Watermen’s legacies live on

There are many lessons to be learned from being on the water, some harder than others, and many unwritten.

Perhaps the No. 1 rule of the latter? Catch a wave, because surfers don’t paddle in.

That was what Walter Guild remembers being told by his father Robert "Rab" when they were in the lineup at Tracks off Nanakuli.

"Here I was a young kid, freezing and cold, sitting out on the lineup and saying I want to go in, I want to go in," Guild said. "He said, ‘Well, then catch a wave, because surfers don’t paddle in.’

"My first water memory probably is my first time surfing, when I was about my son’s age (Ryder is 3), getting pushed out on a board by my dad at Tracks, and I was by myself. I went to turn the board around and a wave hit it and it hit me in the teeth. That is a memory that has stuck with me."

And so has the love of the ocean for the 58-year-old Guild, one of four who will be inducted into the Hawaii Waterman Hall of Fame as part of the Class of 2015. (Monday’s ceremony was postponed due to inclement weather and will be rescheduled for a later date.) The HOF’s sixth class brings the number of inductees to 35 representing Hawaii’s water royalty, among them Duke Kahanamoku, Eddie Aikau, Fred Hemmings, Rell Sunn, Prince Kuhio and Princess Ka’iulani.

For Guild, his selection is very personal, as it also honors his family tree that includes the Macfarlane, Flanders, Philpotts and Campbell branches. Some might call the branches ‘iako — spars that connect an outrigger canoe to its ama (float) — because so many are connected to water and water sports.

There’s Commodore Clarence W. Macfarlane, who helped found one of the oldest ongoing ocean races in the world, the Transpacific Yacht Race from California to Honolulu, in 1906. The Hawaii Commodores Association still awards the Macfarlane Trophy for its Yachtsperson of the Year.

There’s Guild’s late grandmother Muriel Macfarlane Flanders, known for her music and philanthropy. Her endowed scholarship was one of the first established for the Outrigger Duke Kahanamoku Foundation.

And there’s the Outrigger Canoe Club’s Walter J. Macfarlane Regatta, held on July 4 in Waikiki for the 73rd consecutive time this year. It’s one of the longest-running canoe races in Hawaii and is named for Guild’s great-uncle, a former club president who died of typhoid at age 36 in the 1940s.

"The honor of getting this award from the family perspective is huge," said Guild, whose sister Di was one of the first female coaches at Outrigger and an outstanding paddler as well. "We

lived under the shadow of the Walter Mac Fourth of July races and that’s a big deal. The ODKF is really something our family supported from the outset. My grandmother was a tremendous supporter in the days when it was a small, fledgling organization with noble goals but not a lot of resources.

"There are Walters on both sides of the family. Being the oldest boy of my generation I carry the name with pride."

Guild also carried on the family tradition of paddling excellence, one that included his father being part of Kahanamoku’s crews at Outrigger. Guild competed in 17 Molokai Hoe races, winning eight times, including 1990 in Kaoloa, the last koa canoe to cross the finish line first.

Now a sales representative for Heyer & Associates who is involved in the Park Lane Ala Moana condo development, Guild is better known for his OC-6 and OC-1 canoe-building innovations, as we

ll as creating, marketing and promoting various paddling events.

"I really do like where the sport has gone in my lifetime. It’s pretty amazing," said Guild, a former lineman for the Hawaii football team (1978-79). "One of the greatest things I’ve been able to do is help take the sport to Tonga, to Hamilton Island, go to the East Coast and the Liberty Challenge.