Every year, I write about the anniversaries of important Hawaii organizations. In August I explored the 190th anniversary of Liliuokalani Church in Haleiwa, the 100th anniversary of Misaki’s Grocery on Molokai and the 95th anniversary of St. Francis Hospital in Liliha. Here are some more significant anniversaries.
125th anniversary: Bank of Hawaii
The Bank of Hawaii was founded by disgruntled customers of Hawaii’s oldest bank.
A downturn in the sugar industry in 1889 left Castle & Cooke in “grave financial difficulties.” A check of theirs for $54 bounced. Bishop & Co., the forerunner to First Hawaiian Bank, denied them a loan. It ticked them off.
The recession in the sugar industry ended, and Castle & Cooke decided it was time to teach Bishop & Co. a lesson.
Charles M. Cooke and other company officers withdrew all their money from Bishop & Co. in gold coins in 1897. They loaded them into a wheelbarrow and marched up and down the streets of downtown Honolulu before stopping three blocks away and founding Bank of Hawaii.
Peter Cushman Jones was the bank’s first president. Joseph Ballard Atherton was vice president; his son, Edwin Jones, was cashier; and Clarence H. Cooke was secretary and receiving teller. With the exception of P.C. Jones, the bank’s officers were in their early 20s, and the new bank soon became known as “The Kindergarten Bank.”
100th anniversary: Wheeler Army Airfield
Wheeler Field was founded 100 years ago in 1922, adjacent to Schofield Barracks.
One of its founders, Gen. Ralph Wooten, explained why it was built there, when it was, and who it was named for.
“While it had been under consideration for some time,” Wooten said, “it was an international treaty between the United States and Japan following World War I that actually precipitated the founding of Wheeler.
“By the Washington Naval Treaty, the United States agreed not to develop any military installations west of the 180th meridian (international date line).”
“We had a large quantity of air force equipment on the way to the Philippines,” Wooten recounted.
“Since it couldn’t go there, it had to be unloaded at Hawaii, and something had to be done with it! It was decided to start the Schofield area air base without further delay.
“It was named Wheeler Field on November 11, 1922 in honor of Major Sheldon H. Wheeler, former commander of Luke Field on Ford Island, who died in a plane crash in 1921.”
70th anniversary: Leonard’s Bakery
Leonard’s Bakery was founded 70 years ago in 1952. Its specialty is malassadas, so I dived into a box of them.
The first time the word “malassadas,” spelled with a double “s,” appeared in U.S. newspapers was in 1922, 100 years ago on Maui, I discovered. The Catholic Ladies Aid Society sold them at a street fair to raise money. Malassadas also showed up at Portuguese festivals on Oahu in the 1930s.
Leonard’s Bakery may be the first to make and sell them commercially. It opened for business five blocks makai of its current location.
Seven months after it opened, it sold malassadas for the first time on Shrove Tuesday, Feb. 17, 1953.
“Christians are used to fasting during Lent, which starts on Ash Wednesday,” said Margaret Rego, whose husband, Leonard, started the bakery.
“The day before Ash Wednesday is Shrove Tuesday, when everybody celebrates Mardi Gras. In England they make pancakes on Shrove Tuesday. The Portuguese make malassadas. It’s the last day to feast before Lent,” she told The Honolulu Advertiser’s Bob Krauss in 1988.
“When we started the bakery, Leonard’s sister-in-law said, ‘Why don’t you try selling malassadas on Shrove Tuesday?’ She had a good recipe. So we did.
“But the recipe was greasy. We kept changing it until we got nice, fluffy malassadas. Where the malassada originated, I’m not sure. We’ve had people from Portugal in the bakery. They’ve never heard of malassadas.”
Ernest Morgado, vice consul for Portugal in Hawaii, said malassadas come from the Azores, not Portugal. “One day somebody was making a cake, my mother told me. But something went wrong and the cake fell flat. Rather than throw away the dough, the cook fried it.
“That’s how the malassada started. I believe this because the word means ‘badly cooked.’
“I travel back to my father’s village in the Azores every now and then. Last year we ordered malassadas in a hotel. They’re not like here at all; very heavy and greasy and poorly cooked.”
Edna Ryan at the Hawaii Council on Portuguese Heritage says Leonard’s Bakery is responsible for popularizing malassadas. “But they can’t spell it,” she complained. “In 1979 a delegation of Portuguese went to Leonard and explained that his sign is wrong.”
“Malassadas” is correct, I found out. Leonard’s sign is missing an “s.”
“Leonard told us, ‘I can’t afford to put up a new sign.’ That’s why everybody spells it wrong.”
By the way, if the name Ernest Morgado sounds familiar, he was the Huli Huli chicken king. He founded Pacific Poultry in 1958.
65th Anniversary: Elvis Presley’s first Hawaii concert
Elvis Presley came to Hawaii for the first time in November 1957 and left 14,900 fans at Honolulu Stadium all shook up.
Some islanders weren’t pleased with the hypnotic effect his hips seemed to have on teenage girls. They had suspicious minds. Maybe they thought he was the devil in disguise.
Brenda Matsuda wrote a letter to the editor of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin asking for tolerance. She said there were two groups in Hawaii: the anti-Presleyites and the pro-Presleyites.
Matsuda encouraged islanders to give Presley a warm aloha greeting. Thousands did as his ship docked at Aloha Tower.
Elvis told Wayne Harada he enjoyed Hawaii. “Ah love it. Ah never realized that ah’d be in Hawaii. If ah can move, ah’ll move here,” Elvis said.
Elvis told him he particularly liked “pineapple and coconut. It’s all ah’ve been eating.”
Reporter Bob Krauss attended the concert. “The teenage audience (mostly girls) set up a shrill, continuous scream as Elvis romped on the open-air stage dressed in a gold lame jacket trimmed in silver, a black shirt, black slacks and black loafers.
“He stood still for a moment, then threw an experimental wobble at his fans. As if he had pushed a button, the audience erupted with screams.
“From then on the concert resembled some kind of primitive religious ceremony with the audience gradually working itself into a greater and greater frenzy.”
30th anniversary: Hawaii’s Plantation Village
One of the great things about writing this column is that I get to meet many interesting people. One wonderful man I met and became friends with was Goro Arakawa, who ran the family’s store in Waipahu with his siblings.
Back in 1966, Goro and “Mr. Waipahu” Hideo “Major” Okada and other Waipahu residents had the idea to develop a park that would preserve the lifestyle and culture of plantation people so that their children might know about their roots.
Their goal was to create a collection of structures that would typify a plantation village. It would feature each of the major ethnic groups that worked on the plantations, with buildings, furnishings and gardens representative of each culture.
In 1992 the dream of building Hawaii’s Plantation Village was realized. Over 7,000 people enjoyed the opening-day ceremonies.
“The elderly that attended the event were thankful that the village will preserve an era that they loved and cherished,” volunteer Lorene Ono told me, “while the young people were grateful for the opportunity to reflect upon their roots and heritage.”
More than half Hawaii’s population can trace its roots to one of the many plantations. The Plantation Village is a great way to preserve those memories.
To learn more about the Village or plan a tour, visit hawaiiplantationvillage.org.
Congratulations to all these organizations for passing these significant milestones and serving the population of Hawaii for so long.
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Bob Sigall is the author of the five “Companies We Keep” books. Contact him at Sigall@yahoo.com.
