I wrote this story for HONOLULU Magazine’s May 2010 issue… you can view it here.

A Family’s Kuleana

Caring for the bones at the Royal Mausoleum is a responsibility passed down through generations.

I have some extra notes I’m going to post for this story in a future blog… He had some amazing stories to share and I feel very privileged to have met him.

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Princess Kaiulani’s parents were Princess Likelike, younger sister to King Kalakaua and Queen Liliuokalani, and Scotsman Archibald Cleghorn. In the Hawaiian Gazette of 1907, A.S. Cleghorn, then Governor of Oahu Island under the Hawaiian Monarchy, recalled old times.  Here are some quotes from the piece:

“I came to Honolulu in June, 1851,” he said, “from Auckland, by way of Tahiti, in the brig ‘Sisters,’ commanded by Captain Clark.” There were no conveniences for docking, of course, in that early day, and the reefs were dangerous, then as now, to those who did not know them…

“There was a fine market, even then, where the business house of Brewer & Co. now stands, at which all sorts of supplies could be bought very cheaply, fruits, vegetables, fowls and general produce… Grass houses constituted by far the greater part of the dwellings, and they were occupied by white people as well as natives…

“Times were very prosperous; there was plenty of money and it was freely spent. Honolulu was an important port, at the time, in the whaling trade. Between 200 and 500 vessels arrived here in the months of October and December… There were then no sugar plantations. The men were paid off here and spent their money freely.” Exports were “Flour and potatoes. Wheat and potatoes were both raised on Maui then, on lands now given over to cane culture, and there was a good mill…

“Honolulu was very bare of vegetation, there being little beside the cocoa palms, algaroba and tamarind trees. From Kawaiahao Church out to Punahou it was a treeless plain. Along Wilder avenue, as late as the time of Kamehameha V, horse racing was a common amusement.”

And, Cleghorn commented on the smallpox epidemic of 1853: “The dead cart went the rounds twice a day,” he said, “night and morning, and it was loaded. The dead were not put into coffins, but merely wrapped up and buried in a trench behind Kawaiahao Church.”

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"Prince Kuhio's casket is lowered into the Kalakaua crypt at Mauna'ala. His wife, Princess Elizabeth Kalanianaole, is center supported by former Mayor John C. Lane at her right, and the young Princess Kapiolani to her left."

BY Christine Hitt
April 8, 2010

Last month, on March 26, Kuhio Day was observed as a State holiday. Coincidentally, a few days before that, I ran across the February 1922 issue of Paradise of the Pacific in which writer, George Mellen, talked of Prince Kuhio’s death, funeral and fond memories.

“On the handsome gold and silver shield which marks the casket in which his body was laid to rest is inscribed the legend ‘Ke Alii Makaainana,’ which means ‘A Prince of the People.’ He was just that, and the love that his people bore him could not have been so deep and sincere had he been less, even though of the revered alii.”

Prince Jonah Kuhio Kalanianaole Piikoi was his full name, brother to Prince David Kawananakoa Piikoi, and descendents of the Kalakaua line and the kings of the Island of Kauai. “In course of time the brothers dropped the family name, each taking his middle name as his surname,” wrote Mellen. Though it is not clear to me why that was done.  In addition to being called ‘Kuhio’ and ‘Prince,’ he also had the nickname, ‘Cupid.’ It was a name given to him in grade school that was used for him by his oldest friends up until his death.

The fact that he was attached to the royal court during the overthrow of the monarchy, it is no wonder that he had been a Hawaiian Royalist. Years later, he accepted the new order and was elected as a delegate to the US Congress, where he served for 20 consecutive years. While in Congress, he found ways to help the Hawaiian people and perpetuating the culture, including being apart of setting up what is now the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act.  Writes Mellen, “The last great work of Prince Kalanianaole was for his people. He labored ceaselessly for more than a year on a scheme of rehabilitation through which it is hoped the Hawaiian may be returned to the land of his ancestors, to live as fisherman and farmer. Against formidable and aggresively active opposition the Prince managed to consummate his plans, and the ‘Rehabilitation Bill’ is now a law. Through its operation large tracts of land on the Island of Molokai will be allotted to those of Hawaiian blood who desire to return to husbandry. Each will receive a sizeable farm and a sum in cash sufficient to put it under cultivation and sustain a family until the crops begin to yield…”

The story of the funeral which Mellen goes on to tell about for pages describes the love that the people had for the Prince and the elaborate ceremonial funeral that was given to him–though, Prince Kuhio had requested a simple funeral for himself. As you can see from the pictures within this post, “not even the power of a wish expressed by their beloved Prince could influence the Hawaiian people against a state funeral.”

"Members of the Chiefs of Hawaii: Standing at the extreme right of the picture is Judge A.G.M Robertson, wearing a cape of peacock feathers. Looking over the judge's shoulder is William Ahia, and at his right is Duke Kahanamoku."

"Three hundred men of the poolas, uniformed in white with purple sashes, drew the catafalque from the palace to the royal mausoleum in Nuuanu Valley. These men are stevedores and their society is the oldest workmen's benevolent order in the Islands. The women in black holokus at the extreme left of the picture were at one time or another members of the Prince's household."

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I found this photo in the 1921 Paradise of the Pacific pages.  It is not dated or does it explain where it was taken, but I assume that it was taken within the same year.  Although many westerners were moving in during this time, it was still common to see Hawaiian communities living as they had centuries before. And many Hawaiians before and during this time are being moved to locations outside of Waikiki into rural areas. One of my favorite photos yet.

Photo: Courtesy Paradise of the Pacific

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While looking through the 1921 archives of Paradise of the Pacific, I ran across an article by George Mellen titled “Deserted, Nameless and Forgotten.”  It was about a deserted village that he had run across by foot between Makapuu and Waimanalo—there was no automobile access through this area at the time.

The picture shows ruined walls of dwellings and compounds and two parallel lines of the sole remaining section of the “ancient King’s Highway,” as it was called in Mellen’s time.  He also mentions finding a graveyard and heiau. Can you figure out where this is at? Answer: It’s the parcel of land where Sea Life Park now resides and has been since 1964.

Many of the old walls are overgrown with vines and bushes.

Mellen wrote a follow-up article to his 1921 story in 1922 after he found out more information about the land in an article titled “It Was Called Kaupo.” Below are some excerpts of what he learned of the land from a Hawaiian man named A. D. Toomey, a keeper of the “Diamond Head Light”:

“’That old village has a wonderful history,’ Toomey began. ‘I got it from a very old Hawaiian man—he’s dead now—who was born there more than a hundred years ago.  He was the last survivor of the once populous community which included Awawawawamalu on the Koko Head side, where the old man lived in one of the ruined huts on which he had patched a roof of drift wood and old tin as the original grass thatch yielded to the tooth of time and disappeared. He told me of the lively, but reasonably peaceful, times at Kaupo—which was the name of the village on the Waimanalo side which you mention—and at Awawawawamalu when he was a youngster; its history prior to that as it came to him from his elders.

“‘You may perhaps wonder why a village ever existed at Kaupo. There is no land there for taro, and no water except what may be caught from the infrequent rains. Yet Kaupo was a busy and important town because it was the port at which all canoes coming from Molokai, Maui, Lanai and Hawaii landed. They never came to Honolulu, but discharged their freight and passengers at Kaupo. Transportation from there to Honolulu was over land. It was for that purpose the wide, paved road was built, some portions of which remain in good repair today. You surmise it was built by Kamehameha. It was repaired by him, but built many years before his time—how long ago none may say.

Where this great cliff meets the sea marks the end of the automobile road to Kaupo.

Mellen goes on to explain the meaning of the name Kaupo by Toomey:

“’He [Toomey] couldn’t put it into one word, but he said it signified ‘the unknown.’ Kau, in this sense means a shelf or recess, and po means night. So Kaupo literally means the ‘Shelf of Night.’ It was by no means certain, he said, that when a party left Maui for Oahu—which was then known as Kakuhihiwa—he might ever return to the bosom of his family. Landing at Kaupo usually meant battle, principally with bands of robbers who laid in wait along the road to Honolulu, and no citizen of another island was foolish to attempt a landing on these shores without plenty of company.’”

And, Mellen continues in the article to tell Toomey’s story about the day Kamehameha’s army came to Oahu, in the words of the old Hawaiian man before him:

“..on one of those crystal clear mornings which bring Molokai so close that one can make out the white line of its surf, the lookout on Makapuu saw a great brown patch detach itself from the headlands [of Molokai] and float slowly towards Oahu… In due time, he found out. The patch was composed of canoes…. Maui was apparently moving to Oahu lock, stock and barrel. Racing down the trail from the station, the lookout reported that all the canoes in the world were approaching. The mayor of Kaupo thought the lookout was exaggerating, and told him so, but lost no time in appointing a reception committee in case its services were required…

According to our centenarian’s report, which came to him from one who officiated at the reception and lived to tell the tale because a stone from a Maui sling put him sufficiently out of business to be not included in the mopping up proceedings, the battle was neither long nor elaborate, albeit quite thorough. He came to, in time to view the hordes of the conqueror swarming over the trail toward Honolulu. But not till after the warriors of Oahu had been driven up the Nuuanu Valley and over the knife edge cliff of the Pali… This all happened 126 years ago.”

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I found this profile in the December 1920, Paradise of the Pacific (now HONOLULU Magazine) pages, so I thought I’d share it:

Here is the real Grand Old Man of the Hawaiian Islands, Kiaaina by name.

He was born on the island of Kauai a long, long time ago–so long ago indeed that he first saw the light two years before the earliest missionaries landed at Kailua, 200 miles away. Kiaaina grew up during the days when old Hawaii was passing from its unsettled state to the adoption of Christianity and rapid progress, and his life is contemporary with that of the successive monarchs who reigned over a united Hawaii, from the great Kamehameha the First down to the last loved occupant of the throne, Liliuokalani.

Look at the rugged deeply lined face of this man as he pulls contentedly at his beloved pipe! Think of the sights he has witnessed and the wondrous changes he has seen during his long lifetime! Do you realize that he is one hundred and two years of age and was a grown man when many of the most venerable figures that grace our islands were fretful babes, restlessly crying in their cradles? In his boyhood days the islands were still primitive, and though rapidly disappearing, the ancient beliefs in the gods and in the tabu system were still rife. Kiaaina is bent and stopped today and perhaps his dim eyes are looking into the future when he shall be once more with those many mighty ones who have passed onward into the shadows.

Sometimes he is in a reminiscent mood, and then from his lips will flow full many a wondrous tale of the days of the early monarchies–history commingled with legend–fiction and fact inextricably mingled together but cunningly word-painted by this old man. It is a rare privilege to talk with him for he is one of the few remaining links with the past and in him there is true greatness.

Kiaaina–the Paradise greets you with Aloha.

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The Kohala Center invites native Hawaiian scholars to apply for the Mellon-Hawaii Doctoral and Postdoctoral Fellowship 2010-11 Program, which provides selected scholars the opportunity to complete their dissertations or to publish original research.

Applications for the 2009-2010 fellowship program are being accepted through February 15. Visit kohalacenter.org for more information.

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Hawaii’s Most Endangered Places, including the 33 historic structures to be affected by the Honolulu rail transit project.

Contenders to the Throne. Honolulu Magazine takes a look at the different groups who are operating their own Hawaiian groups.

Unseen Treasures. A photo essay of hidden artifacts from Honolulu’s major museums.

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As an employee of HONOLULU Magazine, I have the ease of perusing its extensive archives, which dates back to 1888, under its old title, Paradise of the Pacific. Occasionally, I will flip through the pages and find some interesting articles, or pictures. And, now I can share such finds with you.

Queen's Beach

Everyone’s heard of Queen’s Beach in Waikiki. Above is a photo from the October, 1917 issue of Paradise of the Pacific, now HONOLULU Magazine as it originally looked, and below explains how it was used:

“This is a scene of a fair retreat on the beach at Waikiki, a few miles from the business sector of Honolulu. The spot shown is cut off from the world, on the land side, by a high board fence… The great gathering places of bathers lie some distance beyond the private pier to the left, while the Queen’s Place, as it is called, is reserved for such as Liliuokalani, like any private owner, chooses to permit.

There is seldom a crowd. When the queen tires of the less breezy city precinct, she sojourns at her beach resort. When she is not there, her friends and friends’ friends and acquaintances enjoy the priveleges of the beach retreat… When this picture was taken a bunch of youngsters were holding possession…”

I must note that Liliuokalani passed away in the latter part of the year that this was printed. She was living at Washington Place at the time.

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Stuart Ching being introduced.

BY Christine Hitt
January 26, 2010

Last week, I attended Experts at the Palace 2010 Lecture Series at the Old Archives building on the Iolani Palace Grounds. Every Thursday at noon, experts discuss various topics during the years of the Kalakaua Monarchy.

“Iolani Palace and the British Country House” was the topic of last week’s discussion with Stuart Ching, an Iolani Palace curator.  Here are my notes:

-There are more similarities to the British Country House than differences, in regards to changes of ownership, architecture, furnishings, preservation and authenticity.

-The first palace was built in 1846 and kept the same form/shape as the original shacks that were the first palaces on the grounds.

-The current palace that you see today was completed in 1882. The service quarters were in the basement, principal or reception rooms were on the first floor, family quarters on the second floor and storage space in the higher spaces.

-Many British houses had a family chapel on its grounds but Iolani palace did not. However, during the reign of Liliuokalani, chapel services were held in the basement.

-Like British country houses, furnishings changed with fashion. It was custom to accumulate furnishings from different periods.

-Portraits were displayed around the home to reflect the family’s genealogy, showing strength and power.

-There is a common preservation mantra: Keep things as they are found. Preserve rather than restore.  And, adaptation is always done… just as an air conditioning is added into a palace, or security system.

-Many British country homes had gardens.  Iolani Palace was once surrounded by gardens, which are not there now.

Another important note that Stuart Ching mentioned is about how both British country houses and Iolani Palace must think of ways to raise money for the restoration and preservation of the building.  British homes have done much more in this respect. They’ve been turned into bed and breakfasts, hotels, restaurants, multiple apartments and rented out for films.

Here are the upcoming lectures:
January 28 – Yongthanit Pimosathean – A compromise of East and West: King Rama V and the design of Chakkri Throne Hall in the Grand Palace, Bangkok
February 4 – Neil Dukas – The military forces of King Kalakaua’s Reign
February 11 – Niklaus Schweizer – Kalakaua’s Foreign Policy
February 18 – Nanette Napolean – The Royal Mausoleum

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