Oahu | Page 41 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

March 1, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Tour of Oʻahu – Feb/Mar 1818

James Hunnewell’s Journal covering portions of February and March of 1818 gives some descriptions of his tours on Oahu.

“Thursday, 12. In the morning rainy and dull, but clearing – away; at 10 a. m. left Hanarura in company with two white men and ten Indians, and traveled on a bad road through Palamar, Crehee (Kalihi), Monaraah (Moanalua), Halavar (Halawa), etc.

“In the course of the day we traveled through some beautiful valleys, well cultivated, and watered by small streams, and with some barren hills. At night we stopped at some huts, the residence of a white hermit (Moxley). We took refreshments and it coming on to rain, we put up for the night.

“Friday, February 13. Clearing away in the morning we continued our journey a short distance till we came to a river, which I had to swim (Waiawa). We then came into an uncultivated country, and in the course of the day saw but few huts; we crossed a number of small rivers.

“At dark arrived at Wyaruah (Waialua), and was sent for by the head chief of the place, and treated with fish and powie, and was accommodated with lodging in his own sleeping house.

“Saturday, 14th. Pleasant and clear. After refreshments we took leave of our new friends, traveled along the sea coast, and at noon arrived at Wymaah (Waimea), where stopped the remainder of the day to rest and refresh ourselves. We were here treated with a hog, some dogs, and potatoes. We took lodging here, but fleas were too plenty for sleep.

“Sunday, 15th, pleasant in the morning. Walked around the valley and visited the most remarkable places (some were caves in the rocks, and the spot where the missionaries were killed). [Lieut. Hergest and Mr. Gooch, an astronomer of the British ship ‘Daedalus,’ were murdered at Waimea in 1792.]

“At 10 a. m. took leave of Wymaah and continued our journey as far as [?]ipiruah, where we arrived before night and found the natives very poor, but they, however, brought two roasted dogs and some potatoes, and we put up for the night.

“Monday, 16th. Pleasant and clear. We went a short distance and got a small hog and some taro, and stopped till near noon, and then continued our journey along the sea coast under a ridge of mountains.”

“In the course of the day passed a number of small Indian settlements, some spots of cultivated land, but most of it lying waste. In rain at sundown arrived at a place called Punaru (Punaluu); took refreshments and put up for the night. The first part of the night many natives came to visit us.

“Tuesday, 17th. Pleasant and clear. At sunrise took leave of Punaru and traveled over hills and plains as far as Tahanah (Kahana), and took refreshments.

“Traveled around a long mountain, on the beach, to a place called Ta’aharvah (Kaaawa), and made another stop to rest and refresh, and then proceeded along the sea coast till dark, when we arrived at a place called Whyha (Waihee), and put up for the night; coming on to rain heavily we had little company for the night.

“Wednesday, 18th. Clearing away in the morning. We left Whyha and traveled inland over hills and plains for about ten miles, and stopped under trees to rest and refresh our selves.

“From this we began to ascend the Fall of Nawaur (Nuuanu), which is a precipice of about a thousand feet, nearly perpendicular. From this we traveled through a thick wood for a number of miles when we arrived in sight of Hanarura. We got into the village before sundown.

Another excursion, lasting for a week, was made in March, the account of which is as follows:

“Tuesday, March 24, 1818. At 2 a. m. hove out and found it raining. At 4 it continued raining, when I started from Hanarura in company with two white men and seven Indians, and traveled by moonlight.

“At sunrise we found ourselves in Mownaruah, when it held up raining. At 10, it cleared away pleasant. We stopped to see a chief by the name of Keikuavah (Keikioewa); he gave us a small hog, some fish and taro.

“After resting here we continued our journey. In the afternoon arrived at Waikelie (Waikele), at the residence of a white man by the name of Hunt. We here put up for the night.

“Wednesday, 25th. Pleasant and clear. I found myself very tired – stiff by traveling in the rain over a bad road, so we spent the day here in resting ourselves, and walking out to see the country, some of which I found cultivated, but mostly in waste.

“Thursday, 26th. Pleasant and clear. At 2 a. m. we left our white friend, and continued our journey by moonlight over an extensive plain to a high mountain, and at the dawn of day arrived at the top. (At the Kolekole Pass.)

“The mountains on each side are thickly wooded and full of singing birds, which are very melodious. After descending the mount and traveling over level country we arrived at the seashore at a place called Kohedeedee (deedee-liilii), which is a barren and sandy place. Stopped here for the night.

“Friday, 27th. Pleasant and clear. We went along the seashore as far as Whyany (Waianae) village, where we found a chief of our acquaintance who treated us well and accommodated us at his house, where we spent the remainder of the day, and the night.

“Saturday, 28th. Clear and pleasant; the weather hot. Spent the day in and about the village, making our home at the house of our friend. Whyany is a beautiful valley. In the centre is a large grove of cocoanut trees. It was formerly the residence of the king of this island. The ruins of the old morais are hardly visible.

“Sunday, 29th. Warm and pleasant. In the morning, going in to bathe I struck my head against a stone and cut it considerably. [He always retained the mark] Spent the heat of the day at the house, and in the afternoon walked as far as Koheedeedee and stopped for the night.

“Monday, 30th. Warm and pleasant. At 4 a. m. started for home by way of the sea-coast, which we found barren and sandy. In the course of the morning passed a number of Indian villages.

“We stopped on a place at the foot of a ridge of mountains to rest and refresh. We afterwards continued our journey over an extensive waste plain, in the burning sun, until noon, when we passed a number of valleys inhabited and cultivated.

“Stopped at Whikelie (Waikele), took refreshments, and continued our journey till dark. Stopped at some Indian houses for the night.

“Tuesday, 31st. Pleasant. At 4 a.m. started again by moonlight, and in the forenoon arrived at Hanarura.”

Note, in part, that his reference to ‘Indians’ uses a designation as old as the days of Columbus, when natives of the western world were supposed to be of India, and the name thus once given has not even yet been discontinued.

Oahu-Island-Emerson-Reg0445 (1833)

February 27, 2022 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Marianne Cope

“I am hungry for the work. … I am not afraid of any disease, hence it would be my greatest delight even to minister the abandoned ‘lepers.’”

Farmers Peter and Barbara Koob had five children in Germany and five children in the United States. On January 23, 1838, their daughter, Barbara Koob (variants: Kob, Kopp and now officially Cope,) was born in the German Grand Duchy of Hess-Darmstadt. The next year, the family immigrated to the United States to seek opportunity.

The Koob family settled in Utica, New York and became members of St. Joseph Parish, where the children attended the parish school.

In 1848, young Barbara received her First Holy Communion and was confirmed at St. John Parish in Utica when, in accordance with the practice of the time, the bishop of the diocese came to the largest church in the area to administer these two sacraments at the same ceremony.

After her father’s death, Barbara, in August, 1862, entered the Sisters of the Third Order of Saint Francis in Syracuse, NY, and, on November 19, 1862, she was invested at the Church of the Assumption. She soon became known as Sister Marianne.

As a member of the governing boards of her religious community, she participated in the establishment of two of the first hospitals in the central New York area, St. Elizabeth Hospital in Utica (1866) and St. Joseph’s Hospital in Syracuse (1869). These two hospitals were among the first 50 general hospitals in the US.

Sister Marianne began her new career as administrator at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Syracuse, NY in 1870 where she served as head administrator for six of the hospital’s first seven years.

In 1877, Sister Marianne was elected Mother General of the Franciscan congregation and given the title “Mother” as was the custom of the time.

In 1883, she received a letter from Father Leonor Fouesnel, a missionary in Hawaiʻi, to come to Hawaiʻi to help “procure the salvation of souls and to promote the glory of God.”

Of the 50 religious communities in the US contacted, only Mother Marianne’s Order of Sisters agreed to come to Hawaiʻi to care for people with Hansen’s Disease (known then as leprosy).

The Sisters arrived in Hawaiʻi on November 8, 1883, dedicating themselves to the care of the 200-lepers in Kakaʻako Branch Hospital on Oʻahu. This hospital was built to accommodate 100-people, but housed more than 200.

The condition at the hospital were deplorable. Each Sister-nurse learned to wash the wounds, to apply soothing ointment to the wounds, and to bring a sense of order to the lawlessness that prevails when there is abandonment of hope.

In 1884, Mother Marianne Cope and the Sisters of St. Francis came to Maui and with a royal bequest from Queen Kapiʻolani, established Malulani Hospital (“Protection of Heaven”) in Wailuku, next to the site of St. Anthony’s Church. Malulani was the first hospital established on Maui.

In 1885, realizing that healthy children of leprous patients were at high risk of contracting the disease, yet had no place to live, she founded Kapiʻolani Home on Oʻahu for healthy female children of leprosy patients. Because of her work, she was the recipient of the Royal Medal of Kapiʻolani.

In the summer of 1886, the Sisters took care of Father Damien (later Saint Damien) when he visited Honolulu during his bout with leprosy. He asked the Sisters to take over for him when he died.

Mother Marianne led the first contingent of Sister-nurses to Kalaupapa, Molokaʻi, where more than a thousand people with leprosy had been exiled. Upon arrival, on November 14, 1888, she opened the CR Bishop Home for homeless women and girls with Hansen’s Disease. To improve the bleak conditions, Mother Marianne grew fruits, vegetables and landscaped the area with trees, thus creating a better environment among the residents.

While at Kalaupapa, Mother Marianne predicted that no Franciscan Sister would ever contract leprosy. Additionally she required her sisters use stringent hand washing and other sanitary procedures.

Upon the death of Saint Damien on April 15, 1889, Mother Marianne agreed to head the Boys Home at Kalawao. The Board of Health had quickly chosen her as Saint Damien’s successor and she was thus enabled to keep her promise to him to look after his boys.

The Boys Home at Kalawao was completely renovated between 1889 – 1895 during her administration. During the renovation, it was renamed Baldwin Home by the Board of Health in honor of its leading benefactor, HP Baldwin.

The two new Sisters who came to run the Home were accompanied on their boat journey by poet Robert Louis Stevenson, who stayed for a week. During his stay, he wrote a poem for Mother Marianne and later donated a piano so that “there will always be music.”

Mother Marianne’s spirit of self-sacrifice enabled her to live and work with leper patients for 35 years. Although there was not yet a cure, the Sisters could offer the lepers some semblance of dignity and as pleasant a life as possible.

Mother Marianne died in Kalaupapa on August 9, 1918. The Sisters of St. Francis continue their work in Kalaupapa with victims of Hansen’s Disease. No sister has ever contracted the disease.

On December 19, 2011, Pope Benedict signed and approved the promulgation of the decree for her sainthood and she was canonized on October 21, 2012. (Information here is primarily from Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace.)

February 25, 2022 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Moku O Loʻe

Three brothers, Kahoe, Kahuauli and Pahu, and their sister, Loʻe, were sent from ʻEwa to live in Kāneʻohe. Loʻe lived on Moku o Loʻe (Loʻe’s island). Kahuauli was a farmer at Luluku (in the area of Puʻu Kahuauli). Kahoe was a farmer near Haiku and Keaʻahala; and Pahu was a fisherman in Pohakea (in the area of Puʻu Pahu). (Jokiel, HIMB)

When Pahu went to visit Kahoe he always received poi from him. In return, he gave Kahoe small leftover baitfish instead of good large ulua that he caught daily. Kahoe eventually learned of Pahu’s deceit from Loʻe who came over from her island to visit him. (Jokiel, HIMB)

Several months later there was a famine and everyone hid the smoke from their cooking fires to avoid having to share their food with others. Kahoe was able to conceal his smoke in his valley. It traveled one to two kilometers before appearing on the summit of the cliff.

One evening Loʻe caught Pahu looking longingly at Keaʻahala and said, “So, standing with eyes looking at Keahiakahoe (Kahoe’s fire).” To this day the peak carries this name. (Jokiel, HIMB)

Surrounding Kāneʻohe Bay landward are, again, the Koʻolau Mountains. Seen to the right of Mōkapu Peninsula’s Puʻu Papaʻa and in the foreground is Puʻu Pahu, a hill on the mainland overlooking Moku o Loe. Lilipuna Pier, which provides access by boat to Moku o Loʻe, is located here. This headland is known as Pōhākea.

To the right and continuing southwest are the peaks of Puʻu Kōnāhuanui, Puʻu Lanihuli, Puʻu Kahuauli and Puʻu Keahiakahoe. These surround the large valley of Kaneohe.

It came under the ownership of Bishop Estate. In 1933, Chris Holmes, owner of Hawaiian Tuna Packers (later, Coral Tuna) and heir to the Fleischmann yeast fortune, purchased the island for his tuna-packing factory.

Later, Holmes tried to transform Coconut Island into his own private paradise. He enlarged the island, built the ponds, harbors and seawall surrounding the island. He also planted large numbers of coconut palms which gave rise to its popular name, “Coconut Island”.

Holmes bought a 4-masted schooner in Samoa, the Seth Parker, and had it sailed north to Hawai‘i. It leaked so much on the trip that it was declared unseaworthy. He permanently moved the Seth Parker to Coconut Island. This boat was used in the movie “Wake of the Red Witch”, starring John Wayne. (HIMB)

Christian Holmes built outdoor bars at various points around the island. He had a bowling alley built, and reconstructed a shooting gallery on the island that he had bought at an amusement park in San Francisco. (HIMB)

That’s not all. Coconut Island even housed a small zoo for a short time. Animal residents included: donkeys, a giraffe, monkeys and a baby elephant. Upon Holmes’s death, these animals became the basis for the Honolulu Zoo (along with the Honolulu Bird Park at the Kapiʻolani Park site).

The baby elephant was known as “Empress” at the zoo and died of old age in 1986. Zookeepers believe her to be the longest living captive elephant. (HIMB)

After Chris Holmes passed away in 1944 Coconut Island was used for an Army Rest & Recreation center until it was bought by five investors. Eventually Edwin Pauley became principal owner.

During World War II the army used the island as a rest camp for combat officers, building barracks and adding electrical, plumbing and a sewage disposal plant and improving the dock facilities. After the war, Holmes put the island up for sale and Edwin W Pauley, his brother Harold, SB Mosher, Poncet Davis and Allen Chase (wealthy oil men) purchased it for $250,000.

Pauley, the leader of the group, was a Los Angeles oilman, former treasurer of the National Democratic Party and Reparations Commissioner after the end of World War II.

Through a collaboration of Paul R Williams and A Quincy Jones, a concept plan was developed to use the island as a millionaire’s playground and exclusive resort – Coconut Island Club International.

Described by Ed Pauley as the ultimate “retreat for tired businessmen,” the drawing shows the four-story, 26-suite hostel and proposed amenities. Swimming pools, boathouses, tennis courts, bowling alley, and a lookout tower with a view of Kaneohe Bay and Oahu were all part of the master plan.

Forty-five minutes by speedboat from Honolulu, Coconut Island was the south sea location of the 1940s paradise for five wealthy American businessmen.

With year-round temperate weather, luxuriant plantings, natural wading pools and a world-class dock for expensive pleasure boats, the island was the perfect setting for a private resort where “members and their families can enjoy vacations under the most delightful conditions possible anywhere in the world.” (Los Angeles Times, February 16, 1947)

Their vision of the resort island as an exclusive private club, a “combination millionaire’s playground and crossroads hostel for high level international citizens,” owned and frequented by “substantial people – important people, if you will, notables, or call them what you like…” proved to be too restrictive to support the grand building project. Soon after the drawing was completed, the venture was abandoned.

Eventually, Edwin Pauley, bought out the interests of the other four and became the sole owner of the island. Here, his family spent their summers. Many famous people spent time on Coconut Island as a guest of Edwin Pauley. Some of these include: Harry Truman, Lyndon B Johnson, Red Skelton, Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan.

By the early 1950s Edwin Pauley was approached by the marine biologists at the University of Hawaii’s fledgling Marine Laboratory to use the island’s boat facilities as a base for their research vessel. Pauley responded, “We have a lot of other facilities here. Could you use anything else on the Island?” (Kamins, A History of the UH)

He leased the necessary land to the State “rent free.” The original main laboratory building burned down. Pauley donated the funds to replace it (it was completed in 1965.)

Following the death of Edwin Pauley in the early 1980s, the island was put up for sale. A Japanese real estate developer, Katsuhiro Kawaguchi, offered $8.5 million in cash and purchased the island.

Later, the Pauley Foundation and Trustees approved a grant of $7.615 million to build a marine laboratory to be named the Pauley-Pagen Laboratory. The Pauley family provided the UH Foundation with the $2 million necessary to buy the private portion of the island from Mr. Kawaguchi.

Instead of a millionaire’s playground, the island became a haven for world-class scientists at the Hawaiʻi Institute for Marine Biology (HIMB.) While some generally refer to the island as “Coconut Island,” (and it was featured in the opening scene of Gilligan’s Island, a 1960s television sitcom,) let us not forget its original name, Moku O Loʻe.

February 9, 2022 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

“Excuse my back”

Conversation at Waikīkī: “I see Ed Sawtelle’s back” “I didn’t know he had been away” “I said that I see Ed Sawtelle’s back’s the best known back in Honolulu. I want to see the face in front of the back for once.”

“Ed Sawtelle doesn’t need to say ‘Excuse my back’ when he sits at the console of the great Robert Morton Organ in the Waikīkī Theater: that tall swaying silhouette under the proscenium lights is his signature. (Blanding, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, March 27, 1954)

Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Sawtelle is a graduate of Harvard, where he majored in music, and a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music where he studied under two of the nation’s outstanding authorities, Professor Henry Dunham and Professor Wallace Goodrich.

For some time, Sawtelle was with the Boston Symphony, and for three years was accompanist with the Boston Opera House. He entered the theatrical field in New York, and has been organist and musical director in theaters in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, Atlanta, and Boston.

For many years, Sawtelle was associated with the Robert Morton Organ Company demonstrating and installing theatrical organs. In this particular field he was considered one at the greatest authorities in the country.

Sawtelle first came to Hawaiʻi in 1922 as organist at the opening of the Princess Theater. While here he was organist at the Hawaiʻi Theater, and went to Hilo to open the Palace Theater as organist and musical director. He returned to Honolulu to open the new Waikīkī Theater.

Leaving Hawaii in 1929, Sawtelle was featured on the radio in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York. A concert tour took him through the major centers of the nation.

Mrs. Sawtelle returned to Honolulu with her husband. She, too, is noted in the field of music, having appeared throughout the country on concert tour as Carmen Prentice, mezzo-soprano.

Not only did Sawtelle supervise the building of the Hammond organ for the Waikīkī Theater, but he brought it to Honolulu with him, and has supervised the installation at the new playhouse. (Honolulu Advertiser, August 20, 1936)

As organist for the Consolidated Amusement Company since 1922 with only a break of seven years from 1929 to 1936, Ed meant “moods, memories and music” to Honolulu audiences.

During the war years his audiences extended far beyond the limits of the movie palaces to little lonely atolls in the deep Pacific, to hospitals and observation posts in the Islands, and to ships at sea as his Star Dust Serenade went out over the airwaves to reach and sooth the homesick hearts of men and women in the service. (Blanding, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, March 27, 1954)

Starting in 1937, Sawtelle played the new organ at intermissions and on weekly live radio broadcasts heard throughout the Pacific during World War II. For a time, Sawtelle played two shows a day, seven days a week. He eventually retired in 1955, but a succession of organists carried on the tradition through 1997.

The 1,353-seat Waikīkī Theater opened with great fanfare on August 20, 1936. “This first-class theatre survived as a single-screen house its entire life.” (TheatresOfHawaii) Dickey created an environment as charming and artificial as the image on the screen. (Charlot)

In 1939, the Waikīkī Theatre was equipped with a Robert Morton theatre organ, which had originally been installed (with a twin console) in the Hawaiʻi Theatre in 1929. (Peterson)

“No theater in the world has a more picturesque setting than Waikīkī. Situated on the beach at Waikīkī, it stands on the site where once Hawaiʻi’s royalty played. The playhouse now becomes a glorious new addition to the beach made famous in song and story. It is the new center of activity of that district which long been the mecca of travelers from the world over.” (Honolulu Advertiser; Alder)

“Inside the theater, it felt as if you were in a tropical paradise. A full-colored rainbow arched over the curtains that hid the screen. Along the side walls, there were palm trees that reached from floor to ceiling and lush jungle plants, which appeared absolutely real to my child’s eyes.”

“Then, a distinguished gentleman named Ed Sawtelle would appear and sit down at a large organ console, located just below and in front of the stage, and begin a concert that filled the hall with rolling music that vibrated off the walls.” (Richard Kelley)

February 4, 2022 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Built in About an Hour

The Hawaiian Islands were formed as the Pacific Plate moved westward over a geologic hot spot. Oʻahu is dominated by two large shield volcanoes, Waiʻanae and Koʻolau that range in age from two to four-million years old.

The younger volcanic craters are all less than 500,000 years old. They formed after Oʻahu had moved well off the hot spot and the main shield volcanoes had gone dormant for at least two-million years.

Scientists say Lēʻahi (Diamond Head) (one of these later eruptions) is a tuff cone, formed by hydromagmatic activity. Tuff is a volcanic rock made up of a mixture of volcanic rock and mineral fragments. Wherever there are explosive volcanic eruptions you can expect to find tuff. (SOEST)

A hundred years ago, Hawaiʻi missionary Reverend Sereno Bishop noted Diamond Head was made in less than an 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)

Others noted, “the duration of eruption of Diamond Head was of the order of five hours. The eruption may have been intermittent with interruptions sufficient to extend the whole period of activity to as much as five days, but probably not more.” (Wentworth, Bishop Museum, 1926)

“Volcanic eruptions may be distinguished into two classes, the effusive and the explosive. In the former the molten rock is poured out and covers the mountain slopes with great floods.”

“If you look up at the sides of yonder ravines (on the Koʻolau mountains,) which the rainstorms of many hundred thousands of years have worn out of the original dome-shaped mountain, you will see the back edges of the ancient lava streams lying in layers.”

“The tuff cones are entirely different, and are produced by very brief and sudden explosive eruptions. The tuff was violently shot high aloft into the air in the form of superheated mud. This hot mud cooled and thickened by the expansion of its water and its partial escape as steam before reaching the ground.”

“It hardened and cemented as it fell, though still liquid enough to form in thin layers or laminations as we see it lying around us at the base of the hill. … The tuff-fountain escaping from its confinement, at once expanded and spread out like a vast tree.”

“Here at Diamond Head, which is one mile in diameter, the bulk of the mud spread out half a mile in all directions before ending its fall. Thus a very exact circular ring was piled up of one mile in diameter. There was, however, another influence, that of a violent easterly-wind which deflected the entire fountain westward”.

“The wind also acted with especial force upon the highest part of the fountain, flinging and piling it up on the western side of the crater in a lofty cone. A large part of that cone has been weathered away by the impact of rainstorms upon the soft rock; but it still stands in a peak some 200 feet higher than the main run.”

“The vent or point of issue of the tuff-fountain must have been at the lowest point of the interior, where lies the present pond of water.” (Bishop, Commercial Advertiser, July 15, 1901) (The same series of eruptions produced Punchbowl and Koko Head Crater.)

Somewhat more than half of the craters of southeast Oahu are arranged in linear groups, those dominated by the craters Tantalus, Diamond Head, and Koko Crater. In the Diamond Head group is the main Diamond Head vent, Kaimuki crater and Mauʻumae crater.

(A cinder cone is a volcanic cone built almost entirely of loose volcanic fragments called cinders or pumice that accumulate around and downwind from a vent.)

(Cinders are glassy and contain numerous gas bubbles “frozen” into place as magma exploded into the air and then cooled quickly.) (USGS)