Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

“Reclamation” Projects – Early-1900s

“Whenever in the opinion of the Board of Health any tract or parcel of land situated in the District of Honolulu, Island of Oahu, shall be deleterious to the public health in consequence of being low …”

“… and at times covered or partly covered by water, or of being situated between high and low water mark, or of being improperly drained, or incapable by reasonable expenditure of effectual drainage or for other reason in an unsanitary or dangerous condition…”

“… it shall be the duty of the Board of Health to report such fact to the Superintendent of Public Works together with a brief recommendation of the operation deemed advisable to improve such land.”  (So stated Section 1025, Revised Laws of the Territory of Hawaiʻi, in 1906.)

That year, Board of Health President, LE Pinkham, stated in a report “for the Making of Honolulu as Beautiful and Unique in Character, as nature has Endowed it in Scenery, Climate and Location:”

“Nature, situation and human circumstance fix world-wide prominence and importance on certain strategic points in commerce, navigation and defense. Human events have moved slowly, but are becoming intensely accelerated, and it would seem Honolulu is now beginning to fulfil her destiny.”

Likewise, laws in place gave the Superintendent of Public Works the right to make Improvements to property which had been condemned as insanitary by the Board of Health.

Also in 1906, the US War Department acquired more than 70-acres in the Kālia portion of Waikīkī for the establishment of a military reservation to be called Fort DeRussy.  Back then, nearly 85% of present Waikīkī was in wetland.

The Army started filling in the fishponds and wetland that covered most of the Fort site – pumping fill from the ocean continuously for nearly a year in order to build up an area on which permanent structures could be built.

Thus, the Army began the transformation of Waikīkī from wetlands to solid ground and it served as a model that others followed.

Back then, much of the makai lands from Honolulu to and including Waikīkī were characterized with lowland marshes, wetlands, coral reef flats and farming of fishponds along with some limited wetland kalo (taro) taro agriculture (and later rice.)

However, they were also characterized as, “stretched useless, unsightly, offensive swamps, perpetually breeding mosquitoes and always a menace to public health and welfare”.

The Territory saw the opportunity to drain and fill the land that “was valueless” to be “available for the growth of the business district of the city” and attain “a valuation greatly in excess of the cost of the filling and draining.”

Likewise, in areas such as Kakaʻako there were practical issues to contend with.   “Calmly wading around in muddy water up to waist, on Tuesday after noon last, a Kakaako housekeeper was busying herself hanging out the family washing to dry. Her clothes basket she towed after her on a raft.”

“None of the neighbors marveled at the strange sight for when it was wash-day at their places they had to do the same. Tied up at the front gates of many of the houses in the block were rafts, upon which the more particular members of the families ferried themselves back and forth from house to street”.  (Hawaiian Gazette, April 3, 1908)

This set into motion a number of reclamation and sanitation projects in Kakaʻako, Honolulu, Waikīkī, Lāhaina, Hilo and others.

The first efforts were concentrated at Kakaʻako – it was then more generally referred to as “Kewalo.”  The Kewalo Reclamation District included the area bounded by South Street, King Street, Ward Avenue and Ala Moana Boulevard.

This area already had a practical demonstration of dredging and filling.  In 1907, the US Army Fort Armstrong was built on fill over Kaʻākaukukui reef to protect the adjoining Honolulu Harbor.

“The plan practically takes in all the land from King street to the sea, and it will be the first step in a general reclamation scheme for the low lying lands of the city.”  (Hawaiian Star, October 24, 1911)

Kapālama Reclamation Project included approximately 60-acres of land between King Street and the main line of Oʻahu Railway and Land Company.  In addition, approximately 11-acres of land were filled from dredge material between Piers 16 and 17.

In 1925, the “practically worthless swamp lands” were converted “into property selling as high as $30,000.00 per acre.”

During this project, Sand Island and Quarantine Island were joined to the Kalihi Kai peninsula. In 1925 and 1926, a channel was dug from the Kalihi Channel into Kapālama Basin creating a true island out of “Sand Island.”

The Waikīkī Reclamation District was identified as the approximate 800-acres from King and McCully Streets to Kapahulu Street, near Campbell Avenue down to Kapiʻolani Park and Kalākaua Avenue on the makai side.  (1921-1928)

The dredge material not only filled in the Waikīkī wetlands, it was also used to fill in the McKinley High School site.

The initial planning called for the extension of the Ala Wai Canal past its present terminus and excavate along Makee Island in Kapiʻolani Park, connecting the Canal with the ocean on the Lēʻahi side of the project.  However, funds ran short and this extension was contemplated “at some later date, when funds are made available”; however, that never happened.

Eleven-and-a-half acres of Lāhaina “swamp land” (near the National Guard Armory,) drainage canals and storm sewers were part of the Lāhaina Reclamation District.  (1916-1917) Mokuhinia Pond was filled with coral rubble dredged from Lāhaina Harbor.

By Executive Order of the Territory of Hawaiʻi in 1918, the newly-filled pond was turned over to the County of Maui for use as Maluʻuluʻolele Park.

In Hilo, the Waiolama Reclamation Project included the draining and filling of approximately 40-acres in the area between the Hilo Railway tract, Wailoa River, and Baker and Front Streets.  It included diversion of the Alenaio Stream.  (1914-1919)

Generally, the consensus was the reclamation projects were successful in addressing the health concerns; in addition, they made economic sense.

As an example, in Waikīkī, before reclamation assessed values for property were at about $500 per acre and the same property reclaimed at ten cents a foot, making a total cost of $4,350 per acre.  The selling price after reclamation, $6,500 to $7,000 per acre, showed the financial benefit of the reclamation efforts.

© 2023 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Manuia Lanai

Henry French Poor was the eldest son of Henry Francis Poor and Caroline Paakaiulaula Bush; he was born in the Islands, June 8, [1857].

“Henry F Poor was one of the most brilliant Hawaiians whose cradle ever rocked in these beautiful Islands.  … He possessed the generous spirit of his race and the keen intelligence of his New England’s forebears.”

“As secretary to Colonel Iaukea on the Kalakaua embassy to the rulers of the world he covered himself with honors and his bright letters were published in the local papers.” (The Independent, Nov 29, 1899)

Poor hosted Robert Louis Stevenson on his visit to the Islands.  On January 24, 1889, Stevenson arrived in Honolulu and spent the first six months of that year in the Hawaiian Islands (he later settled and lived in Samoa.)

On January 24, 1889, Stevenson arrived in Honolulu and spent the first six months of that year in the Hawaiian Islands (he later settled and lived in Samoa.)

“For the first few days the Stevenson party stayed with Henry Poor and his mother Mrs Caroline Bush, at 40 Queen Emma Street, Honolulu (24-27 January).”

“Then on 27 January 1889 they moved to Poor’s bungalow, Manuia Lanai [“a pavilion of the native pattern” (Brown)], at Waikiki, three miles east of Honolulu.  In early February Stevenson decided to send the Casco back to San Francisco and stay on to work in Hawaii.”

“As a result he rented the house next to Henry Poor’s. This too was a one-storey ‘rambling house or set of houses’ in a garden, centred on a lanai, ‘an open room or summer parlour, partly surrounded with venetian shutters, in part quite open, which is the living room’”.  (RLS Website)

“Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson has retired to ‘Manuia Lanai’ Mr. H. F. Poor’s sea-side place at Kapiolani Park, where he will probably

remain some time in quiet in order to complete some of the literary work he has undertaken.  We are informed privately however, that it is the intention of Mr. and Mrs. Stevenson after this week to be ‘at home’ on Wednesday afternoons from 2 to 5 pm.” (Daily Bulletin, January 28, 1889)

On Oʻahu, Stevenson was introduced to the King Kalākaua and others in the royal family by fellow Scotsman, Archibald Cleghorn.  Stevenson established a fast friendship with the royal family and spent a lot of time with his good friend King Kalākaua.

On February 3, 1889, there was a luau party at Manuia Lanai, where both Kalakaua and Liliuokalani were invited as special guests.  At the height of the party, Mrs Stevenson presented Kalākaua with a golden pearl from the Tuamotus.  (Ejiri) In giving the gift, Stevenson recited the following line of his sonnet (Daily Bulletin. Feb 4. 1889):

The Silver Ship, my king, – that was her name

In the bright islands whence your fathers came –

The Silver Ship, at rest from wind and tides,

Below your palace, in your harbour rides;

And the sea-farers sitting safe on the shore,

Like eager merchant, count their treasures o’er.

One gift they find, one strange and lovely thing,

Now doubly precious, since it pleased a king.

The right, my liege, is ancient as the Lyre,

For bards to give to kings what kings admire.

‘Tis mine to offer, for Appollo’s sake;

And since the gilt is fitting, yours to take.

To golden hands the golden pearl I bring:

The Ocean jewel to the Island King.

“The feast was purely Hawaiian there being no foreign dish upon the table. Aside from pig, fish, and fowls, roasted underground, were many strange edibles: pu-pu, opihi, two kinds of opae, koelepalau, and kulolo, taro and sweet potato poi, besides others, all beautifully arranged upon a bed of fern leaves.” (Daily Bulletin, Feb 4, 1889)

In the Islands, the renowned author found time for writing, completing The Master of Ballantrae and The Wrong Box and starting others during his short stay.

Stevenson visited Kalaupapa (shortly after Damien’s death) and later wrote of the good work of Father Damien (now Saint Damien.)  He also travelled to Kona on the Big Island (the setting for most of his short story “The Bottle Imp.”)

Henry French Poor died in Honolulu on November 28, 1899 and is buried at O‘ahu Cemetery.

© 2023 Ho‘okuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

“Honolulu’s Tropical Jewel”

This CW Dickey-designed structure was once referred to as “Honolulu’s Tropical Jewel.” (TheatresOfHawaii)

No one man has a more central place in Hawaiʻi’s architectural history than Charles William Dickey (1871-1942.) Born of a kamaʻāina family (his maternal grandfather was missionary Rev. William P Alexander,) he grew up on Maui, graduated from MIT in 1895 and practiced architecture in Honolulu from 1895 to 1904 and from 1920 until his death twenty-two years later.  (Neil)

“Previous Waikīkī buildings had divided into two types: the palatial – such as the Moana Hotel and the Castle residence – and the small and informal – such as the beach house of Kamehameha V. … Dickey’s 1936 design for the Waikīkī Theater is an extreme contrast.”

“His problem was to design a 1930s movie palace which would be appropriate to Hawaiʻi. He used the expected art deco with such flair and taste that the theater compares favorably with any of the type … He then made the theater appropriate.”  (Charlot)

Its initial design was based on a building at Chicago’s moderne 1933 and 1934 ‘A Century of Progress International Exposition,’ but in harmony with its island location.

The final tropical moderne design featured a large garden courtyard between the street and auditorium entrance, with lush plants surrounding a large fountain.

Inside, past fresco murals on the walls and ceiling, the atmospheric auditorium was flanked by lush artificial plants with the proscenium in the form of a rainbow, and tall artificial coconut palms on each side.  (TheatresOfHawaii)

No expense was spared in its construction and furnishings.  This was intended to be owner’s (Consolidated Amusement) deluxe flagship theater.

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)

“The auditorium is a revelation in theatrical architecture. Spacious, cool, it is acoustically correct in every detail. Perfect hearing and vision are available from every seat of the huge auditorium.”

“One of the most unique ideas in theatre ‘atmosphere’ has been incorporated in the decorations. The ceiling, done in soft blue, becomes a replica of the heavens through special lighting effects.”

“Stars twinkle, soft, fleecy clouds float about, the planets send off their soft light. The Waikīkī theatre is one of the few in the world in which this unusual lighting feature has been installed.”

“Through this lighting the great rainbow that spans the proscenium becomes a soft, misty, fairy arch rivaling in loveliness the great rainbows that arch Hawaiʻi’s skies.”  (Honolulu Advertiser, August 20, 1936; Del Valle)

“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.”

“About that time, with the house lights dimmed, someone would flip a switch and magical images of moving clouds would be projected onto the arched, midnight-blue ceiling, completing the illusion of having landed in the middle of a tropical jungle on a remote Pacific island.”

“Finally, the curtains would part and the show would start with a short cartoon and the Fox Movietone News. The ‘news’ events shown were about four weeks old by the time they got to Hawaiʻi, but that’s how we would find out what was happening in the world in those pre-television days.”  (Richard Kelley)

After successfully celebrating its first 30+years, and as the multiplex made movie-going more competitive, in 1969 the Waikīkī Theater name was relegated to Waikīkī #3 (following the construction of the Waikīkī #1 & #2 nearby.)

Renovations in the late-60s, and remodeling a decade or so later kept the theater on life support.   An expanded concession area replaced most of the forecourt, the interior decoration was removed and the auditorium draped.

“Imagine how much half an acre on Kalākaua Avenue is worth. By then, Consolidated was paying half a million dollars per year in property taxes – you have to sell a lot of popcorn to cover that.” (Lowell Angell, Theatre Historical Society of America; Hana Hou)

Waikīkī Theater (Waikīkī #3) remained a single screen theatre until it closed in late-November 2002; Waikīkī #1 & #2 closed at the same time.  They demolished all three in 2005 (the demolition started about 9-years ago, today.)

“Over the years, the movie business has changed dramatically. …  Multiplex theaters offer a variety of features almost any time of the day or night. Cartoons are now feature films. The news of the day is seen on one’s TV, laptop or cell phone.”

“The gracious theater usherettes have long since retired and have not been replaced. The guy at the door who takes your ticket is often dressed in a baggy T-shirt and jeans and barely looks up as he says, ’Your film will be shown in theater seven, second on the right.’”  (Richard Kelley)

© 2023 Hoʻokuleana LLC

 

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Waikīkī’s Construction Evolution

The present Waikīkī has a land area of approximately 500-acres; it once was a vast marshland whose boundaries encompassed more than 2,000-acres.  Consistent with the character of the watered wetland of ancient Waikīkī, where water from the upland valleys would gush forth from underground, the name Waikīkī, which means “water spurting from many sources.”

Three main valleys Makiki, Mānoa and Pālolo are mauka of Waikīkī and through them their respective streams (and springs in Mānoa (Punahou and Kānewai)) watered the marshland below.

Since Maʻilikūkahi founded Waikīkī as a Royal Center of Oʻahu in the 1400s, Waikīkī served as the site of the royal residence and center of governance until 1809 (when Kamehameha I moved the government to Honolulu Harbor.)

Subsequent Kings and Queens visited and stayed in royal beach cottages in Waikīkī.  Mid- and late-19th century Hawaiian royalty were prominent among the first of the new wave to permanently settle in Waikīkī.  It was a place to escape to, as well as a pleasant location to entertain.

In 1877, Kapiʻolani Park was dedicated; its initial intent, through a 30-year lease, was to make available a limited number of beachfront cottage sites and a race track as an attraction.

In 1896, the Honolulu Park Commission took over management of the park and began to operate the park land and “permanently set (it) aside as a free public park and recreation ground forever.”  (In 1913, the City and County of Honolulu took over the management and operation of the park.)

In the 1890s, Waikīkī drew the elite who constructed Victorian mansions.  Starting with James Campbell, Frank Hustace and WC Peacock, larger mansions began to be constructed in Waikīkī.

The later homes of William Irwin (1899) and James Campbell (“Kainalu,” in 1899) epitomized the extravagance of luxury living.  The wealthy discovered the ultimate destination of Waikīkī.

Starting on a small scale, Waikīkī had a number of small residential tracks.  In February 1895 a small subdivision (13-lots, each approximately 5,000-square feet in size) was developed makai of Waikīkī Road (Kalākaua Avenue) and mauka of the John ‘Ena Road intersection.

Then, in 1897, a subdivision map for the Kekio tract was recorded.  The Kekio Tract, shaped somewhat like a triangle, was bounded by Lili‘uokalani Avenue, Waikīkī Road (Kalākaua Avenue), Makee Road (Kapahulu Avenue) and the lands of Kāneloa (Thomas Jefferson Elementary School).

As time went on, the royal estates were sold and subdivided on the dry areas of Waikīkī.

In 1921 the former estates of James Campbell and George Beckley were offered to perspective buyers by developer Waterhouse Trust Company.  With this subdivision the last of the large, readily-developable landholdings in Waikīkī had been broken up.

Further residential development would have to wait for the drainage of the area by the Ala Wai Canal.  Then, they started “land reclamation” projects on the coastal wetlands.

Back then, nearly 85% of present Waikīkī was in wetland.  The Army began the transformation of Waikīkī from wetlands to solid ground at Fort DeRussy and it served as a model that others followed (1909.)

The Waikīkī wetlands were characterized as, “stretched useless, unsightly, offensive swamps, perpetually breeding mosquitoes and always a menace to public health and welfare”.

The Territory saw the opportunity to drain and fill the land that “was valueless” to be “available for the growth of the business district of the city” and attain “a valuation greatly in excess of the cost of the filling and draining.”

During the 1920s, the Waikīkī landscape would be transformed when the construction of the Ala Wai Drainage Canal, begun in 1921 and completed in 1928, resulted in the draining and filling in of the remaining ponds and irrigated fields of Waikīkī.  (By 1924, all of the streams were diverted into the canal and stopped flowing through Waikīkī.)

Walter Dillingham’s Hawaiian Dredging Company dredged the canal and sold the material he had dredged to create the canal to build up the newly created land.  (The canal is still routinely dredged.)

With construction of the Ala Wai Canal, 625-acres of wetland were drained and filled and runoff was diverted away from Waikīkī beach.

The completion of the Ala Wai Canal not only created the opportunity for the development of Waikīkī as Hawai‘i’s primary visitor destination, but also expanded the district’s potential for residential use.

Before reclamation, assessed values for property were at about $500-per acre and the same property was reclaimed at ten cents per square foot, making a total cost of $4,350-per acre.  The selling price after reclamation, $6,500 to $7,000-per acre, showed the financial benefit of the reclamation efforts.

In 1924, the first post-canal residential venture, the McCarthy Subdivision, owned by and named for the Territory’s Governor McCarthy, was makai of what would become Ala Wai Boulevard.  The property, roughly triangular in shape and widest on the Diamond Head side, was bisected by Lili‘uokalani, ‘Ōhua and Paoakalani Avenues.

The mid- and late-1920s saw more and more of Waikīkī being subdivided into residential lots until most of the area was gridded into residential plots.  Before and during this time of residential development, there were hotels.

Hawai‘i’s first accommodations for transients were established sometime after 1810, when Don Francisco de Paula Marin “opened his home and table to visitors on a commercial basis … Closely arranged around the Marin home were the grass houses of his workers and the ‘guest houses’ of the ship captains who boarded with him while their vessels were in port.”

By 1820, Anthony D Allen (a former slave from the continent) owned a dozen houses, “within the enclosure were his dwelling, eating and cooking houses, with many more for a numerous train of dependents. There was also a well, a garden containing principally squashes, and in one part, a sheepfold in which was one cow, several sheep, and three hundred goats.”  (Sybil Bingham Journal)

Reverend Charles Stewart notes of Allen’s place in his journal, “… it is a favourite resort of the more respectable of the seamen who visit Honoruru. …”

While these were part of the first hotel uses in the islands, as time went on, downtown Honolulu had the core of the hotel supply, and Waikīkī, two-miles away by foot over dirt roads, was not considered in the accommodation business.

But that changed.

Sans Souci Hotel, a Waikīkī beachfront resort that opened in 1884 and offered private cottages and bathing facilities, turned it into an internationally-known resort after it hosted writer Robert Louis Stevenson, who wrote about staying there for five weeks in 1893.

In the late-1890s, with additional steamships to Honolulu, the visitor arrivals to Oʻahu were increasing.  When Hawaiʻi became a US territory (June 14, 1900,) it was drawing cruise ship travelers to the islands; they needed a place to stay.

Hotels blossomed, including Waikīkī’s oldest surviving hotel, the Moana Hotel. Often called the “First Lady of Waikīkī,” the Moana Hotel has been a Hawaiʻi icon since its opening opened on March 11, 1901.

By 1918, Hawai‘i had 8,000 visitors annually, and by the 1920s Matson Navigation Company ships were bringing an increasing number of wealthy visitors.  This prompted a massive addition to the Moana.  In 1918, two floors were added along with concrete wings on each side, doubling the size of the hotel.

On February 1, 1927, the Royal Hawaiian (nicknamed The Pink Palace) was officially opened with the gala event of the decade.  Over 1,200-guests were invited for the celebration that started at 6:30 pm and lasted until 2 am.  Over the subsequent decades, promotional efforts grew and so did the number of visitors.

1955 saw the first of a new wave of hotel construction.  Three high-rise hotels opened in Waikīkī that year: the Princess Kaʻiulani, the Reef Hotel and the Waikīkī Biltmore (which itself became a victim of progress and was imploded to make room for what is now the Hyatt Regency Waikīkī.)

Another hotel – Henry Kaiser’s Hawaiian Village, which was not yet a high-rise, opened its first 70-rooms.

Between 1950 and 1974, domestic and international visitor numbers shot up to more than 2-million from less than 50,000.  Statehood and the arrival of jet-liner air travel brought unprecedented expansion and construction, in Waikīkī and across the Islands.

Construction’s dominant role in the state’s economy dates back to Statehood in 1959, which focused tremendous investment interest, as well as visitor interest, in Hawai‘i. Construction activity accelerated in the mid-1960s, and accounted for 8.2% of the State’s Gross State Product in 1970.

The driving force in this increase in construction was the post-statehood tourism boom and related investment activity.  The industry hit post-statehood peaks in 1960, 1970, 1975, 1980, and 1992. (DBEDT)

The image shows locations and dates of Waikīkī construction evolution (over Google Earth.)

© 2023 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Ala Wai Canal

A son of Mā’ilikūkahi (who ruled about the time Columbus crossed the Atlantic) was Kalona-nui, who in turn had a son called Kalamakua. Kalamakua is said to have been responsible for developing large taro fields in what was once a vast area of wet-taro cultivation on Oʻahu: the Waikiki-Kapahulu-Mōʻiliʻili-Mānoa area.

The early Hawaiian settlers gradually transformed the marsh above Waikīkī Beach into hundreds of taro fields, fish ponds and gardens.  For centuries, springs, taro lo‘i, rice paddies, fruit and vegetable patches, duck ponds and fishing areas were a valuable means of subsistence for native Hawaiians and others.

Formerly the home of Hawaiian royalty, including King Kamehameha, Waikīkī, meaning “spouting waters,” once covered a much broader area than it does today.

The ahupuaʻa, or ancient land division, of Waikīkī actually covered the area extending from Kou (the old name for Honolulu) to Maunalua (now referred to as Hawai’i Kai).

Waikīkī’s marshland, the boundaries of which changed seasonally, once covered about 2,000-acres (about four times the size of Waikīkī today) before the marshes were drained.

During the first decade of the 20th-century, the US War Department acquired more than 70-acres in the Kālia portion of Waikīkī for the establishment of a military reservation called Fort DeRussy.

They drained and filled the area, so they could build on it.  Thus, the Army began the transformation of Waikīkī from wetlands to solid ground.

In the early-1900s, Lucius Pinkham, then President of the Territorial Board of Health and later Governor, developed the idea of constructing a drainage canal to drain the wetlands, which he considered “unsanitary.”  This called for the construction of a canal to reclaim the marshland.

The Waikīkī Reclamation District was identified as the approximate 800-acres from King and McCully Streets to Kapahulu Street, near Campbell Avenue down to Kapiʻolani Park and Kalākaua Avenue on the makai side (1921-1928.)

The dredge material not only filled in the makai Waikīkī wetlands, it was also used to fill in the McKinley High School site.

During the 1920s, the Waikīkī landscape would be transformed when the construction of the Ala Wai Drainage Canal, begun in 1921 and completed in 1928, resulted in the draining and filling in of the remaining ponds and irrigated fields of Waikīkī.

The initial planning called for the extension of the Ala Wai Canal past its present terminus and excavate along Makee Island in Kapiʻolani Park, connecting the Canal with the ocean on the Lēʻahi side of the project.

However, funds ran short and this extension was contemplated “at some later date, when funds are made available”; however, that never occurred.

By 1924, the dredging of the Ala Wai Canal and filling of the wetlands stopped the flows of the Pi‘inaio, ‘Āpuakēhau and Kuekaunahi streams running from the Makiki, Mānoa, and Pālolo valleys to and through Waikīkī.

Walter F. Dillingham’s Hawaiian Dredging Company dredged the canal and sold the material he had dredged to create the canal to build up the newly created land.  The canal is still routinely dredged.

During the course of the Ala Wai Canal’s initial construction, the banana patches and ponds between the canal and the mauka side of Kalākaua Avenue were filled and the present grid of streets was laid out.  These newly created land tracts spurred a rush to development.

With construction of the Ala Wai Canal, 625-acres of wetland were drained and filled and runoff was diverted away from Waikīkī beach.  The completion of the Ala Wai Canal not only gave impetus to the development of Waikīkī as Hawai‘i’s primary visitor destination, but also expanded the district’s potential for residential use.

During the period 1913-1927, the demand for housing in Honolulu grew along with the city’s population.  Waikīkī helped satisfy this demand; the large kamaʻāina landholdings virtually disappeared and the area started to be subdivided.

Before reclamation, assessed values for property were at about $500-per acre and the same property was reclaimed at ten cents per square foot, making a total cost of $4,350-per acre.  The selling price after reclamation, $6,500 to $7,000-per acre, showed the financial benefit of the reclamation efforts.

From an economic point of view, without the Ala Wai Canal, Waikīkī may never have developed into the worldwide tourist attraction it is today.

In 1925, the City Planning Commission requested the citizens of Honolulu to submit suitable Hawaiian names for the renaming of the Waikīkī Drainage canal; twelve names were suggested.

The Commission felt that Ala Wai (waterway,) the name suggested by Jennie Wilson was the “most euphonic”.  (An engineer with the Planning Commission was quick to note that, “the fact that Mrs. Wilson is the mayor’s wife had nothing to do with the choice of the name.”)

In November 1965, a storm, classified as a 25-year event, overflowed the Ala Wai Canal banks and flooded Ala Wai Boulevard.

Ala Wai Canal and the historic walls lining the canal are owned by the State of Hawaiʻi. The promenades on the mauka side of the Ala Wai Canal are owned by the State, and by, Executive Ordered to the City and County of Honolulu, the promenades on the makai side are owned by the City.

The promenades on both sides of the Ala Wai Canal are maintained by the City Department of Parks and Recreation.  The Ala Wai Canal is listed in the National and State registers of historic places.

© 2023 Hoʻokuleana LLC