Missionaries | Page 34 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

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September 26, 2016 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Damon Memorial

In 1887, Samual C Gale wrote a letter to the Holden town officials stating: “I am now able to say, that unless prevented by some misfortune, I shall commence the present season to erect upon the Chenery lot a building adapted to both High School and Library purposes.”

“This building and ground, together with some books which we hope to add, my wife and I will present to the Town of Holden as a free gift …”

The result of this wonderful gift is the Damon Memorial Building, built in 1888, in honor of his wife Susan Damon Gale. Susan was the daughter of Colonel Samuel Damon.

The building was designed to house both the Gale Free Library and the Holden High School. The first floor was the library with the high school on the second floor. The Worcester architect Stephen C Earle designed the Romanesque style building.

The Damon Memorial was the second high school in Holden. The first opened in 1880 as part of the second floor of the Center School.

The Damon Building served as the high school until Holden High School opened on Main Street in 1926. In 1954 Wachusett Regional High School opened as the first regional high school in Massachusetts. (Assumption College)

One of the model public buildings of the towns of central Massachusetts is the Damon Memorial of Holden. It is architecturally an ornament to the village. The Memorial stands near the Common.

From the tower wall a rough boulder projects, bearing the words ‘Damon Memorial, 1888.’ The building is trimmed with brownstone, uncut as far as possible. The clock tower is an attractive feature of the building. Inside the arrangements for school and library have been made with great care and foresight.

The Memorial was appropriately dedicated August 29, 1888. In his address Mr. Gale, the donor, said: “Thirty-four years ago I came to this village to teach school. The frame school house, still standing and in use, was then new and was a subject of much interest and pride.”

“The only instruction I received from the school committee as to the management of the school was that I should keep the scholars from marking and scratching the new school house.”

“I entirely neglected my duty in this respect. At the end of the winter, marks and scratches were very abundant; and I knew it was all my fault, for no school master ever had better boys and girls.”

“After thinking over my offense for thirty-five years I concluded that the only suitable recompense that I could make was to give the town a new school house, which I accordingly have done.”

“I do not say, however, that there were no other and more serious considerations for the enterprise. Here my wife was born and reared, and this, in the opinion of at least her husband, entitles the place to monumental honors.”

“May I also especially mention her brother, the late Dr Samuel C Damon, a resident of Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands, a greathearted and broad-minded man, with a deep affection for his native town. He it was who first suggested to me the idea of aiding to establish here a public library.”

“It is in memory of him and of her other kinspeople and friends dear to us both, whose homes have been here in this and other generations, that we have sought to do this town some good thing, so important and permanent that the inhabitants will always kindly remember us.”

Charles E. Parker, who accepted the gift in behalf of the town, assured the donors that the simple conditions of the gift would be gladly observed.

At a town meeting, September 26, 1888, Holden formally accepted the gift and tendered its thanks and appreciation of the Memorial to the generous donors.

In addition to the building Mr. Gale added $3,000 for books, and John Wadsworth, of Chicago, sent $100 ‘as a slight recompense to Holden for having furnished him a wife.’

The Holden Library Association presented its library of fourteen hundred volumes to the town and the library opened in December, 1888, with forty-five hundred volumes, to which large additions have since been made. (Crane, Historic Homes, 1907)

Samuel Chenery Damon, son of Colonel Samuel Damon, was born in Holden, Massachusetts, February 15, 1815. He was graduated from Amherst College in 1836, studied at Princeton Theological Seminary in 1838-39, and was graduated at Andover Theological Seminary in 1841. He was an American missionary.

He was preparing to go to India as a missionary and was studying the Tamil language for that purpose, when an urgent call came for a seaman’s chaplain at the port of Honolulu in the Hawaiian Islands. He was ordained September 15, 1841, and he decided to accept the position at Honolulu.

He married Julia Sherman Mills of Natick, Massachusetts on October 6, 1841. Their children were: Samuel Mills, born July 9. 1843, died June 2, 1844; Samuel Mills, born March 13, 1845, who later was minister of finance under the monarchy in Hawaii; married Harriet M Baldwin, daughter of Rev. D. Baldwin, and their son (Samuel Edward Damon, born June 1, 1873) …

… Edward Chenery, born May 21, 1848; Francis Williams, born December 10, 1852; William Frederick, born January 11, 1857, died October 23, 1879.

Samuel Chenery Damon died February 7, 1885, at Honolulu, and his funeral the next day was attended by a very large congregation, including King Kalākaua and his ministers.

Damon Memorial 1888-Assumption

Damon Memorial Holden, MA

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Damon Memorial 1999 -Assumption

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September 25, 2016 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Windows into a Time

Puakea Nogelmeier gave a talk at Mission Houses related to the translation project he worked on associated with letters from the ali‘i to missionaries. The following is a transcript of portions of his talk. He speaks of the missionaries and the ali‘i and their relationship ….

“The missionary effort is more successful in Hawaii than probably anywhere in the world, in the impact that it has on the character and the form of a nation. And so, that history is incredible; but history gets so blurry …”

“The missionary success cover decades and decades becomes sort of this huge force where people feel like the missionaries got off the boat barking orders … where they just kind of came in and took over. They got off the boat and said ‘stop dancing,’ ‘put on clothes,’ don’t sleep around.’”

“And it’s so not the case ….”

“The missionaries arrived here, and they’re a really remarkable bunch of people. They are scholars, they have got a dignity that goes with religious enterprise that the Hawaiians recognized immediately. …”

“The Hawaiians had been playing with the rest of the world for forty-years by the time the missionaries came here. The missionaries are not the first to the buffet and most people had messed up the food already.”

“And the missionaries, that first bunch on the Thaddeus almost didn’t get to land. I am sure many of you know the story that Kamehameha had said, ‘yes send missionaries from England,’ so when they arrived from America, his son almost said, ‘no, we’ll wait for the pizza we ordered … this isn’t the group we asked for.’”

“But, they end up staying and the impact is immediate. They are the first outside group that doesn’t want to take advantage of you, one way or the other, get ahold of their goods, their food, or your daughter.”

“They cowered three really important things; they come with a set of skills that Hawaiians are really impressed with. Literacy, they had been waiting for it for forty years, basically. And so for forty years Hawaiians wanted everything on every ship that came. And they could get it; it was pretty easy to get. Two pigs and … a place to live, you could trade for almost anything.”

“But, they couldn’t get literacy. It was intangible, they wanted to learn to read and write, and there is proof they did. Kamehameha sets up a school for his sons in 1810. It doesn’t work very well because (his sons) aren’t particularly good students. So it lasts for only about a week or two.”

“Kamehameha tries, he signs his name to letters … they wanted, but nobody can really settle it down.”

“The missionaries were the first group of a scholarly background, but they also had the patience and endurance. So that’s part of the skill sets. … That’s really the more important things that are attracted first.”

“But the second thing is they are pono.”

“They have an interaction that is intentionally not taking advantage. It’s not crude. They don’t get drunk and throw up on the street … and they don’t take advantage and they don’t make a profit. So that pono actually is more attractive than religion.”

“They start in on the skill set and the pono, and those two that lead Hawaiians into religion.”

“But I have students who say the missionaries brainwashed the Hawaiians. Well then, how dumb were the Hawaiians?”

“This project really opens up the move from learning to read and write, which was really a big gun, and advancing the pono, which is the new sort of virtue – that everybody should be held to a standard. That led Hawaiians on a one-by-one.”

“This is not a brainwashing; it’s, as people bought in, they became Christian.”

“Not all of them did. You’ll notice that in 1840, twenty years into the project, the missionaries are still complaining about all the people who didn’t convert. So, if it was a brainwashing effort, it wasn’t that effective.”

“But, reading and writing starts immediately. And, of course, the missionaries can only teach in English. So they are teaching English reading and writing. We’re still playing with trying to open up that little window; there’s a very short window of probably a couple of months where those who have learned to read and write in English suddenly start to … write Hawaiian.…”

“The remarkable success here is that Hawaiians are given a new technology and what they started to put out in writing, they are transitioning from a … very sophisticated stone age culture into a very, very modern world. And now they’re empowered to write all that, and document it.”

“So the first ones who knew how to write are writing down history that had been held orally for hundreds of years. And then, writing becomes a national endeavor.…”

“Hawaii becomes more literate than America or England because the two things, actually Liholiho starts it Kauikeaouli takes it off and says ‘mine will be a nation of literacy.’ When he said that he could already read and write in both languages.”

“It’s not that he’s saying we should learn to read and write.’ He’s saying ‘let my people,’ and he made schools and he made teachers and he made a teachers’ college….”

“That notion that they appreciated the skill set and they appreciated the pono, and that led to appreciation of Christianity….”

An example is found in a letter written by Kalanimōku in 1826 to Hiram Bingham, in part, that letter translates to, “Greetings Mr Bingham. Here is my message to all of you, our missionary teachers.”

“I am telling you that I have not seen your wrong doing. If I had seen you to be wrong, I would tell you all. No, you must all be good.”

“Give us literacy and we will teach it. And, give us the word of God and we will heed it. Our women are prohibited, for we have learned the word of God.”

“Then foreigners come doing damage to our land. Foreigners of American and Britain. But don’t be angry, for we are to blame for you being faulted. And it is not you foreigners, the other foreigners.”

“Here’s my message according to the words of Jehovah, I have given my heart to God and my body and my spirit. I have devoted myself to the church and Jesus Christ.”

“Have a look at this letter of mine, Mr Bingham and company. And if you see it and wish to send my message on to America to our chief (President,) that is up to you. Greetings to the chief of America. Regards to you all, Kalanimōku.”

Here’s the audio of Puakea Nogelmeier’s presentation:

Departure_of_the_Second_Company_from_the_American_Board_of_Commissioners_for_Foreign_Missions_to_Hawaii

Hiram Bingham I preaching to Queen at Waimea, Kauai, in 1826

The Mission Seminary at Lahainaluna on Maui in the 1830s

View of Hilo, Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa in the 1820s

View of Kealakekua Bay from the village of Kaʻawaloa in the 1820s

View of southern Oʻahu from ʻEwa in the 1820

Waimea, Kauai in the 1820s

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June 29, 2016 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Waikīkī Church

By the time the first company of American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) Protestant missionaries arrived in 1820, Kamehameha I had died and the centuries-old kapu system had been abolished. The Hawaiian people had already dismantled their heiau and had rejected their religious beliefs.

The missionaries, less the group left on the Big Island, landed at Honolulu on April 19, 1820. On the sabbath (April 23,) Hiram Bingham, the leader of the group, preached the first formal Protestant sermon in the Islands. Initial services were in thatched structures. Later, a more permanent church was built.

In July, 1821, they began to build a 22 by 54-foot building, large enough to seat 300. This first church building was built of thatch and lined with mats; however, it had glass windows, doors, a wooden pulpit and 2-rows of seats, separated by an aisle. In August of that year, Captain Templeton presented a bell from his ship to be used at the church.

Within a year, Hiram Bingham began to preach in the Hawaiian language. 4-services a week were conducted (3 in Hawaiian and 1 in English.) Congregations ranged from 100 – 400; by the end of the year, the church was expanded.

On May 30, 1824, the church burned to the ground. Within a couple of days after the fire, Kalanimōkū ordered a new church to be built at public expense. A new thatched building (25 by 70 feet) was placed a short distance from the old; it was dedicated July 18, 1824.

Interest in the mission’s message outgrew the church and services were held outside with 3,000 in attendance; efforts were underway to build a larger facility, to accommodate 4,000.

In December, 1825, the third Meeting House building was opened for worship; however, shortly afterward a violent rain storm collapsed the structure. In 1827, Kaʻahumanu stepped forward and “caused a temporary house to be erected which is 86 feet by 30, with 2 wings each 12 feet wide extending the whole length of the building. … It is not large enough to accommodate all who attend the service on Sabbath mornings, many are obliged to sit without.” (Mission Journal – Damon)

The last of the thatched churches served for 12-years. It measured 63 by 196 feet (larger than the present Kawaiahaʻo Church) – 4,500 people could assemble within it.

Then, between 1836 and 1842, Kawaiahaʻo Church was constructed. Revered as the Protestant “mother church” and often called “the Westminster Abbey of Hawai‘i” this structure is an outgrowth of the original Mission Church founded in Boston and is the first foreign church on O‘ahu (1820.)

Kawaiahaʻo Church was designed by its first pastor, Bingham. Following five years of construction, Kawaiahaʻo was ready for dedication ceremonies on July 21, 1842. The grounds of Kawaiahaʻo overflowed with 4,000 to 5,000 faithful worshippers. King Kamehameha III, who contributed generously to the fund to build the church, attended the service.

There were ten ‘āpana, or branches, of the Kawaiahaʻo Church. One of them was the Waikīkī Church (the others included Kalihi, Palama, Nuʻuanu, Pauoa, Moʻiliʻili, Pālolo, Kaimuki, Puaikalani (Kakaʻako) and Kawaiahaʻo itself. (Damon)

Across Kalākaua Avenue in front of the Moana Hotel, on the present site of the shops and Princess Kaʻiulani Hotel, was the first grammar school in Waikīkī, a small graveyard and the church. (Cultural Surveys)

“The Little Church at Waikīkī … The congregation which has worshipped in this church is numerous but poor …. The pretty little church among the cocoanuts is besides a prominent ornament to the neighborhood”.

The church was damaged by a thunderbolt … “It seems that the house was badly shattered – in fact rendered untenable in wet weather, and that it will cost in the neighborhood of five hundred dollars to put it again in good condition …”

“We beg to suggest a concert or other public entertainment to raise funds for the repair of the Waikīkī Church building.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, December 18, 1875)

It turns out the Waikīkī Church was a venue for many concerts, to raise money for the Waikīkī property, as well as Kawaiahaʻo in downtown – and they had frequent royal guests.

“A concert was given on Wednesday evening, commencing at half past seven o’clock, at the Waikīkī Church in aid of Kawaiahao Church. Their Royal Highnesses Princess Liliʻuokalani and Princess Likelike took an active part in promoting the furtherance of this good object, and both of these good ladies also took part in carrying out the programme.”

“The Misses Cleghorn and other young ladies also assisted. A drive to Waikīkī on a beautiful moonlight night is of itself a treat, which was greatly enhanced, by the anticipation of hearing good vocal and instrumental music on arrival there.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, December 15, 1883)

“A musical entertainment was given at Waikīkī Church on Wednesday evening. Their Royal Highnesses the Princesses Liliuokalani and Likelike had taken a great interest in the affair and many of their friends from town took the opportunity to indulge in a moonlight drive and be present at the concert.”

“The church was filled and there was a not inconsiderable audience that preferred the open air and the soft grass of the churchyard to the accommodations provided for them inside … “It is to be hoped that this is not the last time that the people of Waikīkī will invite their town friends to come and hear them sing.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, December 15, 1883)

In an interview for the Oral History Project conducted by the Social Science Research Institute, University of Hawai‘i, interviewee Mary Paoa Clarke (born in 1902) recalls the Waikīkī School:

“We (Mary and her siblings) went to Waikīkī School – that’s across the Moana Hotel – which is (where) the (Princess) Kaʻiulani Hotel (is) now. We walked from our home to school”. Mary also noted that the Waikīkī School only went up to third grade. “We started in the fourth grade at Kaʻahumanu”. (Social Science Research Institute)

“… I had gone to the Waikīkī (Elementary) School for three years. There was Mrs Henry, Mrs Perry and Mrs Ontai. (The) first Waikīkī School was opposite the Moana Hotel – across the street. (There were) three rooms, first, second and third. In one corner of the property there was a graveyard and an old Hawaiian church.) (Lemon Wond “Rusty” Holt, Sr; Social Science Research Institute)

In 1916, Kawaiaha‘o sold the cemetery land around the Waikīkī ‘āpana (branch) church to the Territorial Hotel Co, Ltd, owners of the Moana Hotel.

A new lot was obtained from the Lili‘uokalani Trust; plans for the construction of a new church began immediately, as the church contracted for the construction of a one-story frame building in 1916 on a new lot, near the corner of Kūhiō Avenue and ʻOhua Lane (in the area now occupied by the Waikīkī Banyan Condominium, which was built in 1979.)

Owing to the sale of the Waikīkī Church premises for the extension of the Moana Hotel accessories, some fifty or more bodies which had been interred in its grounds were exhumed and removed to the cemetery of the mother church, Kawaiahaʻo. (Thrum, 1916)

Kawaiahaʻo Church took the responsibility “to remove all remains and coffins buried in the church yard (so far as practical) and re-inter them in some cemetery or cemeteries in the district of Honolulu,” with the costs of the removal to be borne by the Territorial Hotel Co.

Those interred in the Protestant cemetery ranged from as young as 2 weeks to 80 years of age and were noted as having passed away from a variety of causes such as “consumption”, “constipation”, “meningitis”, “diabetes”, “whooping cough”, the most common cause being “old age.” With perhaps one exception, all of the names appear to be Hawaiians who died between 1880 and 1907. (Cultural Surveys)

“Then the Moana (Hotel) built a lot of cottages in there. Of course then years later they were torn down and they built the Princess Ka‘iulani Hotel.” (Leslie Fullard-Leo (born 1909;) Social Science Research Institute)

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Cottages moved in 1953-Princess Kaiulani Constructed after that

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May 1, 2016 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Common Stock

An often repeated (and unfounded/incorrect) statement is, “The missionaries came to do good, and they did very well.” (Suggesting the missionaries personally profited from their services in the Islands.)

A simple review of the facts show that the missionaries were forbidden to “engage in any business or transaction whatever for the sake of private gain” and they did not, and could not, own property individually.

The Prudential Committee of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM,) in giving instructions to the Pioneer Company of 1819, said:

“Your mission is a mission of mercy, and your work is to be wholly a labor of love. … Your views are not to be limited to a low, narrow scale, but you are to open your hearts wide, and set your marks high.”

“You are to aim at nothing short of covering these islands with fruitful fields, and pleasant dwellings and schools and churches, and of Christian civilization.” (Instructions of the Prudential Committee of the ABCFM, October 15, 1819)

Over the course of a little over 40-years (1820-1863 – the ‘Missionary Period,’) about 180-men and women in twelve Companies served in Hawaiʻi to carry out the mission of the ABCFM in the Hawaiian Islands.

To supply the mission members, a Common Stock system was initiated – it was a socialistic, rather than capitalistic, economic structure.

The Common Stock system was a community-based economic system designed to enable the missionaries to accomplish their goals without having to worry about finding sustenance and shelter.

The missionaries were constantly reminded of Matthew Chapter 6, verse 24: “No one can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon (money.)” (Woods)

The Laws and Regulations of the ABCFM stated, “No missionary or assistant missionary shall engage in any business or transaction whatever for the sake of private gain …”

“… nor shall anyone engage in transactions or employments yielding pecuniary profit, without first obtaining the consent of his brethren in the mission; and the profits, in all cases, shall be placed at the disposal of the mission.”

“The missionaries and assistant missionaries are regarded as having an equitable claim upon the churches, in whose behalf they go among the heathen, for an economical support, while performing their missionary labors …”

“… and it shall be the duty of the Board to see that a fair and equitable allowance is made to them, taking into view their actual circumstances in the several countries where they reside.” (Laws and Regulations of the Board, 1812)

So missionaries could devote their entire energies to developing a written language for the Hawaiian people, translating the Bible into Hawaiian and teaching native men, women and children to read it, the ABCFM supplied all the Hawaiian mission’s domestic needs through a Common Stock system administered by appointed secular agents for the mission.

“The kingdom to which you belong is not of this world. Your mission is to the native race,” ABCFM Secretary Rufus Anderson instructed the missionaries. Consequently, missionaries practiced rigid economy partly out of necessity, and partly out of a desire to appear trustworthy to the American churches upon whom they depended for total support. (Schulz)

The Mission was supported by donations to the ABCFM on the continent, “The free-will offerings of many churches, and many thousands of individuals are cast into one treasury, and committed, for application to the intended objects, to persons duly appointed to the high trust.”

“Upon these sacred funds and under this constituted direction, approved persons, freely offering themselves for the holy service, are sent forth to evangelize the heathen.”

“Your economical polity will be founded on the principle established by the Board, ‘That at every missionary station, the earnings of the members of the mission, and all monies and articles of different kinds, received by them, or any of them, directly from the funds of the Board, or in the way of donation, shall constitute a common stock …”

“… from which they shall severally draw their support in such proportions, and under such regulations as may from time to time be found advisable, and be approved by the Board or by the Prudential Committee.’” (Instruction to the Missionaries, October 15, 1819)

The Minutes of a meeting of the Pioneer Company on their way aboard the Thaddeus reinforced these instructions, “The property acquired by the members jointly or by individuals of the body either by grant, barter, or earnings shall also be subject to the disposal of the members jointly.”

“The property thus furnished or acquired, either divided or undivided, shall be devoted to the general purposes of the mission, according to the tenor of our Instructions from the A. B. Com. F. M. and according to our own regulations, not incompatible with those instructions.”

“No member of this mission shall be entitled to use or allowed to appropriate such property divided or undivided, in bying [sic], selling, giving, or consuming, etc. in any manner incompatible with our general Instructions, or contrary to the voice of a majority of the members.” (Minutes of the Prudential Meeting of the Mission Family, November 16, 1819)

The Mission’s secular agent, Levi Chamberlain, kept track of everything mission families received from the Depository, gifts from mainland friends or family members, and any presents from Native Hawaiians. Everything was counted against the equal distribution of goods.

Mission family members were allowed to keep personal gifts from family and friends as private property, but those gifts were subtracted from what they would otherwise be entitled to receive from the Depository. (Woods)

In 1836 the Mission wrote, “No man can point to private property to the value of a single dollar, which any member of the mission has acquired at the Sandwich Islands.”

Missionary Dwight Baldwin noted, “Every member, I think, to a man, has been engrossed in labors for the benefit of the people. And it is certainly true of nearly every one, that he has turned his attention to no provision whatever which his children might need in America.” (Schulz)

“In spite of the fact that they followed this community-based economic system, there is no doubt that the missionaries were capitalists. In 1838 William Richards took leave from the mission and then resigned to become the translator and advisor for King Kamehameha III.”

“At the King’s request Richards taught the chiefs about capitalism and constitutional government using a book he translated by Baptist pastor and Brown University President Francis Wayland, titled The Elements of Political Economy.”

“This class led directly to the establishment of the so-called Hawaiian Bill of Rights a few months later in 1839 that guaranteed rights to commoners that included rights to their own property.”

“The class also led to the establishment of the first constitution of Hawai‘i in 1840. The class may also have prepared the way for the Māhele in the late 18405 that established the right of private land ownership.” (Woods)

Two years after Kamehameha III created the first Hawaiian constitution, legislature, and public education system, the ABCFM aided the missionaries by transitioning to a salary system. The Board allotted each couple $450 per year and granted children under 10 an additional $30 and children over 10, $70 annually. (Schulz)

At their General Meeting in 1843, the Mission resolved, “That although we consider the salary allowed us by the Board a bona fide salary, still, in our character as missionaries, we are a peculiar people, having wholly consecrated ourselves to the Lord for the spread of the Gospel in the earth …”

“… and however it may be proper for other men to engage in speculations, and accumulate property, we cannot consistently with our calling engage in business for the purpose of private gain.” (Cheever)

The Depository continued as a purchasing agent for missionaries who could purchase their supplies at a discount from the Secular Agent, but all gifts or other earnings were still deducted from this salary. Land and herds continued to be owned jointly by the mission. (Woods)

Missionary parents could now give their children a New England education in the islands at O‘ahu College (Punahou, founded in 1841) and save their personal incomes for their children’s futures. (Schulz)

In 1863, the ABCFM withdrew financial support for the mission and the Missionary Period ended.

I encourage folks to visit the Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives, in the shadow of Kawaiahaʻo Church, on King Street. It’s a great way to learn the facts about the missionaries and the Missionary Period.

Docent guided tours (Tuesday through Saturday, starting on the hour every hour from 11 am with the last tour beginning at 3 pm) take about an hour and cost $10 ($8 Kamaʻāina, Seniors and Military,) Students $6 (age 6 to College w/ID;) Kamaʻāina Saturday (last Saturday of the month) 50% off for residents.)