I love finding stories that connect dots that are seemingly unrelated. This week’s column begins with the Pioneer Inn, which tragically burned down in Lahaina last month.
A replica of the Pioneer Inn opened in 2019 in Kalama, Wash. The town may have been named for a Kula, Maui, man named John Kalama. I may even be able to connect that to King Kalakaua being hosted at the White House by President Ulysses S. Grant in 1874.
Reader Ronald Michioka told me last week that the Kalama Harbor Lodge in Kalama was modeled after the Pioneer Inn, built in 1901. “I am writing to ask if you could do a story about this ‘sister’ to the Pioneer Inn and the fascinating namesake for the lodge, Mr. John Kalama. They even named their town for him!”
The Kalama Harbor Lodge is owned by Mike and Brian McMenamin. When they were young, their family stayed at the Pioneer Inn in Lahaina, and they have good memories of it.
The lodge was “based on the architecture of the Pioneer Inn, and we owe the inspiration behind the design to this historic Hawaiian landmark,” a spokesperson said.
An outrigger canoe hangs from the lobby ceiling. There’s also a painting of the Pioneer Inn by artist Eona Skelton, with the 150-year-old Lahaina banyan tree in the background. The tree was damaged in the wildfire but is showing signs of new growth.
The lodge held a fundraising concert Sept. 17 for those affected by the Maui fires and also donated $2 from every McMenamins handcrafted beer or cider sold that day at all 56 of their hotels and pubs, raising over $18,000 for the Hawaii Community Foundation’s Maui Strong Fund.
Native bonds
The town of Kalama is about 40 miles north of Portland, Ore., on the Columbia River. The Cowlitz County Historical Society says, “Kalama may have been named after a singing, ukulele- playing Sandwich Islander named John Kalama, who settled in Washington Territory in 1830.”
Kalama was born in Kula, Maui, around 1814 and may have been a distant relation to Queen Kalama, who was married to King Kamehameha III.
Alternatively, the town may have been named for Native American people or places.
“What is known about this settler? John Kalama was a poverty-stricken 16-year-old who had left Hawaii on a fur-trading ship. He was accepted and respected by the Nisqually Indians and eventually wed Mary, one of chief Martin’s five daughters.”
Fur trappers
Kalama hunted, fished and trapped extensively on the river. He also worked as an agent collecting furs for the Hudson’s Bay Co., North America’s oldest company (founded in 1670 and still around today). At one time the company had offices in Honolulu and hired Hawaiians to be fur trappers.
The French fur trappers were great canoemen but not great swimmers. The Hawaiians could do both, even in cold water, and the Hudson’s Bay Co. wanted more of them in their canoes.
The company’s headquarters in Kalama was adjacent to Fort Vancouver, built by the British in 1825. From then until about 1866, over 600 people lived there, including Hawaiians, Native Americans and Europeans. It was the hub of trade in the American West at the time.
‘Kanaka Town’
In the 1850s it was nicknamed “Kanaka Town” for the Hawaiian word for “person.” With its diversity, it was the West’s first multicultural city. It encompassed several hundred square miles of farmland and boasted a sawmill, shipyard, distillery, dairies and tannery.
While French was the area’s official language, a pidgin developed, made up of Hawaiian, English, French and several Native American languages.
Fur trading became less important to the economy of the West about that time, and more mercantile opportunities presented themselves.
The rise of Gen. Grant
In 1846 the U.S.-Canadian border was finalized, and the U.S. Army took up residence at Fort Vancouver. One of the soldiers was a young quartermaster named Capt. Ulysses S. Grant, who was there from 1852 to 1853.
Several other future generals served at Fort Vancouver, including George C. Marshall, Phillip Sheridan and George McClellan. Additionally, Charles Lindbergh, James Doolittle and Eddie Rickenbacker all flew airplanes there. Henry Kaiser’s Vancouver shipyard built over 200 warships nearby during World War II.
Grant’s biographer Ronald White believes his quartermaster positions prepared him in understanding military supply routes, transportation systems and logistics. There was more to winning wars than battlefield tactics.
During the Civil War, Grant was elevated to general of the Army. Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered to him at Appomattox, ending the conflict. A war hero, Grant was elected president of the United States in 1868 and again in 1872.
Population decline
John Kalama died in 1871. A few years later the railroad moved its headquarters to Tacoma, and soon after, the population of Kalama dwindled to fewer than 100. A fire destroyed the heart of the business section in 1877, but settlers continued to arrive and the town survived.
Archaeologists began exploring the area in the 1970s and have found an astonishing 140,000 artifacts. In 2007 a replica of Kanaka Town was built at Fort Vancouver on the Kalama River.
Forgotten Hawaiians
Momilani Naughton studied the Hawaiians who lived in the area for her doctoral thesis, “Hawaiians in the Fur Trade: Cultural Influence on the Northwest Coast 1811-1875.”
The early Hawaiians married Native Americans because laws prevented them from marrying Caucasian women.
“The amazing thing was that quite a number married chiefs’ daughters. It seemed to be a little higher status to marry a Hawaiian,” Naughton said. Many part- Hawaiians became Native American tribal leaders. The Hawaiians proved to be good at farming, herding and carpentry.
They thrived in the Pacific Northwest for over 150 years, but after a while, many of their grandchildren were not even aware they had Hawaiian blood. “In a sense, they are Hawaii’s forgotten Hawaiians,” Naughton believes.
About 3,000 residents live in Kalama today. Every August a Kalama Heritage Festival is held, with lots of food booths, Hawaiian and Native American entertainment.
A capital visit
Let’s go back to Grant for a moment. While serving at Fort Vancouver, he must have had many interactions with Hawaiians who lived in Kanaka Town. To the best of my knowledge, he was the first U.S president to have had a good deal of contact with Hawaiians.
Kalakaua was elected king and began his reign Feb. 12, 1874. Less than 10 months later, he and his entourage were on their way to Washington, D.C., to negotiate a treaty of reciprocity. They arrived in Washington by train Dec. 12, 1874. Despite his new status, the United States rolled out the red carpet for him.
Secretary of State Hamilton Fish, Secretary of the Navy George M. Robeson and Secretary of War William W. Belknap came aboard to greet the king at the train station. Reporters from The New York Times, New-York Tribune, New York Telegram, New York Star, Baltimore Press Association and several other newspapers covered the event.
Following a champagne reception, a brigade of U.S. Marines, accompanied by the Marine Corps Band, paraded the king and his group down Pennsylvania Avenue, past throngs of enthusiastic, cheering onlookers to the Arlington Hotel, where they would stay.
Ten days later, Grant toasted the king at a White House state dinner, the first one ever held. Kalakaua was also invited to speak to a joint meeting of Congress.
The U.S. and the kingdom of Hawaii successfully negotiated a treaty of reciprocity, eliminating taxes on goods shipped from one to the other. It all went smoothly, despite the king catching a cold.
Did Grant’s two years at Kanaka Town make him familiar with Hawaiians and predispose him to be open and receptive to King Kalakaua when he visited Washington in 1874? There is nothing in the historical record I could find to answer the question definitively. Grant’s biography by White doesn’t mention Hawaiians or his meeting with Kalakaua.
Grant did say that the Indians near Fort Vancouver, many of whom were part- Hawaiian, were “the most harmless people you ever saw. My opinion is that the whole race would be harmless and peaceable if not put upon by the whites.”
Historian Peter von Buol added, “One of Grant’s best friends was the civil engineer, Iroquois chief Ely Parker, whom he met in his hometown of Galena, Ill. He added him to his staff during the Civil War. It makes sense that he’d have befriended Hawaiians.”
There you have it. From the Pioneer Inn in Lahaina to Kalama Harbor Lodge; John Kalama; Hudson’s Bay Co.; Fort Vancouver; Kanaka Town; Ulysses S. Grant and King Kalakaua — all connected by a thin thread of aloha.
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Bob Sigall is the author of the five “The Companies We Keep” books. Contact him at Sigall@Yahoo.com or sign up for his free email newsletter at RearviewMirrorInsider.com.
