Rearview: Iconic Honolulu sports bar was popular for 3 decades

Reader Edward Allen reminded me that Ala Moana Boulevard did not connect to Kalakaua Avenue until the early 1950s.

Before that, if you were driving on Ala Moana toward Waikiki, you had to turn left on Ena Road and take it mauka two blocks to Kalakaua.

Planners wanted to continue Ala Moana Boulevard to Kalakaua Avenue, but the problem was a restaurant was in the way.

Most readers will not even know its name, but it is significant in many ways. For three decades it was Hawaii’s sports bar. Joe DiMaggio hung out there with Honolulu Advertiser sports editor “Red” McQueen during World War II.

Co-owner Sam Uyehara helped baseball great Wally Yonamine become a ballplayer in Japan, and Gabby Pahinui met his wife there.

Its name was the Smile Cafe, and it has an interesting story. Let’s look into it this week.

The Smile Cafe was at 1953 Kalakaua Ave. That puts it right in the intersection of Ala Moana Boulevard, Niu Street and Kalakaua Avenue today. You’ve probably driven through the restaurant’s site many times without knowing it.

Planners wanted to extend Ala Moana Boulevard to Kalakaua Avenue as far back as 1939. Their preferred path was through the restaurant. They called it the “Smile Cafe Route.”

The Smile Cafe suggested the road take what they called the “Ideal Route,” through the Fort DeRussy parade grounds on a diagonal. This route would eventually connect to a University Avenue extension that would “speed traffic between the urban area and Manoa Valley.”

Back then the state planned a “makai arterial” along the waterfront, and Ala Moana Boulevard would be part of it.

The Smile Cafe opened in 1932. It was one of more than 350 Okinawan-owned restaurants in Hawaii, such as Columbia Inn, Zippy’s, Jolly Roger, Like Like Drive In, Highway Inn, Flamingo and KC Drive In.

An ad from that year offers lobster or chicken dinners “prepared by a capable chef who knows his cooking” for 75 cents.

Cafe owners Sam and Masaji Uyehara sponsored many local athletic teams, and their place became a rendezvous for sports fans.

‘Red’ McQueen

Longtime Honolulu Advertiser sports editor “Red” McQueen frequented the Smile Cafe. He was the center of attention wherever a crowd gathered at sports banquets and receptions. His Hoomalimali column was “Hawaii’s sports Bible” from 1928 to 1970.

He was on a first-name basis with DiMaggio, Johnny Mize, Stan Musial and many other major leaguers who found themselves in Hawaii during or soon after World War II.

McQueen often held court at the Smile Cafe with Uyehara into the wee hours of the morning. Every night there were more than a dozen athletes or fans listening to his stories or recounting their own personal exploits.

Wally Yonamine

Yonamine said Sam Uyehara knew a lot of people in Japan and set up the contacts that led to his being hired by the Yomiuri Giants in 1951. He was the first American to play professional baseball in Japan.

The Giants gave him a $2,000 bonus and paid him $185 a month plus rent. “I thought I’d struck it rich,” Yonamine said. He spent 11 years playing ball in Japan and finished with a remarkable .311 batting average.

Gabby Pahinui

Pahinui, a slack key guitar master, said one of his first gigs, at 17 in 1937, was playing at the Smile Cafe. Unfortunately, he liked to drink, and his liquor bill was often as big as his pay, Pahinui often joked.

Gabby met his wife, Emily, at the Smile Cafe. They later had four girls and six boys.

Eminent domain

The road through Fort DeRussy required congressional action, which was not forthcoming. So, in 1951, the Smile Cafe property was taken, and Ala Moana Boulevard was connected to Kalakaua Avenue.

Sam and Masaji Uyehara moved to 1415 Kapiolani Blvd., which was just mauka of where Ala Moana Center would be seven years later, and just Ewa of Keeaumoku Street.

The Smile Cafe had three large banquet rooms that could hold up to 160. The Quarterback Club met there for many years, and the Hono­lulu Adventurer’s Club was founded there in 1954. It was a men’s club, “devoted to hairy-chested macho adventure.”

Wayne Sumida said, “Back in the day, my dad was either a player, coach or manager for a senior AJA baseball team, the Kalihi Koyu Kai. In the late 1950s and early ’60s, my brothers and I were mascots and bat boys for the team.

“After every game we would have either lunch or dinner with the players. At least once or twice a season, we would eat at Smile Cafe.

“The entrance to the Smile Cafe faced Kapiolani with parking in front of the restaurant. I’ve been a lifetime carnivore, so I do remember eating the teriyaki steak and hamburger steak. Being a young child, those meals were always good.”

Baseball re-creations

Sixty years ago it was common for radio stations to “re-create” ballgames from news service reports, rather than broadcast actual faraway games, broadcaster Don Robbs told me.

Most listeners thought they were listening to real-time broadcasts, including those at the Smile Cafe.

Robbs, who began calling games on KGU radio in the early 1970s with the legendary sportscaster Les Keiter, said he was one of the best.

“Keiter could remember every major league score and story of that day. He had a photographic memory.”

At one time Keiter, Joe Rose and Don Klein were doing radio re-creations of major league games off fragmentary information transmitted from United Press International.

They used to wait until they had about five or six innings available before starting the broadcasts, Honolulu Advertiser reporter Dan McGuire wrote.

Sports enthusiast E. Walker “Chappie” Chapman figured out a way to take advantage of the delay.

Chapman was one of the men who began the Hula Bowl and was a co-founder of Royal Theatres.

“Chappie sneaked into the UPI office one afternoon and memorized the first three innings of a Yankees-Tigers game,” McGuire said.

“Then he sped over to the Smile Cafe and found an avid group waiting for the broadcast to begin. It was not yet common knowledge that the local radio men delayed their accounts of the major league action, and Chappie took full advantage of the situation by making bets on what each batter would do.

“Unfortunately, he got a little greedy and stretched his streak to such a length that suspicions arose. Someone dropped in who knew what was going on. So Chappie returned all bets, bought several rounds for the house, sang a few of his favorite songs and headed off into the night.”

Passing the torch

The Uyeharas sold the property in 1962 to make way for a 12-story office building next to the Ala Moana Building. They announced a temporary closure of the Smile Cafe and asked their customers to await their new location, but it never came.

However, the enterprising Uyehara brothers also owned the Ilima Drive Inn, Aiea Drive in, Keone’s Lounge, Friendly Service Station, Bethel Optical and Portraits Hawaii.

Columbia Inn manager Gene Kaneshiro said that after Smile Cafe closed his restaurant became the sports hangout for sportsmen and women until its closing in 2001.

Because the Columbia Inn was “at the Top of the Boulevard,” next to the newspaper building, housing both The Honolulu Advertiser and the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, both news services — the Associated Press and United Press International — and KGU radio station, which carried many radio sport broadcasts, reporters and sports fans hung out there.

The Smile Cafe captivated islanders for several decades but has now passed into our rearview mirror.

———

Have a question or suggestion? Contact Bob Sigall, author of the five “The Companies We Keep” books, at Sigall@Yahoo.com.