Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young 3 Comments

Seaside Hotel

What we think of today as the “Royal Hawaiian Hotel” actually is the second hotel of like name (the first one was in downtown Honolulu – the location of the State Art Museum and office) and, the site of the present Royal Hawaiian used to be the home of the Seaside Hotel.

But there was a link between the site and the hotel’s name. In the 1890s, the Seaside Hotel was a beach annex to the Royal Hawaiian Hotel located at Richards and Hotel streets.

There is now another “Seaside Hotel” in Waikīkī, but that’s different from the hotel we are discussing here. That other “Seaside” was built in 1970 and has been used by United Airlines as a perk for employees and company retirees.

This Seaside was really on the water and until the Royal Hawaiian took its place, it was one of the earliest hotels in Waikīkī.

It was situated on 10 coconut-covered oceanfront acres on one of the best parts of Waikīkī Beach (Kamehameha V (and others) had a residence here, on land known as Helumoa.)

It was the only Honolulu hotel where guests were accommodated in separate and distinct cottages (bungalows and tent houses.) Each was named for prominent people who stayed there (one was the Alice Roosevelt Longworth cottage – named for Teddy Roosevelt’s cigar-smoking daughter.)

It was marveled as “folksy, family-style living”) and it was a favorite of author, Jack London, who noted, “The older I grow, the oftener I come back, and the longer I stay.” (SagaOfSandwichIslands)

In 1907, the Seaside Hotel opened on the property, and was later acquired by Alexander Young’s Territorial Hotel Company, which operated the Alexander Young hotel in downtown Honolulu.

In 1924, the Seaside Hotel’s lease of the land at Helumoa was soon to expire and the land’s owners (Bishop Estate) put out a request for proposals to build a hotel.

Matson Navigation Co. had big plans to build luxury ocean liners to bring wealthy tourists to Hawaiʻi. But, they needed a hotel equally lavish at Waikīkī.

Soon Matson’s luxury ocean liner and its 650 wealthy passengers would be arriving in Honolulu every two weeks and the two largest hotels, the Alexander Hotel and the Moana, could not accommodate all of them. The availability of the Bishop Estate land began putting wheels into motion.

In March 1925, William Roth, Manager of Matson Navigation Company, his wife Lurline (whose maiden name was Matson) and Mrs. William Matson, the widow of the founder of Matson Navigation Company, arrived in Honolulu for a three-week stay so that Roth could attend the annual Matson conference.

Famous New York-based architect Charles V. Wetmore also arrived in Honolulu at the invitation of Matson Navigation Company leadership.

Wetmore advised Matson Navigation that “Honolulu is one of the wonder spots of the world, and it should have a hotel that is as much of an attraction as the city itself.”

Castle & Cooke, Matson Navigation and the Territorial Hotel Company successfully proposed a plan to build a luxury hotel, with 400 rooms, at a cost of $2 million on the parcel of Waikīkī beach to be leased from the Bishop Estate.

The ground-breaking ceremony took place on July 26, 1925, before a building permit was issued or a contract was signed with the building contractor, Ralph Wooley. By the time the contract was executed on September 5, 1925, some three hundred men were already at work.

The building permit still was not signed by August, and the City withheld granting it unless the building codes were first revised (high rises were not, then, permitted.) The planning commission did not want to revise the building code to allow high rises on Waikīkī beach.

The City and County Board of Supervisors disregarded their concerns and allowed the increase in heights. This would forever change the landscape of Waikīkī, as the decision also allowed much taller highrises to be built in the area.

The opening of the Waikīkī Royal Hawaiian on February 1, 1927, ushered in a new era of luxurious resort travel to Hawai‘i. The six-story, 400-room structure was fashioned in a Spanish-Moorish style, popular during the period and influenced by screen star Rudolph Valentino.

The Honolulu Star-Bulletin described the newly opened Royal Hawaiian as “the first resort hostelry in America.”

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Seaside-Hotel-(SagaOfSandwichIslands)-1916
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Guests walking toward Seaside office and entry-(SagaOfSandwichIslands)-1913
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Helumoa_Summer House of King Kamehameha V, Waikiki-(eBay)-1873
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Coconut Grove during the hotel's construction (HHF) (1925)
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Dancers are from the Dan Wallace Hula Studio in the Royal Hawaiian Hotel-(HSA)-1950s-PP-33-5-023
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Waikiki scene arial view of moana & RH

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Robert Louis Stevenson

Starting in 1888, Robert Lewis Stevenson (born in Edinburgh Scotland on November 13th 1850,) the famous author of popular works such as ‘Treasure Island’ and ‘Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde,’ began a tour of the South Pacific, visiting Tahiti and the Marquesas.

For nearly ten years his health had been declining; he was told by his doctor to travel there because the climate was good for his bad health.

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

Here, 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.”)

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.

In 1889, Stevenson wrote a poem, “To Kalakaua:”

“The Silver Ship, my King – that was her name
In the bright islands whence your fathers came –
The Silver Ship, at rest from winds and tides,
Below your palace in your harbour rides:
And the seafarers, sitting safe on shore,
Like eager merchants 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 Apollo’s sake;
And since the gift is fitting, yours to take.
To golden hands the golden pearl I bring:
The ocean jewel to the island king.”

Stevenson also befriended Princess Kaʻiulani (daughter of Princess Likelike and Archibald Cleghorn – and the King’s niece) and was a frequent guest at her home, ʻĀinahau, in Waikīkī.

It was Stevenson who first referred to Kaʻiulani as “the island rose” in a poem he wrote for her and inscribed in her autograph book – Stevenson’s poem, “To Princess Kaiulani:”

“Forth from her land to mine she goes,
The Island maid, the Island rose;
Light of heart and bright of face:
The daughter of a double race.

Her islands here, in Southern sun,
Shall mourn their Kaiulani gone,
And I, in her dear banyan shade,
Look vainly for my little maid.

But our Scots islands far away
Shall glitter with unwonted day,
And cast for once their tempests by
To smile in Kaiulani’s eye.”

When Kaʻiulani left for boarding school in England at the age of 13, Stevenson had several of his books bound specially for her (she was away from the Islands for nine years.)

Later in 1889, he and his extended family traveled to Samoa where they decided to build a house and settle.  He took the native name Tusitala (Samoan for “Teller of Tales”, i.e. a storyteller).

He returned to Hawaiʻi in 1893 for a short stay at the San Souci Hotel in Waikīkī (a beachfront resort that opened in 1884 offering private cottages.)  It gained fame, after he wrote about staying there for five weeks.

Stevenson’s remarks in the guest book note: “If anyone desires such old-fashioned things as lovely scenery, quiet, pure air, clean sea water, good food, and heavenly sunsets hung out before their eyes over the Pacific and the distant hills of Waianae, I recommend him cordially to the Sans Souci.”

With turmoil at the time in the Hawaiian Islands and health concerns on his part, Stevenson returned to Samoa where on December 3, 1894, he passed away at the age of 44.

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Kāhi Hāli‘a Aloha

Unlike western burials in caskets (where the body is stretched out in the prone position,) native Hawaiians were typically buried wrapped in tapa in the flex position (the legs were drawn taut until the knees touched the chest (Malo.))

In addition to actual burials in and under the earth or land, Hawaiians also used burial caves, disposal pits and caverns to hide the bones of the dead (Kamakau.) The funerals take place in the night, to avoid observation and to maintain secrecy.

There are several special secret burial hiding places for the high chiefs, including the caves in ‘Iao Valley, Maui and Pali Kapu O Keōua, Kealakekua Bay, Hawai‘i.

Many ancient Hawaiians were buried in the beach and sand dunes, in unmarked graves.

Waikīkī has a centuries-old Hawaiian heritage, inhabited by Native Hawaiians for some 2,000-years. Waikīkī was the preferred playground and royal residence of generations of ancestors. (Kāhi Hāli‘a Aloha plaque)

As a result of ongoing excavation and construction in modern Waikīkī, the bones of long-deceased Hawaiians come to light. Lineal descendants worked with governmental agencies to find ways to dignify and honor the final remains of those who preceded them. (Kāhi Hāli‘a Aloha plaque)

A Memorial was proposed and designed by the lineal descendants to accommodate Hawaiian ancestral remains – Kāhi Hāli‘a Aloha (“The Place of Loving Remembrance.”)

Keawe Keohokālole designed the memorial; his lineage includes High Chiefess Ane Keohokālole, biological mother of King Kalākaua and Queen Lili‘uokalani.

The Memorial is the first of its kind to offer permanent and dignified protection to generations of Hawaiian ancestral remains unearthed and/or repatriated from museum collections across the nation.

The burial monument, situated at the corner of Kalakaua and Kapahulu Avenues (fronting the Honolulu Zoo,) now contains about 200 iwi kūpuna (skeletal ancestral remains.) Currently, the remains fill only the west-facing side of the eight-sided memorial.

Approximately 50 sets of skeletal remains, said to be more than 100 years old, were discovered during a Board of Water Supply project along Kalākaua Avenue. In addition, there are 150 skeletal remains that were unearthed during earlier Waikīkī projects (these had been stored for years at Bishop Museum.)

At the time of the blessing, A. Van Horn Diamond, speaking on behalf of the families, said, “This is the affirmation of what happens when families assume their responsibility and the community provides support for it to take place.”

When I was Deputy Managing Director for Hawai‘i County, I remember Lily Kong, a respected Kona kūpuna, had recommended a similar type of arrangement (a burial memorial for the relocation of inadvertent burials) in each of Kona’s ahupua‘a.

(According to State law, inadvertently discovered (finding a burial that was not previously known,) burial remains are to be protected in place (if not immediately threatened with damage from natural or man-made causes.) Final disposition of remains is determined in consultation with DLNR-SHPD and native Hawaiian descendants of the families.)

State rules (HAR §13-300-2) define lineal and cultural descendants:
“Lineal descendant” means with respect to Native Hawaiian skeletal remains, a claimant who has established to the satisfaction of the council, direct or collateral genealogical connections to certain Native Hawaiian skeletal remains …”

“… or with respect to non Native Hawaiian skeletal remains, a claimant who has established to the satisfaction of the department, direct or collateral genealogical connections to certain non Native Hawaiian skeletal remains.

“Cultural descendant” means with respect to non Native Hawaiian skeletal remains, a claimant recognized by the department as being the same ethnicity, or with respect to Native Hawaiian skeletal remains, a claimant recognized by the council after establishing genealogical connections to Native Hawaiian ancestors who once resided or are buried or both, in the same ahupua`a or district in which certain Native Hawaiian skeletal remains are located or originated from.

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Papaʻenaʻena Heiau

Hawaiʻi’s iconic landmark, Lēʻahi (Diamond Head) overlooks Waikīkī. Papaʻenaʻena heiau once stood on its western slope, overlooking the Waikīkī coastline. It was referred to by some early writers as “Lēʻahi heiau.”

“It consisted of a mana (supernatural or divine power) house approximately 50 feet long; an oven house (hale umu); a drum house; a waiea or spiritual house; an anuʻu or tower; a lele (altar) and twelve large images. The heiau was bordered by a rectangular wooden fence approximately six to eight feet tall with an eight-foot wide base, which narrowed to three feet at its apex.” (Ireland)

It is likely that the heiau was built in 1783 by Kahekili, the mōʻī (ruler) of Maui, as part of a victory celebration following Kahekili conquest of Oʻahu.

Surfing was one of the principal attractions for Waikīkī to both the chiefs and commoners who resided there. “Here at the ‘surfing heiau’ of Papaʻenaʻena, a terraced structure … is where surfers came to offer their sacrifices in order to obtain mana and knowledge of the surf.” (Kanahele)

When surf was ‘up,’ Kahuna at Papaʻenaʻena heiau reportedly flew a kite at the heiau as a signal to the people of the wave conditions. (Kanahele)

An ancient chant tells of Papaʻenaʻena and surfing:

There at Kalahuewehe is the big surf created by Papaʻenaʻena.
Arise, of ye surf of Kalahuewehe, arise! …
The kahuna of Papaʻenaʻena flies his moon kite
To proclaim the suitability of the sea for surfing.
The eager lookout on yonder highland
Anxiously scans the skies for this signal,
And relays the good news by runners;
Farmers, woodsmen, bird catchers all,
Leave their tasks and fetching their surf boards
Hurry to the beach at Waikiki.
Soon the sea is filled with natives
Sporting in the billowy surf;
Trick riding, zigging and zagging, amidst the foam,
Shouting words of defiance against the angry surf
To topple the rider if it can …. (Kanahele)

Papaʻenaʻena heiau was also a luakini heiau; human sacrifices were made at the terraced stone structure. The heiau was probably used for sacrificial or sacred purposes for 35 years.

Some historians believe that when Kamehameha I conquered ‘Oahu in 1795 at the Battle of Nuʻuanu, Kamehameha I used Papaʻenaʻena heiau to offer a sacrifice of his slain rival, Kalanikūpule, to his war god Kūkaʻilimoku.

After Kamehameha’s troops were overcome with dysentery in 1804, that stopped his attempt to conquer Kauaʻi, Kamehameha repaired Papaʻenaʻena heiau and offered in sacrifice 400 pigs, numerous coconuts and bananas and three kapu violators.

The heiau was also used for one (possibly its last) sacrifice. Kanihonui was killed and placed on the Papaʻenaʻena alter.

Kamehameha learned that Queen Kaʻahumanu had an affair with Kanihonui. He was a handsome 19-year old. Reportedly, Kaʻahumanu had seduced the boy while she was intoxicated; in addition, the boy was the son of Kamehameha’s half-sister – and, Kamehameha and Kaʻahumanu raised him.

George W. Bates, in 1854, describes a heiau at the foot of Lēʻahi (believed to be Papaʻenaʻena) as: “Just beyond Waikiki stand the remains of an ancient heiau, or pagan temple. It is a huge structure, nearly quadrangular, and is composed merely of a heavy wall of loose lava stones, resembling the sort of inclosure commonly called a ‘cattlepen.’”

“This heiau was placed at the very foot of Diamond crater, and can be seen at some distance from the sea. Its dimensions externally are 130 by 70 feet. The walls I found to be from six to eight feet high, eight feet thick at the base, and four at the top.”

“On climbing the broken wall near the ocean, and by carefully looking over the interior, I discovered the remains of three altars located at the western extremity, and closely resembling parallelograms. I searched for the remains of human victims once immolated on these altars, but found none; for they had returned to their primitive dust, or been carried away by curious visitors.”

Later (at about 1856,) Queen Emma ordered her workers to take rocks from Papaʻenaʻena heiau to build a stone wall around her property at Waikīkī.

During the Māhele the site was transferred to the future King Lunalilo. After the king’s death, this site was sold to James Campbell, in 1883. Later, Walter F. Dillingham bought the land from Campbell.

With the help of famed Chicago architect, David Adler, the Dillinghams built a home similar to the Villa La Pietra they admired in Tuscany while on their honeymoon – they named their new home La Pietra – meaning The Gem or The Rock.

After Walter’s death, La Pietra was sold to Hawaii School for Girls, who relocated their school there (1969.) The former Papaʻenaʻena heiau site is now the home for La Pietra – Hawaii School for Girls, an independent, college preparatory school for girls, grades 6 through 12.

When Papaʻenaʻena heiau stood on Diamond Head, it overlooked what is today First Break, the beginning of Kalahuewehe, a surfing spot famous for hundreds of years.

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Waikiki-Kaneloa-(Before Kapiolani_Park)-Lyons-Reg0306 (1876) (portion)-noting_Papaenaena

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Fort DeRussy

The Artillery District of Honolulu was established in 1909 and consisted of Forts Ruger, DeRussy, Kamehameha and Armstrong.  The District was renamed Headquarters Coast Defenses of Oahu sometime between 1911 – 1913.

Battery Randolph within Fort DeRussy was built between 1909 and 1911 and gained international, national, state and local significance at a time when British, French, Russian, German and even the Japanese had ships in the Pacific, and were expressing interest in Hawai‘i.

The Army mission in Hawai‘i was defined as “the defense of Pearl Harbor Naval Base against damage from naval or aerial bombardment or by enemy sympathizers and attack by enemy expeditionary force or forces, supported or unsupported by an enemy fleet or fleets.”

The Army fortified O‘ahu’s harbors with a system of gun emplacements employing mortars and long-range rifled guns.  Although its guns are gone, the old batteries are still there.

Batteries at Fort DeRussy, including Battery Randolph and Battery Dudley, were responsible for the defense of Honolulu Harbor.

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 (most of the land west of the present Lewers Street or mauka of Kalākaua) were in wetland agriculture or aquaculture.

Fort DeRussy has evolved immensely when it was sold as a 72-acre parcel of “undesirable” land, to the building of Battery Randolph at the east end of Fort DeRussy in 1911, to the significant roles that Fort DeRussy played during WWII.

The Army started filling in the fishponds which covered most of the Fort – 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.

Battery Randolph at Fort DeRussy demonstrates the shift in emphasis from fortification structures to the weapons contained therein. In contrast to the stark, vertical walls of older forts, the new works of reinforced concrete were designed to blend, so far as possible, into the surrounding landscape.

The low profile, massive emplacements all possess concrete frontal walls as much as twenty feet thick behind 30 or more additional feet of earth.  The batteries were (and still are) all but invisible and invulnerable from the seaward direction. The permanency of construction is also evident by their present condition.

In its heyday, Battery Randolph had two 14-inch guns and Battery Dudley had two six-inch guns mounted on disappearing carriages. When they were installed, they were the largest guns in the entire Pacific from California to the Philippines.

The disappearing carriages allowed the guns to remain hidden from sight of approaching battleships by solid concrete walls called parapets, capable of withstanding a direct hit from a 2,000-pound artillery shell.

To get the gun into the firing position, the artillery crew tripped a lever attached to a 50-ton weight. As the weight fell, it lifted the gun tube into battery (the firing position), and the gun was then ready to fire again.

A crew of roughly 14 artillerymen would load a shell in the breech, and then load 340-pounds of gun powder behind it.

After lobbing the 1,556-pound shells up to 14 miles out to sea, the recoil automatically pushed the gun carriage back down behind its concrete parapet; the gun was then reloaded.

A well-trained crew could fire a round downrange every 30-seconds.  As one round was impacting its mark, the second round was already half way in flight to hit the target again.

Protecting Soldiers inside the battery, the overhead concrete was up to 12-feet thick.  On the ocean side of the battery, concrete was the equivalent of 30-feet thick.

These 1890s-era weapons were very accurate.  Observation points on top of Diamond Head and Tantalus were used to triangulate the distance, direction and speed of potential adversaries via telephone to the plotting room at Battery Randolph.

The guns were capable of hitting a 20-foot target from six miles away – the equivalent of hitting a bus in Kāneʻohe (or a fly on a wall 60-feet away with a bullet the size of a pinhead, all without the aid of a computer.)

With the end of World War II came the realization that the fort was no longer capable of meeting the needs of the US military in Hawaiʻi. The giant guns were cut up and sold for scrap, having never fired a shot in anger or defense.

Battery Dudley was razed to the ground; Battery Randolph was eventually abandoned and briefly became a warehouse storage facility.  In 1976, the Army designated Battery Randolph home of the US Army Museum of Hawaiʻi.

Today, Fort DeRussy Armed Forces Recreation Center is the home of the Hale Koa Hotel (House of the Warrior,) an 817-room, world–class resort hotel and continued favorite R&R destination for our country’s military personnel and the US Army Museum of Hawaiʻi.

The museum houses a gift store that sells military memorabilia, books, clothing, military unit insignia and World War era music.

The museum is funded by the Department of Defense and admission is free of charge and open to the public, Tuesday through Saturday, 9 am-5 pm, and closed on some federal holidays, but open on military holidays.

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Target Practice by the 10th Company, CAC, with the 14-inch guns of Battery Randolph in July 1915-(CoastDefenseJournal)
Target Practice at Battery Dudley-(CoastDefenseJournal)-1938
'South Gun' at Ft. DeRussy -originally from USS New Hampshire(CharlesBugajsky)
Saratoga and Lexington off Diamond Head
One of Battery Randolph’s 14-inch M1907M1 guns on its disappearing carriage-(CoastDefenseJournal)
Loading practice at Battery Randolph, ca. 1920-(CoastDefenseJournal)
Ft DeRussy Tents ca. 1913
From 1908 until 1917 most of the troops at Fort DeRussy lived under canvas-(CoastDefenseJournal)
DeRussy Beach Waikiki-(vic&becky)-1953
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Battery A, 16th CA, conducts a target practice with a mobile 155 mm GPF gun at DeRussy Beach-(CoastDefenseJournal)-late-1930s
Fort DeRussy is nearly complete - area north (right) is still generally undeveloped-Battery Dudley in lower center-CoastDefenseJourna)-1919
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'North Gun' at Ft. DeRussy-originally from USS New Hampshire (CharlesBugajsky)
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