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June 5, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hermit of Kalalau

“People may think I am a fool but I have found real happiness and, above all real peace of mind.” (Wheatley)

Bernard Gamaliel Wheatley was born the son of a shopkeeper in St Thomas, Virgin Islands, October 14, 1919, son of Osorio Solario Wheatley and Anna (Fleury) Wheatley. (Ancestry and Soboleski)

Wheatley received a medical degree from Meharry Medical College in Nashville, Tenn., and held a medical post with the Army, from which he was discharged in 1946.  Wheatley practiced medicine for a short time in Sweden. (TenBruggencate)  Dr. John Eriksson, who was his superior, says: “He was a good surgeon and a nice man.” (Ebony)

“There is evidence to indicate that both in medical school and in later practice the doctor showed brilliance and an unusual capacity for work. He was also successful.”  (Krauss)

Then, “‘He became,’ one of his friends say, ‘a religious fanatic.’ This transition was not accomplished without a mental upheaval. Dr. Wheatley disappeared three times. The last time he was found naked in a Stockholm park.”

“The doctor-turned-mystic is critical of his former colleagues. ‘Shooting people with penicillin,’ he says, ‘is no better way of curing disease than shooting hydrogen missiles is a means of curing war.’  His rejection of medicine, he says, was hastened by a heart attack he suffered in 1951 in Sweden.”

“‘I became struck,’ he continues, ‘with the similarity between psychosomatic medicine and the teachings of Christ – how closely hate and fear and anxiety are related to heart disease, high blood pressure, peptic ulcer, diabetes mellitus.’”

“‘Finally, I made up my mind to go directly to the cause of disease instead of treating the symptoms. In a moment of lucidity, I saw all the way to the fact that man could overcome death and could control his health by living a life of love.’” (Ebony)

“He was treated for a nervous breakdown. In 1953, he went to Paris, where his brother, a pianist, lives. He wandered around Europe for a while and then came to America.”

“He turned up unexpectedly at the homes of several of his classmates. They were shocked by his appearance and the sudden change in his personality. It was like meeting a completely different man, one doctor says. He walked from New York to California.”

“In Chicago, he was a guest in the home of the Reverend William J Faulkner, who was dean of chapel when Wheatley was a student at Fisk University. He told Faulkner that he wanted to found a center for the propagation of his philosophy. Faulkner replied in a lighthearted vein that Hollywood would be just the place for the center. Both men laughed.” (Ebony)

“A few months later, Wheatley turned up in Hawaii. He worked for a while as a dessert maker in a restaurant. He quit this job. ‘I found,’ he says, ‘that at the end of the day I had spent so much energy arguing with the waitresses that I had none left for creative thinking.’”

“When a man who knows Wheatley heard this explanation, he said; ‘That sounds typical of him. He was probably telling them what stupid, narrow lives they lead and they were telling him he was crazy. And probably, they were all right, in a way.’”

“Wheatley’s last job was at the Central YMCA in Honolulu. He was desk clerk. He quit this job because he didn’t think it was right to charge poor people for rooms.”  (Ebony)

“[I]n April, 1957, Dr. Wheatley turned his back on the world and went into Kalalau Valley. ‘My guess,’ a friend of his says, ‘is that these experiences are what finally drove him out of the world and into Kalalau. To a man of his sensitivity, I should think an arrest and appearance in court with attendant publicity would be a sort of final stamp of social disapproval in his mind.’” (Ebony)

Wheatley became known as the Hermit of Kalalau.

“The Hermit of Kalalau is a lean but powerfully built man of 40 years, His jaw and upper lip are covered with short, curling black whiskers. He was barefoot and dressed in a pair of tan swimming trunks and a spotlessly clean T-shirt.”

“He spoke with excellent articulation and with great poise, searching for just the right word, as if he were giving a lecture out there on the trackless beach. … Then then the Hermit helped us carry our gear across the sunlit sand into his ‘guest cave,’ a small cavern beside the one in which he lives under a majestic black cliff.”  (Krauss)

“In front of his cave, about 30 feet wide and 12 feet deep and eight feet high in the rear, were a series of neat, geometrical patterns ln the sand. Otherwise the sand was undisturbed.”

“‘These are my paths,’ the Hermit explained. ‘May I ask you to use them?  You see, there is great beauty in the land with the sun or moonlight upon it. Footprints destroy it. And I’ve found that, of all the requirements for survival, beauty is the most important.’” (Krauss)

“Then he took us on a tour of his valley. We started with his own cave. It reminded me very much of the cell of a monk. The immaculate sand floor is terraced in two levels. On the first terrace the Hermit has, on one side of the cave, his tiny fireplace, which is a grill set neatly upon four stones. He must use it only occasionally because there was only a trace of ash.”

“Above the fireplace, on the top terrace in a niche in the lava rock, the Hermit keeps his silverware and cooking utensils. He has about four spoons, as many forks and a few knives. Also three cups and saucers and as many jelly glasses.”

“Everything was neatly arranged on the rocks and on a wooden board. ‘I try to keep some degree or nicety and orderliness,’ the Hermit explained. “I always set my table (a wooden box) correctly with silverware at meals even though I’m having only taro. One can judge character by the way a man acts m the wilderness.’” (Kraus)

“Little by little I pieced together the strange story of survival that began in April, 1957.  ‘I had seen the valley from the lookout in January of that year,’ the Hermit said, ‘and felt attracted to it. In April I hiked in for the first time.’”

“’Had you ever been on the trail?’ ‘No. All I had with me was a lunch. I didn’t even have matches. It took me two days to get into the valley. I lost the trail and had to hull my way through the lantana. My clothes were pretty badly torn.’”

“‘The first time I stayed for 23 days. Then I became constipated because of the guava seeds. The pain was pretty bad for about five days. Finally I flagged down a passing sampan and the crew took me to Lihue Hospital.’  Five weeks later the Hermit was back in his valley, armed with a mess kit this time, and a change of clothing.”

Why was he there … “What he is trying to do, he said, is live according to what he believes with no compromise. Apparently, the only place he  has found this is possible ls in remote Kalalau Valley.”

“‘On the outside I constantly feel limitation around me,’ he said. ‘The instinctive reaction to a new situation is fear. There is so much that is negative in the world so many people to say, ‘That’s impossible.’ Here in the valley I feel no fear or limitation. That doesn’t mean I think I can fly. But I feel that l can always do what I have to do. Some wisdom must come from taking chances.”

“‘I’ve found,’ he said, ‘that very few people want to hear what I have to say. I can accomplish more by talking to the occasional person who is interested and understands. Try not to judge others. There is no way of knowing which of us will finally be most important in the scheme of things.’”

“When hippies came to Kalalau in the late-1960s with their hallucinogens and lifestyles at odds with his own, he finally left his once solitary home.  A good friend of his said that he had dedicated his life to God, and Kalalau had been his test. By surviving there alone for so long, he had proven that God had taken care of him.”  (Soboleski)

“I think a person should be improving all the time. Then, on a certain day, you know that you have achieved enough change in yourself to belong in another place on a certain day. That is what happened to me. … I have stayed at the YMCA several times. Other times I stay with friends.”  (Kraus)

“’I’ve never really been a hermit I used to leave the valley fairly frequently when friends needed me. I often played tennis or bridge with them. I’m primarily a thinker. I came to the valley to evaluate things.’ … He says he is never going back to the practice of medicine.”  (Knaefler)

“One of his chief criticisms of you and I is that we don’t DO the things we say we believe. … He puts little stock in philosophers because ‘they don’t act on their philosophies; they don’t participate in the universe.”  (Krauss)

“Dr. Bernard Wheatiey died on Kauai at 72 on December 3, 1991, and his ashes were scattered in Kalalau Valley.” (Soboleski)

© 2025 Ho‘okuleana LLC

Filed Under: Place Names, Prominent People Tagged With: Bernard Wheatley, Hawaii, Kauai, Kalalau, North Shore, Hermit, Hermit of Kalalau

May 20, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Crossing Anahulu Stream

When the Reverend John Emerson and his wife Ursula arrived in Hawai‘i in 1832, they were assigned to establish an American Protestant missionary station in Waialua. (Clark)

“[T]wo new houses are building which we shall occupy as soon as they are finished. Only a few rods from them is a fine spring of running water, which feeds a small river large enough for canoes.”

“This is the Anahulu which, bending and broadening, empties about a third of a mile away into Waialua Bay, where the ocean waves roll in upon a sandy beach.” “The home was known thereafter as ‘Waipuolo,’ ‘The Bubbling Spring.’” (Emerson)

“The Anahulu river (cave of the hulu – a kind of fish) is a narrow estuary averaging forty feet wide, which makes up from Waialua Bay a mile or more to the mouth of the Kawailoa stream.”

“On its opposite banks were two homes facing each other. On one side were the Gulicks, and on the other the Emersons. In each family there were seven boys and a younger sister, the Gulicks ranging three or four years older than the Emersons.” (Emerson)

Later it was found that a “need of the Waialua farmers was easier access to the Honolulu market, which could only be reached by a horse-trail leading through deep gulches and streams, or by small coasters that had to contend with currents and baffling winds.”

“Accordingly, after much urging, it was decided by the Government to develop the horse-trail into a road and bridge the streams. Of course this work required supervision. The only man at hand who could plan it and handle both native and white workmen, was my father, so he was asked to add to his other duties that of being the road supervisor of the district.”

“During the two years my father held this office, the road up and down the sides of five gulches was graded and made fit for carriages and oxcarts, and over the streams five bridges were built. Eighteen miles of roadway were constructed to connect with the road already built from Honolulu to Ewa.”

“Some of the time my father had a gang of fifty or more natives under him making the road, and several white carpenters at work building the bridges. When all was finished, business in Waialua began to boom.” (Emerson)

Later, “the law declares that vehicles weighing more than 15 tons shall not cross public bridges or traverse public roads … (Star Bulletin, July 22, 1915) The bridge crossing Anahulu Stream in Haleiwa was designed to carry horse-drawn carriages.  (Griffin)

Then, “traffic was stopped … when the Anahulu bridge between Waialua and Waialee collapsed under the weight of a twenty two ton plow tractor owned by the Waialua plantation.” (Hawaiian Gazette, July 20, 1915)

Around-the-island traffic stopped, “The Anahulu bridge, over the Anahulu stream at Waialua on the main road between Haleiwa and Kahuku; will be closed to traffic until further notice.” (Star Bulletin, July 20, 1915)

Then a new reinforced concrete bridge was planned across Anahulu Stream. George E Marshall was given a $62,000 contract to build the double arched span (each 80 feet long). (Advertiser, Aug 26, 1920)

During construction, the bridge was almost lost. “Working in the pouring rain from 9 o’clock Thursday night to 2 o’clock Friday morning, a gang of workmen directed by George e Marshall saved the new Haleiwa bridge, for which Marshall is the contractor, from probable destruction.”

“[T]he stream, usually low, became a raging torrent due to the kona storm, and was fully 100 yards wide and 10 feet deep. Masses of sugar cane, wooden flumes, boards and debris of various kinds were buried against the bridge by the storm waters and desperate work was necessary to keep the debris from backing up the flood.” (Star Bulletin, Dec 27, 1920)

The bridge later faced a different threat, “The old bridge channels through itself all the life around it. Spanning the Anahulu River, it pulls together the banks of Haleiwa.”

“It remembers the old and sees the new.  Its too-narrow arches funnel the tide of progress filtering through the town. ‘Slow down’ it says ‘look at me.’  Built in 1921 when Haleiwa was a sleepy town, the bridge tries to lessen the pace of the traffic it channels through the still sleepy town.”

“The bridge still hears the plop of boots through the taro patches and the lap of waves against the orange and white sampans. The shrill whistle of the cane train is gone, and the clanking rumble of the Tournahauler is fading.”

“The bridge heard the Big-City folk call its neighboring buildings ‘delapidated’  but only scoffed. ‘Old things are good things,’ it said. ‘They allow the old to remember and the young to learn.’

“The bridge feels the surge of the tide below and the stain of red mud on its once-white arches. It feels the weight of small boys jeering the long tour cars or quietly fishing.”

“As the new small boat harbor was carved into the earth at its side, the bridge watched in wonder. Man diverted its river.  Man cut off a chunk of the ocean for quiet waters. Man could easily have blown up the too-narrow bridge. Fortunately he didn’t.”

“Beautification once meant to the bridge a new coat of white paint. Now it may mean survival to the matron of Haleiwa, the guardian of the rotting buildings.”

“Like all structures the bridge once faced destruction in the face of bigger and more modern thoroughfares. But plans were changed. The new highway that will bring new faces in search of recreation will pass through Haleiwa nearer the mountains.”

“The old Kamehameha Highway will become a scenic route, a roadway of the past, if the young people of Haleiwa have their way.”

“The rebuilding and new construction in Haleiwa will take on a theme, so have decided the young men who once fished from the bridge. The most dominant scene will be the harbor, the sampans, the fishing village. The other scene, further up the river,  will be the taro patches, the small riverside vegetable farms.”

“The new life that grows up along the shores of the river and beaches will share the laziness and quiet of the old life. And standing as a guardian between the two scenes will be the bridge, listening, seeing, feeling.”  (Star Bulletin, Feb 14, 1967)

Due to its shape, it earned the name ‘Rainbow Bridge’ – a little more appealing that its technical name, ‘Kamehameha Highway Bridge #603.’  It is one of the most recognized symbols of Hale‘iwa. (Historic Hawai‘i Foundation)

© 2024 Ho‘okuleana LLC

Filed Under: Buildings, Missionaries / Churches / Religious Buildings, Place Names, Prominent People, Economy Tagged With: Anahulu Stream, Haleiwa Bridge, Rainbow Bridge, Hawaii, Haleiwa, John Emerson, North Shore, Anahulu

December 30, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Mount Kaʻala

The Waiʻanae Mountains, formed by volcanic eruptions nearly four-million years ago, have seen centuries of wind and rain, cutting huge valleys and sharp ridges into the extinct volcano.  Mount Kaʻala, the highest peak on the island of Oʻahu, rises to 4,025 feet.

Today, only a small remnant of the mountain’s original flat summit remains, surrounded by cliffs and narrow ridges. It’s often hidden by clouds.

Mount Kaʻala is mentioned in Hawaiian mythology as a mountain that the goddess Hiʻiaka, the sister of Pele, climbed on her way back to the island of Hawai‘i from Kaua‘i. From there she saw the destruction that Pele, enraged over her long absence, created by causing a flow of lava over her lands in Puna.

According to Hawaiian traditions, the Kaʻala bog, on the west side of the summit, was once a freshwater pond used as a fishpond. Kamaoha was the goddess of this pond in which shore fish and a kind of mullet were caught. The informant who reported the pond to McAllister called it a luakini fishpond (1933), which might indicate its use only by chiefs.  (TetraTech)

When viewed from Kūkaniloko, the sun sets directly behind the summit of Mount Kaʻala at the vernal and autumnal equinoxes. Thus, it has been suggested that these places may have been of importance in Hawaiian astronomy and calendric determinations. (TetraTech)

Kaʻala is the subject of several ʻŌlelo Noʻeau.

“Ka ua Kolowao o Kaʻala.
The Mountain-creeper rain of Kaʻala.
This rain is accompanied by a mist that seems to creep among the trees.”

Ancient Kahuna spoke of Mount Kaʻala as being clothed in the golden cloak of Kāne, the first deity of the Hawaiian pantheon. Kaʻala was the guardian of the road to the west, the path of the sun, the resting place on that great road to death where spirits of the dead return to their homeland.  (CZM)

Several ʻŌlelo No’eau speak of Kaiona, goddess of Kaʻala and the Waiʻanae Mountains.

Ka wahine hele la o Kaiona, alualu wai li‘ulā o ke kaha pua ‘ōhai.
The woman, Kaiona, who travels in the sunshine pursuing the mirage of the place where the ‘ōhai blossoms grow.

Ke kaha ‘ōhai o Kaiona.
Kaiona’s place where the ‘ōhai grows.

He lokomaika‘i ka manu o Kaiona.
Kind is the bird of Kaiona.
Said of one who helps a lost person find his way home.

Kaiona was known for her kindness and helpfulness. She rescued travelers who lost their way while crossing her mountain home by sending an ʻiwa bird to guide lost individuals to safety. This goddess was so beloved by Hawaiians that her name was given to Bernice Pauahi Bishop in mele that honor Pauahi.

In 1970, Hawaiʻi became one of the first states in the country to recognize the importance of its unique natural resources by establishing the State Natural Area Reserves System (NARS.)

Then, in 1981, the 1,100-acre Mount Kaʻala Natural Area Reserve was established to protect the diversity of native ecosystems, including native shrublands, forests and a bog.  (DLNR)

Most of the 1,100-acres of the state natural area reserve at Mount Kaʻala are made up of rugged terrain, including steep, inaccessible gulches. It ranges from wet forest at the top, to lowland dry forest.

The Mount Kaʻala NAR protects Hawaiian plants and animals and ecosystems, most found only in Hawai`i, and some very rare. The only vehicle access is a controlled government road, while arduous ridge trails lead to the summit of Mt. Kaʻala.

There, a boardwalk trail takes you on a walk through a native cloud forest. The boardwalk allows visitors to explore the misty flats of Kaʻala safely, and with a minimum of impact to the fragile plants and animals.

Protection of Mt. Kaʻala Natural Area Reserve’s watershed forests by restoring native forest ecosystems is critical for maintaining the water supply of West and Central Oahu. Volunteers reintroduced the critically endangered kamakahala – with fewer than 100 individuals remaining in the wild – to its native habitat in the ridges of Mt. Kaʻala.

(The FAA maintains an active tracking station at the summit, which is closed to the general public and secured by the US Army from Schofield Barracks. The tracking station can be clearly seen from afar as a white domed shaped structure.)

© 2022 Hoʻokuleana LLC

 

Filed Under: Place Names Tagged With: Natural Area Reserve, Waianae, Nanakuli, Makaha, North Shore, Hawaii, Oahu, Kukaniloko, Kaala

May 21, 2020 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Waialeʻe Industrial School

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

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

“The first notice of a reform school is contained in the report of M. Kekuanao’a, president of the board of education, in 1866. The legislature in March, 1865, voted an appropriation of $6,000 for an industrial and reform school.” (Report to the Governor, 1903)

The department of public instruction established an industrial and reformatory school at Keoneula, Kapālama, Oʻahu and had authority to establish other industrial schools across the Islands.

In 1899, a proposal was made to establish a new school at Waialeʻe on Oʻahu’s North Shore, but action wasn’t taken until 1901 when the land was deeded over to the department of education. It was built to replace an older school.

On the May 13, 1902, the last of the boys of the reformatory school in Honolulu – 68 in number – were moved down to the new buildings at Waialeʻe, the institution was thereafter known as the Waialeʻe Industrial School.

The Waialeʻe Industrial School was situated on 700-acres of land, about 5-miles from Kahuku and 8-miles from Waialua. It had a coast line of over a mile, and it extended back to the mountain ridge.

School improvements were built about ½-mile from the ocean on low land between a series of bluffs. Taro patches were built above the beach; there was a large pond supplied by “never-failing springs.”

This site enabled the school to carry on agriculture, dairy farming and fishing, besides giving instruction in carpentering, blacksmithing, the manufacture of poi and general school work.

In 1903, four taro patches had been made and planted; a fifth is about ready to plant. A vegetable garden was planted with onions, tomatoes, com, beans, lettuce, radish, beets, and carrots.

There have also been planted 220 banana plants and about 500 trees for windbreaks and firewood. The trees planted are eucalyptus, gravillea robusta, ironwood, kamani, poinciana, tamarind, alligator pear and mango.

A terrace was built, extending 30 feet around the main building, and planted with grass. A considerable area has been cleared of lantana and stones.

For the dining hall 8 tables and 24 benches have been made, 3 safes for the pantry, a table and cupboard for the kitchen, a table and cupboard for the hospital, and 42 desks have been set up and placed in the schoolroom.

The following buildings were built by the boys: a clothes and store room, 18 by 48 feet, a closet with 10 compartments, 5 by 30 feet, with urinals and latticed screen, a carpenter shop, 20 by 40 feet, and a poi house of corrugated iron with cemented floor, 13 by 15 feet.

In 1903, there were a total of 78-boys in the Waialeʻe Industrial School. (At that time, their attendance was noted as: In school 73; In hospital 1; In Oahu jail 3; and Escaped 1.)

Their offenses included: Truancy 18; Vagrancy and homeless 11; Disobedience to parents 15; Common nuisance 1; Trespass 3; Assault and lottery 2; Larceny 25; Housebreaking 1; and Burglary 2. (Reportedly, an average of 180-boys lived at the school at any given time.)

All was not pretty at the place. “Members of the education committee of the house of representatives are of the opinion that the so-called dark cells or dungeons are improper and should be abolished.” (Star-Bulletin, 1919; as noted in Honolulu Weekly)

Another Star-Bulletin article reveals excerpts of a journal discovered by then-superintendent Morris Freedman that covers most of the inmates from 1899 to 1908. “Disobedience to the moral suasion of parents [resulted in] a man-sized term of 3 to 5 years . . . Runaways were not few and far between . . . Ball and chain were used.” (As noted in Honolulu Weekly)

A related article on the “Boys of Waialee” notes an unpublished piece by Freedman between 1935–1939 that notes corporeal punishment: “Oregon boots, shackles, leg irons, cat-o-nine tails, straps soaked in vinegar and salt, terrific lashings and beatings were the order of the day.”

“In 1921, when Mr. Wesson [took over] the school his first act was to destroy these vestiges of the Dark Ages era [and he] discontinued the use of dark cells which were built below the level of the street surface … his treatment was by far more humane than it had been before.”

A September 3, 1953 editorial in the Honolulu Record notes, “70 per cent of the Oahu Prison inmates comes from Waialee Training School for Boys, which is supposedly a correction and rehabilitation home.”

“This does not include prisoners at Honolulu Jail who “graduated” from Waialee, many of them asking in early youth while at Waialee to be transferred to the jail rather than withstand the brutality and bestiality of the administration staff at the boy’s school.”

The school was operational for approximately 50-years; the boys were moved to facilities on the windward side (above Kailua.)

Later, Crawford’s Convalescent Home operated mauka of Kamehameha Highway. On about 135-acres of the makai lands (below the highway) UH-Manoa College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources (CTAHR) operated the Waialeʻe Livestock Experiment Station, an animal research and demonstration facility.

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© 2020 Hoʻokuleana LLC

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Filed Under: General, Schools Tagged With: North Shore, Crawford Convalescent Home, Hawaii, Oahu, Waialee Industrial School, Koolau Boys Home

March 26, 2017 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hono O Nā Pali

The Natural Area Reserves System (NARS) (administered by DLNR) was created in 1971 to “preserve in perpetuity specific land and water areas which support communities, as relatively unmodified as possible, of the natural flora and fauna, as well as geological sites, of Hawai‘i”.

The NARS is based on the concept of protecting ecosystems – not merely single species. Because the natural resources of Hawai‘i are under constant threat from invasive species, human encroachment, feral ungulates, climate change, and other threats, the NARS seeks to protect the best remaining examples of the State‘s unique ecosystems.

Kauai is the oldest of the eight major Hawaiian islands, and the island consists of one main extinct shield volcano estimated to be about 5 million years old as well as numerous younger lava flows (between 3.65 million years to 500,000 years old).

The island is characterized by severe weathering, which has formed the spectacular cliffs of the Nā Pali coast and Waimea canyon areas.

Hono O Nā Pali Natural Area Reserve encompasses almost 3,600 acres on the north coast island of Kauai. The Reserve was designated in 1983 and expanded in 2009 to preserve native natural communities in the Hanalei and Waimea Districts, including the Hanakāpī‘ai, Hanakoa and Waiahuakua ahupua‘a.

The Reserve stretches from sea level along the picturesque Nā Pali coast to the highest point at Pihea (4,284 feet.) The Reserve encompasses parts of Hanakāpī‘ai and Hanakoa streams and all of Waiahuakua Stream; the southern boundary of the NAR is the south side of the Alaka‘i Swamp Trail.

The Reserve can be broadly classified as containing three major ecosystems including lowland mesic (which includes a variety of grasslands, shrublands and forests,) lowland wet (here, typically dominated by Kukui,) and montane wet (the forest canopy is a mix of ʻōhiʻa and other native trees.)

The lowland coastal ecosystems also contain steep cliffs characterized by plants found in drier areas. The coastal areas and cliffs provide habitat for a number of other seabirds including ‘iwa, brown booby and both red and white-tailed tropicbirds.

Hono O Nā Pali Natural Area Reserve has been described as “one of the best remaining forest ecosystems in Hawai‘i, as well as the rare and endangered plant and animal species it supports.”

Land use records from 1856-1857 show that lands in this area were being used for the cultivation of kalo, olona and kula. In the late-1800s Hanakoa and Hanakāpīʻai were also used for coffee cultivation. Kalalau was abandoned in 1919 and then used for cattle grazing in the 1920 for a limited time. (DLNR)

“The mountains along the shore, for eight or ten miles, are very bold, some rising abruptly from the ocean, exhibiting the obvious effects of volcanic fires; some, a little back, appear like towering pyramids”. (Hiram Bingham, 1822)

“There is a tract of country on the west coast of the island, through which no road is practicable.” (Bowser, 1880; Maly) “For twenty miles along the northwestern coast of Kauai there extends a series of ridges, none less than 800-feet high, and many nearly 1,500-feet, terminating in a bluff that is unrivalled in majesty.”

“Except for a very narrow, dangerous foot-path, with yawning abysses on each side, this bluff is impassable.” (The Tourist’s Guide, Whitney, 1895)

The trail was originally built around 1860 (portions were rebuilt in the 1930s) to foster transportation and commerce for the residents living in the remote valleys.

Local labor and dynamite were used to construct a trail wide enough to accommodate pack animals loaded with oranges, taro and coffee being grown in the valleys. Stone paving and retaining walls from that era still exist along the trail.

It traverses 5-valleys (and the NAR) over 11-miles, from Hāʻena State Park to Kalalau Beach, where it is blocked by sheer, fluted cliffs (pali;) it drops to sea level at the beaches of Hanakāpīʻai and Kalalau. The first 2 miles of the trail, from Hāʻena State Park to Hanakāpīʻai Beach, make a popular day hike. (DLNR)

“During the Māhele, the King granted lands to the Kingdom (Government), the revenue of which was to support government functions. In the Nāpali District, the ahupuaʻa of Kalalau, Pohakuao, Honopu, Hanakāpīʻai and one-half of Hanakoa were granted to the Government Land inventory.”

“Portions of the lands that fell into the government inventory were subsequently sold as Royal Patent Grants to individuals who applied for them.”

“The grantees were generally long-time kamaʻāina residents of the lands they sought… Thirty grants were sold in the Nāpali District to twenty-seven applicants; the lands being situated in Kalalau and Honopu.” (Hawaiian Government, 1887; Maly)

The upper region of the area was put into Territorial Forest Reserve (Nā Pali – Kona Forest Reserve) for protection in 1907. Even before that time, the concern for native forest prompted cattle eradication activities in this area during 1882 and 1890.

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vista-of-the-Alakai-including-the-Hono-o-Na-Pali-NAR
vista-of-the-Alakai-including-the-Hono-o-Na-Pali-NAR
Fencing to help protect Hono O Na Pali
Fencing to help protect Hono O Na Pali
On-the-coastal-trail-at-hono-o-na-pali
On-the-coastal-trail-at-hono-o-na-pali
Hono o Na Pali Natural Area Reserve
Hono o Na Pali Natural Area Reserve
Na-Pali-Coast-Kauai
Na-Pali-Coast-Kauai
Kalalau-View-from-Hono-O-Na-Pali
Kalalau-View-from-Hono-O-Na-Pali
Alakai Swamp at Hono O Na Pali Natural Area Reserve
Alakai Swamp at Hono O Na Pali Natural Area Reserve
The Hono O Na Pali Natural Area Reserve on Kauai features a stream crossing on the Alakai Swamp Trail
The Hono O Na Pali Natural Area Reserve on Kauai features a stream crossing on the Alakai Swamp Trail
Hono-O-Na-Pali-Map
Hono-O-Na-Pali-Map

Filed Under: General, Hawaiian Traditions, Place Names Tagged With: Hawaii, Kauai, Na Pali, Natural Area Reserve, North Shore, Hono O Na Pali

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