 Welcome, and aloha. My name is Mark Shklav. I am the host of think tech Hawaii's law across the fee program. Today, we are going to have a very special show. We're going across the sea of local commerce to meet and talk with A. Kiyosaki Day about her new book called Alamoana Center. Alamoana Center. It's not just steel and concrete. It also houses history, emotions, and memories of the Hawaii community. Alamoana Center has been a focal point of social and commercial activity in Honolulu for 60 years. It's an interesting mix of local aloha and international diversity. A. Kiyosaki Day recently retired as a senior leasing agent for Alamoana Center, but before she retired, he decided it was time to write a book to preserve the legacy of Alamoana Center. OK? I'm pleased to have you here. Good to see you. I'm delighted to be here. Now, I know you wrote this book, and we're going to go into it a little bit more. But before we go into the book, tell me a little bit about yourself. I mean, where are you from? You're from Hawaii, and what your background is, your business background, and how you got to Alamoana. Well, I was born and raised in Hawaii. I was born on Maui and went to high school and college on Oahu. So a local girl from the very beginning. I graduated from University of Hawaii with a degree in English, hoping that it could write a book someday. But of course, life got in the way, and I had to get a job, and I got a job in real estate as it turned out. I started working at Alamoana Center in 1995 after I returned from 15 years in the mainland, and we found each other. That was where I was meant to be. And I began leasing Alamoana Center and have been leasing it for almost 24 years, which means finding the stores, negotiating leases, and bringing them and opening them up at the top. Well, that's been my job for 24 years. Wow, wow. So you say you grew up and went to school here. What was your first contact as a young person in Honolulu with Alamoana Center? Just curious. It was actually before we even moved to Oahu because the family would fly out to Honolulu on vacation or family visits, and we would always go downtown to go shopping at the Liberty House downtown and McInerney and Kim Chow Shoes and Woolworth. It was all so fascinating to a young kid from Maui. But I'll tell you that when Alamoana opened, we didn't go downtown anymore. We went to Alamoana Center. And then our family moved here when I was about 13 or 14 years old, and so it was all about Alamoana as far as I was concerned for shopping. Yeah, okay. So you were the leasing agent and you've recently retired and after many years there. Why did you do this book? What's this book about? It's interesting. About a year and a half ago, in late 2017, I approached our CEO about writing this book. And the reason I did was because for many years, I've been the teller of the story and the keeper of the history for Alamoana Center because I was one of the more senior employees there. And in recent years, we've had to do presentations for Wall Street investors, JV partners, the board of directors, and they're always fascinated with Alamoana. And so I had this history spiel that I did for many years. I've done it in New York, I did it in Chicago. You were like the docent. Kind of, yes, you know, because it was just handed to me and I was happy to take it. I developed a great fascination for the history of this property, which is a very dignified and interesting history, much more than people know. So when I decided to retire a couple of years ago, I approached our CEO and I told him I'd like to retire in a couple of years, but before I do, I want to write this book. And he immediately said yes, because he understood that there was a legacy and the way I pitched it to him was that this is something that we owe the people of Hawaii. And I felt very strongly that if I didn't write it, it may never get written because we all, a lot of people know the story that live and work at Alamoana Center, but we have jobs. I had a job leasing. I didn't have time to write a book. So it was a very nice commitment on the part of at the time general growth properties to allow me to do this and publish this book. Okay, so you kind of were able to bring your dream of being a writer into reality through this. And you say that there are a number of things about the history of Alamoana Center that you found fascinating. And tell us about it. Tell us some of the background, some of the stories. Well, one of the approach that I took in writing this book was it is a story about the property, about the land. It's not about the stores so much. It's, you know, there are people involved, there are stores involved, there is money, there's investment, there's development. It's really a story about the land. And so the story of the land goes all the way back to ancient times. Actually, we have a slide, slide number one, which shows what the area looked like. So Alamoana is located in an area called Kalia. In the background, very faintly, you can see Diamond Head and there's that lone palm. But the entire area, pretty much from Kaka'ako through the Alawai area, all the way to the foothills of Diamond Head, was like this, it was swamp land. There were lo'ikalo, there were fish ponds, there were rice patties, but it was not densely populated because it was very swampy land. And it wasn't really used for anything except farming, it looks like. That's right, there were not a lot of, because it was swamp, people didn't really live there except to tend the fish ponds and tend to the lo'ikalo. So it was not densely populated and it became kind of a swamp. They called it a health menace at one time because of the duck farms and the pig farms and all the mosquitoes and the odors, et cetera, that were coming out of there. The other part of the history, not just the ancient land, but the land was owned as all of Hawaii was by the Hawaiian royal family, by King Kamehameha. And so the land passed from King Kamehameha. At one time it was owned by the Hawaii, the government of Hawaii. So after the great mahele, it did confirm that the land at Kalea was owned by the government of Hawaii. But the government of Hawaii invaded back to Kamehameha the fifth some years later. And so it returned to the royal family and it stayed in the royal family until after the death of Bernice Kauahi Bishop, as she wanted to sell the land. It took a little while to sell it because it was such undesirable land. Okay, yeah, and I guess that's why the government gave it back too. They said, well, hey, what the heck? We'll just return this land. Nothing will ever be here. And they didn't feel it was a taxable event, I guess. Okay, so what happened? So what happened after Bernice Kauahi Bishop passed away? They just put it up for sale. But nobody wanted to buy it because it was a swamp and it was wetlands and it was kind of nasty and it was on a dirt road. There used to be a dirt road pretty much from downtown through Kakaako along where Alamoana Boulevard is all the way to Waikiki and it was an unpaved dirt road. Across the street from the Alamoana Center property was the city dump. And so it was pretty. That's where the beach is now. Yes, that's where Alamoana Beach Park is now and it was not until the 1930s that the Alamoana Beach Park was developed. And the driving force behind the development of Alamoana Beach Park was actually the guy who bought the Kaliya property from the Bishop of Stegu Kamehameha School. It was Walter Dillingham. Walter Dillingham was the son of Frank Dillingham who was, he created the Oahu Railroad. He was an industrialist. Walter created a dredging company. And back in the day when they owned the railroad and they owned farms and they owned dairies, they used this dredging equipment. I think we have a picture of one of the dredges in image number two. So Walter owned the dredging company. That's a dredge barge. It's this big clumsy looking blockish boat barge. And what this barge did was dig up the harbors and the beaches and the entrance to the harbors. It's not a sexy or interesting or fascinating or glamorous business, dredging. But it was critical to the development of an island economy. Because everything that we have here came in by ships. So we're talking about the Navy, the whaling ships and just all everything that came to Hawaii came in through the harbors. So Hawaii dredging company was instrumental in creating the harbors on all of the island. And Walter Dillingham had the foresight to be involved in that. Yes. What was he thinking? When he bought Alamoana, Roperty, Kalia, what was going through his mind? What did he have? What did he know? Did he know something? He was a man with vision. When he paid $25,000 for a little over 50 acres in Kalia, everybody thought he was crazy. And they asked him, why are you paying so much money for this nasty swamp? And he said, maybe it'll be worth something someday. Now he did have the foresight to realize that the Kalia property was between downtown Honolulu, the center of commerce in Hawaii, and Waikiki, which was becoming a resort area. Now he bought it in 1912, and Waikiki didn't really start developing his resort area until the 20s, but he had the foresight. He thought ahead. He really did. He did. He saw that it was centrally located. And then he had the wherewithal, and the equipment, and the company that could actually make something of this property. No other company probably could have done this. But because he owned a dredging company, they, for example, dredged the Alawai Canal in order to drain the swamps at Waikiki so that Waikiki could be developed as a resort. They took the coral and sand that they dredged out of the Alawai Canal and out of other dredging projects throughout the island, and brought it to Kalia, and they filled the swamps. Nice. Now who else could have done that except the dredging company? And what was going on in his mind? It's amazing, you know, to think that he, what was he thinking 100 years ahead? Yes, exactly. He just felt, I mean, again, he said maybe it'll be worth something someday. But by the time the idea for Alamoana Center came up, Kapiolani Boulevard was already there, and in the 30s, Mr. Dillingham, Walter Dillingham himself, was a driving force behind creating Alamoana Beach Park, which is visible behind us. It's beautiful today. It's a gorgeous beach. It was built in the 1930s using funds from Roosevelt's New Deal. But Mr. Dillingham owned the property across the street, so it would behoove him to get rid of the dump, which was where the park is today. Wow, wow. So that's the background of that. And he put, you know, one plus one, and he actually made three, because he knew Waikiki was coming up and he knew there was downtown, and he figured, I guess, I mean, I guess and something in between would grow and be, you know, make money also. Right, but we have another image, number three, which shows what he saw. So in the foreground is Honolulu Harbor. And way in the background is Diamond Head. In the middle, all that white stuff there is the Alamoana Kalia area being filled with sand. That's why it's all white, because the sand and coral that was brought from the dredging project looked like that. And so this went on for many, many years. And then by the time World War II rolled around, the property was almost completely dry, but they leased it, or they allowed the U.S. Army to use it as a storage area. And so the Army used the property during the war for storing lumber and other supplies. And we kind of take it all for granted today, don't we? I mean, that background of knowing how the property became as beautiful as it is, including the commercial property that had once been swamped, and then the beach, a dump. Wow, I mean, it really has progressed since those days, but we don't know about it. We've never heard about it. And your book covers that, right? I mean, your book tells about that background and that history of the beginning from the Royal Ownership onward, is that right? Correct, you know, and when I wrote the book again, it was, it's a story about the land. And that's why we put the picture on the cover of Diamond Head and the Lo'ikalo, because it is about the land and subsequent development over time. Most of us only know it as a shopping center in 1959 until the current day, but it was lots of other things before that. The shopping center idea didn't happen until the early 40s. Lowell Dillingham, Walter Dillingham's son, had the idea to put a shopping center there. Okay, and we're gonna take a break right now, and we'll be right back in a minute. And I want to hear about how the shopping center came into being. So we'll be right back with Kay Day for Alamoana Center. Thank you. Aloha, I'm Lauren Pair, a host here at Think Tech Hawaii, a digital media company serving the people of Hawaii. We provide a video platform for citizen journalists to raise public awareness in Hawaii. We are a Hawaii nonprofit that depends on the generosity of its supporters to keep on going. We'd be grateful if you'd go to thinktechhawaii.com and make a donation to support us now. Thanks so much. Hi, I'm Rusty Komori, host of Beyond the Lines on Think Tech Hawaii. My show is based on my book, also titled Beyond the Lines, and it's about creating a superior culture of excellence, leadership, and finding greatness. I interview guests who are successful in business, sports, and life, which is sure to inspire you in finding your greatness. Join me every Monday as we go Beyond the Lines at 11 a.m. Aloha. Welcome back. I am Mark Schlauwe. I'm here with Kay Kiyosaki Day. We are talking about her new book, Alamoana Center. And again, we're learning a lot about the history of Hawaii and the background of Alamoana Center. We're at the point now, Kay, how did Alamoana Center come into being? What were the steps that made it happen? Well, back in the 30s and 40s, not just in Honolulu, but in any metropolitan area, the shopping was concentrated in the downtown area, where there was public transit, the courts, the hotels, the office buildings, et cetera. But over time, especially as people started buying automobiles and having private automobiles, the downtown areas became very congested and very difficult to find parking. So shopping was not as efficient as when you got on the trolley or the bus and went downtown. So this was happening throughout the United States. And so shopping centers were being developed on the mainland in several areas, and they were decentralizing retail. They were moving retail out of the downtown area into generally into suburban areas where they could develop. In the case of Alamoana, it was Lowell Dillingham, the son of Walter Dillingham. He had visited Country Club Plaza in Kansas City some years before, and he thought that would be a great use for this Alamoana property. At the time, the land was zoned for, I believe, apartments and other commercial zoning, and they went and got a change in the zoning so that they could develop the shopping center. And he was right because there was a booming time for automobile ownership. And Alamoana offered thousands of free parking spaces and the convenience of having all of your favorite stores in one place. It was a genius idea at the time. It was considered a huge gamble at the time, however, because it had never been done on this scale, certainly not out in the middle of the Pacific. And for the Dillingham group or Hawaiian land to obtain the financing was not an easy feat. They had, however, the man who was driving the development was Donald Graham, Don Graham. He passed away a few years ago. A vital, interesting, fascinating man, again a man with vision, but he was the man. He worked for Dillingham as a vice president and he was tasked with getting the financing, putting the plans together, et cetera. So he saw the land and... By the way, that sounds like a full-time job. Oh yes, he was a busy man for many years. The original plan for Alamoana was a sprawling open-air shopping center on one level. He was designed after a center in Chicago, Oprah, I believe, in Chicago. Don Graham didn't feel that was the right use of the land, so he wanted to interview other architects. And they ended up with John Graham, no relationship, John Graham in Seattle. Now, Mr. Graham is best known for designing the Seattle Space Needle, which was the second revolving restaurant that he designed. The first one was the one on top of the Alamoana building. Interesting. But anyway, so they went up to Seattle and they met with John Graham. Don and John met. They showed him the aerial photographs and he says, did you ever think about doing a double deck or two levels shopping center? And over Don Graham's head, a light bulb went off because he could use the land twice. And so he could get a better return on his investment and better utilization of the land. Amazing, huh? Amazing. So the next step was to develop it and start building and what happened? Well, before they could even develop, I mean, they started designing it, of course, so they could have the general layout, but they had to get an anchor store. And so they went after the May Company and Ally's stores and some big department stores. Marshall Field was one that Don met with to try to get them to come here. But they didn't. It was too big a venture. One store in the middle of the Pacific was a bit daunting for these companies. So at the time, the local department stores, McInerney and Liberty House are already in downtown Honolulu, and Sears was in Pava'a, where the old police station was. And Don and Mr. Dillingham talked Sears into moving to Alamoana Center. And they did this, but they didn't want to move. But the general manager kind of knew that they were running out of parking because more and more cars are coming. Right, down in that area. Yes, and so they didn't have enough parking to accommodate all these stores. So he thought, you know, this might be a good idea. So they bought the land from Sears, and then they spun it and sold it to the police department. And in the meantime, Sears. So Dillingham bought it and sold it. Yes, Dillingham bought it, and then they sold it to the city and county of Honolulu for the police department. That was the deal. Yes. So they got the lease with Sears. And once you have an anchor store, then you have something to build on. And Sears, I should tell the story about Mr. Thieker. Morley Thieker was the general manager of Sears back in the 40s and the 50s. He was a very kind and well-liked man. He felt bad about moving Sears from Pava'a to Ala Moana because around Sears, in that whole area, all of these businesses had developed because Sears was bringing people in there. Small businesses. Small businesses like Slipper House and, you know, E.E. does and others. You know, they were all in this area, small dress shops and businesses that cater to the local people. So he actually asked the developer to offer spaces to these merchants, which we did. And some of them actually did come. The other story that's really interesting is there used to be a peanut lady, the lady that sold boiled peanuts. Until the 90s, I believe, 80s or 90s, she sold boiled peanuts outside of the Sears store at Pava'a. And Mr. Thieker insisted that she be allowed to do so at Ala Moana. Well, the developers thought, oh, we can't have that. You know, take a lady out there at this table, selling peanuts. In paper bags. Exactly, because she had buckets and paper bags. But Mr. Thieker insisted, and he almost threatened to kill the deal if they wouldn't accommodate her. So they did. And she sold peanuts outside of Sears until she retired. Wow. Wow, that's a good story. And actually, that's what your book is about, isn't it? It's about, I was going through, there's a lot of these stories. It's not just about stores. It's about people and Hawaii and kind of the aloha spirit a lot of times. And that's really what the book, Ala Moana Center, seems to convey to me. And has that been the reaction that you've got from people too? Well, that was one of the reasons that I wanted to write it, because as employees of Ala Moana Center, myself and all the people that work there, we know that the people of Hawaii are very, very, it's personal to them. Ala Moana is personal. They grew up here. They all have us, everybody went here. You grew up in Honolulu and you're a teenager, you hung out at Ala Moana. That's where you got your communion outfit. That's where you got your prom dress and your prom shoes. So we all have a story around Ala Moana Center. So it's very personal to the people of Hawaii. So I wanted to write it, and I didn't want to write about specific stores. There are some stories and they're about friends and Slipper House and Watermills, et cetera. The iconic stores. Yes, the older ones. But it was not so much about that as it was about the experience. And to me, I really feel that the experience is about, it's the aloha that's in this place. It's a very special place. It's very compelling. It draws people to it. You may not like the new design or the new fancy stores. Everybody likes the old days, right? And what do you tell them? What do you tell people about the, there was the good old days when they had seers and... Villaroma and Carol and Mary, Ross, Sutherland, et cetera. Now we have some high-end stores and there's tourists going to them. And I mean, what do you tell people? Well, Hawaii is not the same today as it was in 1950, 1960, 1970. The community has changed, the business has changed. When Ala Moana Center opened, it was completely for the local people. The economy was based on agriculture, sugar and pineapple. And it was not until the early 60s that tourism started to take over as one of the more driving forces, tourism and the military. So the economy was changing. And so we had to address also our customer. Our customer was evolving. As much as I too, I'm a baby boomer. I'm nostalgic about the Ala Moana, the 60s and 70s and the stores that were here. But to me, it would be really tragic if that's still what Ala Moana was because those stores are no longer relevant as cool as they were back in the 60s and 70s. Those kinds of stores no longer exist, not just in Hawaii, but all over the United States. These mom and pop retailers. Times have changed. They have changed, yes. All right, and what does your book say about from the construction to the present? What is the message that it conveys? Well, it's been personal for a lot of people. It's been constant development. And with every subsequent phase of development, every change that's made at the shopping center, we've had all kinds of reactions from the people that live here. They love it. Oh, they love it when we brought Victoria's Secret or Bath and Body Works. Oh, but they hate it when we bring too much luxury stuff because it's not for the local people, et cetera. But we do have to understand that our customer base is so much bigger than it used to be. Especially as Mr. Dillingham knew it would be. I mean, he knew that it's going to be between downtown and Waikiki, and we got a mix of people. Wow. It's absolutely right. That's kind of crazy. It is. When you think about it, he kind of conceived that. He knew about it. He did, and whether he, because he knew. Consciously or not. Yeah, exactly. But tourism was already becoming a factor back in the 50s. But it wasn't, of course, in the Asian, the Japanese tourists in the 70s and 80s, that became a huge factor. And can we ignore them? No. They drive, our tourism drives our economy. If we were to ignore what the Japanese tourists want or the American tourists want, we would be a pretty sad place. And we would not be one of the most iconic and most successful shopping centers in the world. We had to change. Well, in the minute we have left, I'd like you to tell me a little bit about what you've learned personally from writing this book. And maybe put another photo of the book on the screen so we can take a look at it. What did you learn from your experience in this book? Personally, that I could do something that I didn't know I could do. I wanted to write a book. I majored in English because I wanted to write a book. But, you know, I didn't have a chance until the very end of my career. But it was personal to me. And also, when I put my name in the book, my name's Kaye Day. My maiden name is Kiyosaki. But I felt it was important to put my maiden name in the book so that it would be connected with the local people. I'm a local girl. I was born and raised here. This mall means as much to me as it does to a lot of other people in the state of Hawaii. So I've made, I feel a connection with a lot of other people through the passion that we all have for this really iconic piece of life. When will the book be available? When is it available now? I know that there are some volumes because I've seen them. But is it available to the public now? It will be. Our 60th anniversary officially is in August, August 13th. Of Alamoana Center. Yes, of Alamoana Center. So the book will be sold by Barnes & Noble, as well as the Alamoana Customer Service Center, and possibly some other retail outlets, probably getting closer to August as a commemoration of the 60th anniversary. Wow. OK. And I expect that there will be more celebrations at Alamoana, and this book fits in perfect with that. Yes. OK, thank you very much for being my guest today. I'm glad to hear about the book and all the connections and all the stories, and looking forward to diving deeper into it. Ladies and gentlemen, we are out for today. We will be back again in a couple weeks with another program. Thank you, Kay Day. Aloha. Aloha.