Images of Old Hawaiʻi

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Central Union Church

Although Central Union Church does not owe its existence directly to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM,) its connection with that organization has always been so intimate that the two have worked hand in hand in the islands.

The history of Central Union Church dates back to the days of the Seaman’s Bethel Church.

In 1828, churchmen in Boston had founded the American Seamen’s Friend Society to supply Bibles and religious messages to the whaling and trading ships leaving for foreign waters.

In 1833, practically the only commercial interest in these islands centered around the fleet of whalers which each season filled Honolulu Harbor or anchored off-shore.  That year, the Seamen’s Friend Society sent Rev. John Diell to establish a chapel in Honolulu.

The Bethel Chapel and the seamen’s chaplaincy were dedicated on November 28, 1833, in a service attended by “the king, Kinau, and the principal chiefs … together with a respectable number of residents, masters of vessels and seamen.”

The growing population of the town led some to believe that it was time to leave the fold of the Seamen’s Friend Society and form a separate and self-supporting church, and by their efforts, in 1852, the Second Foreign Church in Honolulu came into existence.

Worshiping for four years in the old Court House, for many years known as the store of H. Hackfeld & Co., in 1856, they built a permanent house of worship at the corner of Fort and Beretania streets and the name of the organization was changed to the Fort Street Church of Honolulu.

In April 1887, Fort Street Church extended a formal proposal to unite in a new organization, and from that time until the formal union, two churches worshipped together.  Selection of the new church’s name was settled by vote; the final result was Central Union 28, Church of the Redeemer 18, and Bethel Union 1.

Thus, Central Union Church began its existence. The original congregation numbered 337 members—250 from the Fort Street Church, 72 from Bethel Union, 13 from other churches and 2 on confession of faith at the first service.

By 1888, increased church membership made it apparent that the Central Union congregation was outgrowing the Fort Street building.

Central Union owned a lot on the makai-Diamond Head corner of the intersection directly across Beretania from Washington Place, home of the heir-apparent to the throne of Hawaiʻi, Mrs. John Dominis, later Queen Liliʻuokalani.

Plans for the new church were discussed repeatedly over the ensuing several years, as wishes for a “commodious and substantial church edifice” outgrew the site.

But the lot was too small for a new stone structure and enough room for churchgoers’ horse-drawn carriages; so they negotiated with Punahou Preparatory School located across Beretania Street between Washington Place and the present St. Andrew’s Cathedral, to allow churchgoers to hitch their horses in the back of the school grounds (but not in the front yard.)

Plans were completed and work begun. A special service on June 3, 1891, marked the laying of the cornerstone, placed by the oldest member of the church, Samuel Northrup Castle, and the youngest, Sophie B. Judd.

Central Union’s growth in membership and consequent increase in attendance created a real problem of overcrowding at the Richards Street location. Increased traffic noise on Beretania Street and congestion in downtown increased frustration in the congregation and they decided to move, again.

There was much searching for the “perfect” site for a new church building. Members even took to the air and flew over Honolulu in an airplane to survey possibilities.  The site committee reported on May 26, 1920; it judged one location outstanding in all respects.

This 8.3-acre parcel was part of the Dillingham estate (known as Woodlawn) at the corner of Beretania and Punahou streets, “well away from the center of town” but within easy reach of the new residential areas.

The senior Dillinghams had both been members of the Bethel Union congregation before their marriage in 1869 and therefore were early members of Central Union.

To design a building that would express the church’s New England heritage, the congregation retained the Boston architectural firm of Cram and Ferguson. EE Black, Ltd. was the general contractor. Seating was planned for 750 on the main floor and 250 in the balcony.

The cornerstone was laid in 1922 following retrieval and opening of the cornerstone from the Richards Street church. Stone from the old church were transferred to the new one and were placed in the foundation of the new Central Union. The 1891 cornerstone itself was embedded high in the wall of the entrance.

“Open Air Services” were held on the new church grounds as early as June 1922, so that the congregation could watch the construction progress and enjoy the new property.

By the end of March 1924, the new building was essentially complete, and during the week of May 18, Central Union Church, also known as the “Church in a Garden”, moved to its present location on Beretania Street.

The idea of a Children’s Chapel arose, “to accommodate extensions of all the services of Central Union Church, including use by all age groups for any church function which would be better served in a small, intimate setting.”  The cornerstone of the Atherton Memorial Chapel was finally laid in November 1949  (Information and images here came from ‘Central Union Church 1887-1988’.)

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Missionaries Lay The Foundation for a System of Public Instruction

Merze Tate, Professor of History at Howard University, wrote a 1961 article titled, The Sandwich Island Missionaries Lay the Foundation for a system of Public Education in Hawaii. The following is taken from that article.

“Aside from conversions, one of the most notable achievements of the Congregational and Presbyterian missionaries sent to the Sandwich Islands under the auspices of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions was the development of an educational system for the nation.”

“A broad enlightenment program for the islanders depended upon instruction in the indigenous tongue and this, of necessity, was delayed until the pioneer teachers had learned the language and reduced it to a written form. Nevertheless, before the evangelists were well settled at [Kailua-Kona], on Hawaii, and Honolulu and Waimea, on Oahu, they made a start in English.”

“The missionaries reasoned that if the masses were to be made literate within a reasonable period they would have to be taught in their own tongue.”  (Merze Tate)

The cycle of missionary educational endeavor divides itself roughly into three periods: first was a decade of establishment and experimentation, lasting from 1820 to about 1831. Here the language was reduced to a written form, teaching materials were printed and adults learned the rudiments of reading and writing.

The second period, from 1831 to 1840 was characterized by a shift from adult to child education. By improvement in training teachers to teach.

Finally, the following two decades where the missionaries gradually relinquished their control of educational activities; this saw the establishment of public education under governmental control in 1840, and lasted to 1863 when the ABCFM ended the mission in Hawai‘i. (Whist)

“After the first printed sheets came from the press in the Hawaiian language, on January 7, 1822, and all were able to see their own words in print, learning to read, write, and spell was comparatively easy”.

“After the chiefs beheld their language in print they began to manifest a more lively interest in education for themselves and for their children and in the establishment and maintenance of schools for their people.”

“After the public advocacy of instruction by the highest chiefs, in April 1824, similar action came from all parts of the kingdom.  Learning also received a great impulse from the personal tours of the vigorous Kaahumanu, who went all through the islands commanding the people to listen to the Kumus, or missionary teachers, and the chiefs to provide facilities for schools.”

“Because of the lack of paper and slates, writing was taught only to a very limited extent, and arithmetic hardly at all until an eight-page pamphlet on the subject was published at the beginning of 1828.”

“By 1825 the people stood waiting for instruction while the missionaries were endeavoring to bring out a new supply of spelling books, which would make possible the doubling of the number of schools.”

“Between April 1 and October 15, 1825, the mission station on Oahu distributed 16,000 copies of their Elementary Lessons [Pi-a-pa], nearly all of which were used in schools. Outside these, however, there were multitudes anxious to learn but could not be furnished with competent teachers or palapala.”

“Men and women as well as children, requested enrollment in the first schools and eagerly sought the materials of instruction by bringing at different times in the course of the season sugar cane, taro, a bunch of bananas, a fowl, or a kid, a bundle of sticks for firewood, a ball of native cord, or the offer of some kind of work to exchange for a spelling book.”

“Obviously, the few missionaries in Hawaii could not, in addition to their primary evangelical duties, personally instruct the multitude of pupils seeking education or give adequate supervision to numerous schools scattered throughout the islands.”

“It was necessary to utilize the services of Hawaiian teachers. For the periodic inspection of the numerous schools two methods were used: quarterly examination (hoike) of as many as possible of the pupils of a whole district in a convenient place, and tours throughout a district or about an island by one or more missionaries or Hawaiians appointed for that purpose.”

“The first method, however, stimulated community interest, made the youth more eager in their pursuit of the new learning, and became gala occasions, ending in a feast.”

“The evangelists’ initial educational work, despite its limitations, produced important and enduring results and laid the foundation upon which they were able to intensify their educational efforts and to establish permanent educational monuments in the 1830’s.”

“There was continued increase in the number of people receiving instruction.  In 1828, 37,000 were in school, while two years later the number stood at 41,283, with 20,000 scholars on Hawaii, 10,385 or Maui, 6,398 on Oahu, and about 4,500 on Kauai.”

“The following year there were 1,100 common schools in operation with a pupil enrollment of 52,000. By the close of that year the Pi-a-pa had gone through nine editions to place a total of 190,000 copies in circulation.”

“However, at times during this period of educational expansion schools in some districts were practically deserted for work on the land or in collecting sandalwood in the forests.”

“After the heaviest pressure of adult education was over, the missionaries, realizing that the hope of the nation lay in its children, gave more attention to teaching youngsters.”

“The first school built exclusively for Hawaiian children met in 1832 in a large, badly constructed, unfurnished building which used adobe bricks for seats and desks, and had no glass windows.  But even this ‘step in the ladder of progress’ was demolished in an autumn storm.”

“The Sandwich Islands Mission, in June 1831, however, resolved to establish a high school to ‘instruct men of peity and promising talents’ in order that they might become assistant teachers.”

“The school, with Rev. Lorrin Andrews as principal and sole instructor, was delightfully located at Lahainaluna, or Upper Lahaina, on a high elevation about two miles back from the port of Lahaina, on Maui. Governor Hoopili made a grant of land of one thousand acres, which concession was later confirmed by King Kamehameha III.”

“Although started as an experiment to qualify Hawaiian teachers in ‘the best methods of communicating instruction to others,’ the first twenty-five students had already taught and had had some training at the mission stations.  Moreover, almost all were married men who brought their wives with them.”

“In 1833, the missionaries resolved to initiate a manual labor system in connection with the studies at the high school and in the following year decided to enlarge and put the institution on a permanent basis/”

“From Lahainaluna, on February 14, 1834, was issued the first Hawaiian newspaper, in fact the first paper west of the Rocky Mountains in the North Pacific, Ka Lama Hawaii, or Hawaiian Luminary, which contained miscellaneous instruction for the school.”

“In addition to Lahainaluna, several other educational institutions were established during the decade of the 1830’s.”

“In 1839, at the request of the chiefs, a family or boarding school was opened in Honolulu for the education of their children [Chiefs’ Children’s School, Royal School]. That these young chiefs should be in school under systematic instruction was considered of immense importance, both for their and the Hawaiian kingdom’s welfare and future.”

“The old chiefs were rapidly disappearing and if their heirs were to fill their places, they must be well prepared. They must either acquire a good education or become extinct as chiefs.”

“Up to 1840, when the mission surrendered the administration of the common schools to the government, the major share of the responsibility for the education of Hawaiian youth was in the hands of the American Protestant missionaries.”

“After that date, as we have seen, they established and continued to operate more select and boarding schools for an increasing number of Hawaiians who were able to pay something toward the education of their children.”

“The station and boarding schools for native Hawaiians which the missionaries founded were their pride, their joy, their hope, and their stronghold of the nation.”

“Through their instrumentality the evangelists expected to raise and influence an intelligent and somewhat educated people, and in this aspiration they were not disappointed.”

“Initially, the Sandwich Islands Mission – for both humanitarian and selfish reasons – resisted the proposal to make English the language of the nation and to teach the subject in all the mission schools.” (Merze Tate)

In a letter to the Sandwich Island Mission, Rufus Anderson, corresponding secretary for the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Mission (ABCFM) in Boston, wrote on April 10, 1846: “I trust you will not fall in with the notion, which I am told is favored by some one at least in the government, of introducing the English language, to take the place of the Hawaiian.”

“I cannot suppose there is a design to bring the Saxon race in to supplant the native, but nothing would be more sure to accomplish this result, and that speedily.” (Hawaiian Language Policy and the Courts, Lucas)

The arrival of the first company of American missionaries in Hawai­ʻi in 1820 marked the beginning of Hawaiʻi’s phenomenal rise to literacy. The chiefs became proponents for education and edicts were enacted by the King and the council of chiefs to stimulate the people to reading and writing.

John Laimana tells us that by 1831, in just eleven years from the first arrival of the missionaries, Hawaiians had built 1,103 schoolhouses. This covered every district throughout the eight major Islands and serviced an estimated 52,882 students.

The proliferation of schoolhouses was augmented by the printing of 140,000 copies of the pī-ʻāpā (elementary Hawaiian spelling book) by 1829 and the staffing of the schools with 1,000-plus Hawaiian teachers.

By 1832, the literacy rate of Hawaiians (at the time was 78 percent) had surpassed that of Americans on the continent. The literacy rate of the adult Hawaiian population skyrocketed from near zero in 1820 to a conservative estimate of 91-percent – and perhaps as high as 95-percent – by 1834. (Laimana)

Missionary Hiram Bingham stated that the rise in literacy and education, “was like laying a corner stone of an important edifice for the nation.”

“This legendary rise in literacy climbed from a near-zero literacy rate in 1820, to between 91 to 95 percent by 1834. That’s only twelve years from the time the first book was printed!” (KSBE)

“The Missionaries have been the fathers, the builders and the supporters of education in these Islands”.  (Lee, December 2, 1847, Privy Council Minutes)

“Thus we may conclude that the educational work of the Sandwich Islands Mission was of incalculable value in disseminating knowledge to all classes of people, in the kingdom, in planting and nurturing religious concepts and some of the better features of western civilization, and in laying the foundation for a system of public instruction”. (Merze Tate)

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Sereno Edwards Bishop

Sereno Edwards Bishop was born at Kaʻawaloa on February 7, 1827; he was son of Rev. Artemas and Elizabeth (Edwards) Bishop (part of the Second Company of missionaries to Hawaiʻi (arriving April 27, 1823) and first stationed at Kailua, on the Big Island.)

Mrs Bishop had been a girlhood friend of Mrs Lucy G Thurston, who had preceded her to Hawaii as a missionary, some four years earlier. Mrs Bishop died February 28, 1828 at Kailua, the first death in the mission.

Mr. Bishop, Sr subsequently married Delia Stone, who was a member of the Third Company of missionaries (December 1, 1828.)

The missionaries’ house was usually in a thickly inhabited village, so the missionary and his wife could be close to their work among the people; the missionary children were typically cooped up in their home.

With hundreds of children all about them, missionary children had no playmates except the children of other missionaries, most of whom were scattered over the Islands, meeting only a few times a year.  (Thurston)

“In the early-(1830s,) Kailua was a large native village, of about 4,000 inhabitants rather closely packed along one hundred rods of shore (about 1,650-feet,) and averaging twenty rods inland (about 330-feet.)”

“Near by stood a better stone house occupied by the doughty Governor Kuakiui. All other buildings in Kailua were thatched, until Rev. Artemas Bishop built his two-story stone dwelling in 1831 and Rev. Asa Thurston in 1833 built his wooden two-story house at Laniākea, a quarter of a mile inland.”

“The people had ample cultivable land in the moist upland from two to four miles inland at altitudes of one thousand to twenty-five hundred feet. It is a peculiarity of that Kona coast that while the shore may be absolutely rainless for months gentle showers fall daily upon the mountain slope.”  (Bishop)

Sereno Bishop was sent to the continent at age 12 for education (he graduated from Amherst College in 1846 and Auburn Theological Seminary in 1851,) he married Cornelia A Session on May 31, 1852 and returned to Hawaiʻi on January 16, 1853.

His observation of Honolulu at the time noted, “The settled portion of the city was then substantially limited by the present
Alapaʻi and River streets and mauka at School street. There was hardly anything outside of those limits and the remainder was practically an open plain.”

“Above Beretania street, on the slopes and beyond Alapaʻi street, there was hardly a building of any nature whatever.”

“At that time there was a small boarding school for the children of the missions at Punahou, under direction of Father Dole. This little structure alone intervened between the city and Mōʻiliʻili, where about the church there were a few houses.”  (Bishop)

Bishop assumed the position of Seaman’s Chaplain in Lāhainā.  The Bishops remained nine years at Lahaina, where five children were born to them (two of the boys died at a young age.)

After 10-years in Lāhainā, he moved to Hāna and later returned to Lāhainā and served from 1865 to 1877 as principal of Lahainaluna. Mr. Bishop considered the work which he did among the native students at Lahainaluna was among the most fruitful of his life.

He left his mark at Lahainaluna, physically, in the shape of the grand avenue of monkey pods on the road to Lahaina, which he personally planted.  (Thurston)

Bishop had a reputation as an amateur scientist with interests particularly in geology.  Bishop’s contributions as an atmospheric scientist were sufficiently prominent to be mentioned in the Monthly Weather Review.  (SOEST)

Rev. Sereno Bishop, a missionary in Hawaiʻi, was the first to provide detailed observations of a phenomenon not previously reported – he noted his observation on September 5, 1883.  It was later named for him – Bishop’s Ring (a halo around the sun, typically observed after large volcanic eruptions.)

Bishop’s observations followed the eruption at Krakatoa (August 23, 1883.)  His findings suggested the existence of the ‘Jet Stream’ (this used to be referred to as the ‘Krakatoa Easterlies.’)

“It now seems probable that the enormous projections of gaseous and other matter from Krakatoa (Krakatau) have been borne by the upper currents and diffused throughout a belt of half the earth’s circumference, and not improbably, as careful observation may yet establish, even entirely around the globe.”  (Sereno Bishop)

Bishop made other volcanic observations; a hundred years ago, he noted Diamond Head was made in less than a hour’s time and is “composed not of lava, like the main mountain mass inland, but of this soft brown rock called tuff.” (Bishop, Commercial Advertiser, July 15, 1901)

In 1887, he moved to Honolulu and became editor of “The Friend,” a monthly journal, founded in Honolulu in 1843, “the oldest publication west of the Rocky Mountains.”

Bishop was identified as “the well-known mouthpiece of the annexation party” and criticized by royalists for his comments.  He remained in Honolulu and died there March 23, 1909.

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Kuapehu

Pukui translates Ka‘awaloa as “the distant kawa,” and explains “runners went to Puna or Waipio to get kava for the chiefs”.  The archaeological sites of Ka‘awaloa reflect the occupation of this coastal flat from pre-contact times until approximately 1940.

At the time of Captain Cook’s arrival in 1779, Ka‘awaloa was one of the seven chiefly residential compounds in Kona and home to some of the island’s most important ruling chiefs. At least two (2) heiau are recorded on Ka‘awaloa Flat, as well as Puhina o Lono Heiau on the slopes above. (DLNR)

Kalokuokamaile recorded that “When Keawe-nui-a-‘Umi lived at Kaawaloa, he was known as the awa drinking chief and would send his runner to Waipio and Puna to get awa”. In Judd’s dictionary, Hawaiian Language, he translates it as “Ka awa – the harbor). Rev. Paris is cited as translating Ka‘awaloa means “the long landing place”. (Maly)

“It has been said that Ka‘awaloa means something like ‘Awa gotten from far away,’ and this was because the people of Kona had to go all the way to Puna to get their ‘awa.”

“This isn’t true. Kona always had plenty of ‘awa. Old Charley Aina always said that Ka‘awaloa described the ‘Long, or distant canoe landing’ of the area.” (Billy Paris; Maly)  Ka‘awaloa is recognized as the site of Captain James Cook’s demise.

The missionaries arrived in Hawai‘i in 1820 and the first Kealakekua missionary settlement was established at Ka‘awaloa Flat by Reverend Ely in 1824. The missionary records indicate that a church and several missionary houses were built at Ka‘awaloa. (DLNR)

Because of the heat, the missionaries moved the mission upslope to Kuapehu in 1827.  Kuapehu was “A place belonging to Naihe where he raised taro. His wife, Kapiolani, allowed missionaries to build there, over the ruins of her house.” (Place Names)

“The distinguished chief woman, Kapiolani, built a fine stone house near by the old meeting-house, and resided there for some time, living decently and in order to the day of her death, ap ornament of religion, and a wonderful trophy of the grace of God.”

“She interested herself in the missionary’s American friends, shared with them the pleasure of foreign letters, and was in all things the sympathizing mother and friend.” (Cheever)

“On the first day of the new year, I met the assembled chiefs and people at Kaawaloa, and to our mutual joy opened to them the Scriptures.”

“An attempt was made for the permanent establishment of the Kaawaloa station at Kuapehu, Naihe and Kapiolani removed and built there, and others gathered round them; but the people of the district chiefly preferred the shore station as more convenient to them.” (Bingham)

“But Kaawaloa, at the landing-place on the north side of Kealakekua bay, however conveniently accessible to the people of the district, who live much along the shores, was cramped and rocky, being composed almost exclusively of lava.”

“It was hot, dry, and barren, affording neither brook nor well, nor spring of fresh water, nor field, nor garden-spot for plantation, though a few cocoa-nut trees, so neighborly to the sea, find nourishment there.”

“Kuapehu, about two miles inland, east of the bold and volcanic cliff at the head of the bay, is, in many respects, preferable as a place of residence.”

“It is elevated 1500 feet above the sea; is airy and fertile, fanned agreeably by the land breeze from the cold Mauna Loa by night, and the sea breeze by day, making the temperature and climate about as agreeable and salubrious as Waimea.”

“Scattered trees around, and the forest a little further in the rear, the banana, sugar-cane, upland kalo, potatoes, squashes, gourds, and melons, which its soil produces; its high grasses, flowering shrubs, and wild vines, all contrasted finely with the dry and sterile shore north of the bay.”

“Besides the ordinary productions of the country, Mr. Ruggles, Naihe, and Kapiolani had a variety of exotics – the grape, fig, guava, pomegranate, orange, coffee, cotton, and mulberry, growing on a small scale, which is the most that can be said, as yet, of these articles at the Sandwich Islands.” (Bingham)

“An honorable woman, a hoary-headed Hawaiian convert to Christianity, Kekupuohi, who had been one of the wives of Kalaniopuu, the king in the days of Capt. Cook, but now a member of the church at Kailua, visiting at the thatched cottage of Mr. Ruggles, in the midst of this scenery …”

“… and having her attention agreeably attracted by a prolific grape vine, which spread its fruit and foliage over the door, and by the various flowers and fruits of the garden-like court”. [Bingham] translated:”

“It may be proper to say here that the church and mission-houses of this station, some time after Mr. Ruggles, through loss of health, left the field, were located on the south side of Kealakekua Bay, a position which was supposed to accommodate the people connected with the station better than the north side, or Kuapehu in the rear.” (Bingham)

In visiting the area, Sereno Bishop notes, “Our nearest missionary neighbor outside of the town of Kailua were the Ruggleses, who lived at Kaawaloa, twelve miles south. Their dwelling was at Kuapehu, two miles up the mountain, a most verdant and attractive spot.”

“It later became the residence of Rev John D Paris. Kaawaloa proper was a village on the north side of Kealakekua Bay.”  (Bishop)

In 1852 the Rev Paris, who had been at Waiohinu for ten years, was assigned to the Kealakekua district. He wrote that the name Ka‘awaloa was used, by the Hawaiians, more often than Kealakekua.  Paris built Kahikolu Church that served the Ka‘awaloa and Kealakekua area; it also was as the Mother Church for the South Kona Area. (NPS)

“We often visited Kaawaloa, probably twice a year, going by water in a double canoe, generally starting two or three hours before daylight, so as to carry the land breeze a good part of the way.” (Sereno Bishop)

“Following the Path of the Gods, Kealakekua; dotted for miles by heathen temples great and small, I found Kuapehu. A grass house, built by Keike, Brother Ruggles, and a cottage built by the beloved Forbes, where the mission families used to spend a few weeks for a change as a health station”. (Recollections of Paris)

There was a road “built above the shoreline flats in the late 1850s to connect Kailua to Ka‘awaloa. Its starting place at Kealakekua was the Paris house at Kuapehu.”

“Government documents of the time describe this road as the “Road from Kealakekua pali”. Samuel Clemens travelled it in 1866 and described the occasional “great boughs which overarch the road and shut out the sun and sea and everything, and leave you in a dim, shady tunnel.” (DLNR)

The Paris family dominated the life of the ahupua‘a from its purchase in 1859 to the death of Rev. John Paris, Sr. (a Congregational minister) in 1892. The son, John Paris, Jr., retained much of his father’s interests.

“Here for five or six years the veteran missionary [John D Paris] continued in his Master’s work. On the marriage of his son John, in 1880, the old home at Kuapehu was sold to him. and the elder Paris family, Father and Mother Paris with their daughter Ella, moved again to Honolulu, expecting never to return.” (The Friend, June 1926)

His only son, John, Jr. became a stock raiser of both cattle and goats, kept at Ka‘awaloa and other nearby lands. He was also the recipient of his father’s most choice land. The Paris’ daughter, Ella, ran a boarding house on the site of Kapi‘olani’s mauka house referred to as the Paris Hotel. (DLNR)

Billy Paris in an oral history noted, “my great-grandfather, with his second marriage, he had two children. His daughter was Ella Hudson Paris.”

“The home I was telling you about, he first built, was down in Mauna-alani, where my sister’s living now. Up on the hill–directly on the hill there above the junction, where the deep cut is on the upper side of the road–the home is still there. (The house site name is Kuapehu.)”

“It’s quite in pretty bad shape today [1981]. My cousins have just recently sold that property to someone. And I see they’re starting to clear the lot now next to Kamei’s Cleaners there–Shiraki’s Cleaners or whatever it is.” “Well, you’ll see a roadway on the left going up. The hotel is on top of the hill.”

(Kuapehu is above “the Captain Cook junction, where you go down to Napoopoo” – “that is where Princess Kapiolani [once] lived.”) (Paris; Social History of Kona)

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Harvey Rexford Hitchcock

Harvey Rexford Hitchcock, the oldest son of eleven children of David (a shoemaker and author of several books) and Sarah (Swan) Hitchcock, was born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, March 13, 1800.

Hitchcock joined the Congregational church in Great Barrington, January 5, 1817. He entered Williams College as a Junior in 1826; he graduated on September 3, 1828.

After graduation, Hitchcock studied theology at Auburn Seminary, where he was graduated in 1831.  On August 26, 1831, he married Miss Rebecca Howard of Auburn, New York.

Within a couple of months, he sailed as a missionary with the Fifth Company of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.  They sailed aboard the Averick, leaving New Bedford, November 26, 1831 and arriving in Honolulu, May 17, 1832.

Others in the Fifth Company included Rev. William P Alexander, Richard Armstrong, John S Emerson, Cochran Forbes, David B Lyman (Hitchcock’s college classmate,) Lorenzo Lyons, Ephraim Spaulding (their wives and others.)

He was assigned to Molokai and established the first permanent Mission Station on the Island at Kaluaʻaha in 1832.  Rebecca Hitchcock noted shortly after their arrival that there was not a foreigner on the island and no horses except for a lame one belonging to a chief.  (Curtis)

In 1834, the Hitchcocks received additional help with the arrival of Rev and Mrs Lowell Smith (Smith was a college mate of Hitchcock – who arrived on the Sixth Company in 1833.)

 The expanding mission was growing close to 500 members and two outstations, one in the east and one in the west, had been established.

Smith gave this description of the Island and its people: “The people reside mostly on the eastern part of the island, on the north and south sides; but the greater number are on the latter.” (The estimated Island population was about 6,000.)

“Their houses, many of them, are no more than five or six feet long by four wide and five feet from the ridge-pole to the ground; and these are not unfrequently the habitations of two, three, and sometimes more individuals of both sexes.”  Each is “But one apartment, no floor, no window, no chimney, except the humble door at which you enter.”

“The name of the elation is Kaluaʻaha; it is owned by the best and one of the most pious high chiefs on the islands, who desired us to take it as our station, assuring us at the same time, that she would act the part of a parent to us. We have fenced off about two acres of land as a door yard and garden, and might have extended our limits much farther had we chosen. “

“There is a delightful cluster of shade trees before our door, which was formerly a favorite resort of the chiefs; and under it, for several successive weeks, we met for the worship … On our arrival, there was no house of any importance, and few of any kind in the vicinity.”

“During the year, however, many comfortable houses have been built, with sleeping apartments, and other accommodations which give to them an air of neatness and comfort hitherto unknown on the island.” (Smith; Missionary Herald)

Hitchcock preached his first sermon in Hawaiian the last week of September 1832 in the open air. In the Molokai Station Report, Hitchcock wrote, “in about two months a meeting house was finished 30 feet by 120.” It was probably built of thatch.  (HABS)

“A spacious school-house is nearly completed, so that the station begins to assume the appearance of a small village.”  (Smith; Missionary Herald)

Nearby was Pukoʻo; it had a natural break in the reef with a perfect beach for landing canoes.  Hitchcock’s early church records often mentioned this location as the most convenient for travel to Lāhainā.  (Curtis)

In a January 1840 letter from Hitchcock, we get a glimpse of his daily life, “I hope to continue without interruption my present system of labors; that is, to hold a Bible class Sabbath morning of twenty-five girls, preach at ten o’clock, have an adult Sabbath-school at noon, and preach again at four.”

“My week-day labors are as follows, – a Bible class daily with the above-mentioned company of females, who are committing Matthew to memory at the rate of six verses a day. I spend some time with them in teaching singing.”

“On Tuesday and Thursday mornings I preach at sunrise, and preach regularly on Wednesday afternoon. Saturday evening I have a lecture for the church. Once in two weeks on Friday I address the men’s benevolent society, or catechise them on the New Testament; and on Tuesday have a Bible class of adults.”

“I make it a point, as far as possible, to visit some parts of the parish daily, and hold direct religious conversation with the people. In these visits I am happy to say that I am received with respect, and listened to by the people. Rarely have I gone to one house and commenced conversation, without drawing around me others, particularly the aged.”

“My miscellaneous labors consist in conversing with those who resort to my study for the purpose, and giving out medicine for the sick. I am trying also to crowd in a weekly lecture on the most important points in theology, designed for several of the most pious and intelligent members of our church, in order to enable them to become more efficient helpers in the great work.”  (Hitchcock, Missionary Herald)

In the mid-1840s, they were working on building a new church; “Our main work the past year has been the erection of a permanent house of worship … Preparing most of the timber and getting it onto the ground from the distance of ten miles or more, procuring many of the stones for building …”

It was dedicated on April 3, 1844; “The house has been completed nearly two months. It is 100 feet long by 50 broad outside; walls 2-1/2 feet thick and 18 feet high. …. The thatching is pilimaoli. It leaks but little; has 4 doors three of which are 7 feet high and about as wide…”  (Hitchcock; HABS)  (Remnants of the church are still there; in 2009, a new roof was built inside the walls of the existing church.)

Hitchcock died August 29, 1855 … “for 23 years he has labored with unusual devotion, zeal and earnestness to enlighten, purify and elevate the people … He lived to see his labors crowned with wonderful success.”

“His great work was indeed the preaching of the gospel; yet in the infant state of the people, he had to superintend every thing, schools were to be created and managed; the sick, the aged and the destitute to be cared for; civil officers to be advised, the whole people clad and civilized and their souls saved.”

“He gave himself heartily to his work and made an unreserved consecration. … He did desire to live longer, not however for any selfish end, but that he might preach the gospel.”  (The Friend, September 29, 1855)  (His grandson was David Howard Hitchcock, the notable artist in Hawaiʻi.)

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