we know it today. Working as a school teacher in Waubeka, Wisconsin, Cigrand arranged for his pupils at Stony Hill School to celebrate the American flag’s ‘birthday’ on June 14, 1885.

Shortly after this celebration, Cigrand moved to Chicago, Illinois, to attend dental school. His dedication to observing the birthday of the flag did not stop with his move.

In June 1886, he publicly proposed an annual observance of the flag birthday in an article entitled “The Fourteenth of June,” published in a Chicago newspaper. His efforts remained steadfast in the years to come. (Postal Museum)

From the late 1880s on, Dr. Cigrand spoke around the country promoting the annual observance of a flag day on June 14, the day in 1777 that the Continental Congress adopted the Stars and Stripes. (University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry)

In 1888 William T. Kerr of Pennsylvania founded the American Flag Day Association of Western Pennsylvania, an organization to which he dedicated his life.

(A lesser-known claim is that of George Morris of Connecticut, who is said to have organized the first formal celebration of the day in Hartford in 1861.)

In 1916 Pres. Woodrow Wilson proclaimed June 14 as the official date for Flag Day, and in 1949 the US Congress permanently established the date as National Flag Day. (Britannica)

Flag Day is not an official federal holiday, though on June 14, 1937, Pennsylvania became the first (and only) US state to celebrate Flag Day as a state holiday.

According to the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), “Our national standard has undergone more design transitions than any other flag in the world.”

4 U.S. Code § 8 – Respect for flag notes (from Cornell Law School): No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing.

  • The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.
  • The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise.
  • The flag should never be carried flat or horizontally, but always aloft and free.
  • The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery.
  • The flag should never be fastened, displayed, used, or stored in such a manner as to permit it to be easily torn, soiled, or damaged in any way.
  • The flag should never be used as a covering for a ceiling.
  • The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature.
  • The flag should never be used as a receptacle for receiving, holding, carrying, or delivering anything.
  • The flag should never be used for advertising purposes in any manner whatsoever.
  • No part of the flag should ever be used as a costume or athletic uniform. However, a flag patch may be affixed to the uniform of military personnel, firemen, policemen, and members of patriotic organizations.
  • The flag represents a living country and is itself considered a living thing. Therefore, the lapel flag pin being a replica, should be worn on the left lapel near the heart.
  • The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning.

The original Pledge of Allegiance was written by Francis Bellamy (1855 – 1931), a Baptist minister, in August 1892. The Pledge was published in the September 8th issue of The Youth’s Companion, the leading family magazine and the Reader’s Digest of its day.

In 1892, Francis Bellamy was also a chairman of a committee of state superintendents of education in the National Education Association. As its chairman, he prepared the program for the public schools’ quadricentennial celebration for Columbus Day in 1892. He structured this public school program around a flag raising ceremony and a flag salute – his Pledge of Allegiance. (WA Secretary of State)

Bellamy’s first recited Pledge of Allegiance was:  “I pledge allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands one Nation indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all.”

“One Nation indivisible” referred to the outcome of the Civil War, and “Liberty and Justice for all” expressed the ideals of the Declaration of Independence.

“The flag of the United States” replaced the words “my Flag” in 1923 because some foreign-born people might have in mind the flag of the country of their birth instead of the United States flag. A year later, “of America” was added after “United States.”

No form of the Pledge received official recognition by Congress until June 22, 1942, when the Pledge was formally included in the US Flag Code. The official name of The Pledge of Allegiance was adopted in 1945.

The last change in language came on Flag Day 1954, when Congress passed a law, which added the words “under God” after “one nation.” (US District Court, Southern District of WV)

I pledge Allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America
and to the Republic for which it stands,
one nation under God, indivisible,
with Liberty and Justice for all.

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Marston Mats

Before and during WWII, logistics and flexibility of options to deal with men and equipment guided technology.  With the expanded use of air power, addressing the logistical needs of aircraft became imperative.

“The most recent information from operations now in progress abroad indicates that permanent runways are out of the question in modern warfare (causing) the development of landing and take-off mats to assume the highest possible priority.”  (Maj. Gen. Henry H. Arnold, Chief of the Air Corps)

Runways for bombers based in rear areas could be built like standard highways. These plans for simple construction were almost obsolete as soon as made, for the Air Corps was even then designing heavier planes which called for runways of greater bearing capacity.

Constructing runways at the front and more elaborate ones farther back, as the planes being contemplated in 1939 dictated, would take a long time—long enough to interfere seriously with the striking power of the air arm.

The Air Corps expressed immediate interest in news that the British and French were laying down portable steel mats as a substitute for hard-surfaced runways.

In December 1939, the Air Corps asked the Engineers to develop a similar landing mat. Since practically nothing was known about the subject, the two services agreed that the Engineers would attempt to get more information from abroad, would canvass the American market for likely materials, and, after conducting field tests with loaded trucks, choose the most promising types for service tests with planes.

The military command noted, “The requirements may be divided into two separate categories: First, pursuit and observation, ie, light weight types; Second, bombardment, ie, heavy load types.”  It seemed possible that “if no delays are incurred and if this project is pushed that some concrete decision can be arrived at by the first of the Fiscal Year 1941.”

A pierced steel plank was developed at Waterways Experiment Station, an Army Corps of Engineers research facility in Mississippi.  The 21st Engineers, under the command of Col Dwight Frederick Johns, was assigned the task of investigating techniques for the rapid construction of air bases.

In November 1941, the first major aerial operation experiments took place at Marston, North Carolina.  The 21st Engineering Regiment (Aviation) constructed a 3,000-foot runway on virgin ground for use by the 1st Air Support Command.  The job took 11-days and used 18-railroad carloads of a new product known as pierced steel planking.  (Gabel)

It met expectations; and early in February 1942, the Engineers and Aviation groups agreed on a minimum of 15,000,000 square feet of mats. Thereafter demands increased rapidly.

By midsummer, the total required production of pierced plank mat was at 180,000,000 square feet—an amount that would consume from 70,000 to 100,000 tons of steel per month (about one third of the nation’s sheet capacity.)

While the Corps called it ”pierced (or perforated) steel planks (PSP,)” it adopted a name associated where it was initially tested – Marston Mats (named for the North Carolina City.)

The standardized, perforated steel matting was pierced with 87 holes to allow drainage; it was 10-feet long by 15-inches wide and weighed 66-pounds; a later aluminum version came in at 32 pounds.

The mats were often laid over the local vegetation, which varied depending on the location from loose straw to palm fronds. The sandwich of steel and vegetation absorbed moisture and cut the dust kicked up by heavy aircraft.

While the first planked airstrip took 11-days to install, by the end of World War II an airfield could be carried across the Pacific within a single cargo hold of a Liberty ship, and could be ready for aircraft to land 72 hours after unloading. (AirSpaceMag)

During raids, sometimes the mats were hit/damaged.  The Seabees constructed “repair stations” along the runway, each with foxholes for the repair crews and packages of 1600 square feet of Marston mat, the amount that experience showed was necessary to repair the damage from a 500-pound bomb.

Trucks were preloaded with sand and gravel and concealed around the runway. Following a hit on the runway, the repair crews would clear away the damaged Marston mat as the trucks were brought out to dump their loads in the crater.

100 Seabees could repair the damage of a 500-pound bomb hit on an airstrip in forty minutes.  In other words, forty minutes after that bomb exploded, you couldn’t tell that the airstrip had ever been hit.  (Budge)

At first the US had Marston Mats to itself, but eventually the invention was shared with its Allies, including Russia under the Lend-Lease program.

Two-million tons of temporary runway were produced in WWII to bring American airfields to each island captured from the Japanese. Marston Mats have been used in every war since.   (AirSpaceMag)

The pierced plank mat continued to be the type requested by theater commanders. The Engineers admitted that the pierced plank mat “turned in a creditable performance through-out the world.”  (The Corps of Engineers)

Among other places, Marston Mats formed the 6,000-foot temporary runway at Morse Field – South Point, Hawaiʻi.  Likewise, the Kualoa Airfield at Kāneʻohe Bay had a Marston Mat ramp.  Kahuku Army Air Base started as a Marston Mat runway that was later paved.

In the later ‘reuse’ category, my mother found that aluminum Marston mats made great benches and re-potting surfaces for her orchids.

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