 It was called Chickens, poultry, chicken gossip and pigeon news. A guy named H. L. Chung was the author of that column. We're talking about columns here today with Bob Siegel. He's a columnist for the Star Advertiser. He writes books and he writes a lot and he has a tremendous wealth of stories and historical vignettes about the islands and my feeling and I wanted to express to you is that it's very important for Hawaii to have an identity. Its identity is historic and we need to stay in touch with that, don't you agree? I think it tells us who we are today. It's not just something that happened to other people. If those things hadn't happened to other people, you and I wouldn't be sitting here right now talking about it. We are the remnant of that history and we're thrown into the world from those people and those events that happened in the past and if those events hadn't happened. Life would be different now. Somebody else would be here, not us. True. So Rear View Mirror is in the name of your column anyway and you have a lot of books and there's one of them, just one of about 15 or 20 of them. I got five. Five. Okay well it seems to me to be 15 or 20. This one is, which one is this now? This is book number five. I'm going through the colors of the rainbow so I've gone red, yellow, green, blue and now purple. Okay. What I'll do for number six, I haven't figured out. I'm sure you will though. So what's this one about? What's number five about? Well you know they're all of a similar vein. They're just different stories about Hawaii people, places and companies and I'm looking for a wow factor. I'm looking for something that the average person is going to go wow, I had no idea. And so you know that we have tunnels through Haiku Valley over to Halava Valley, the H3. We've got Liki-Liki Highway which by the way they're going to call the Kahahu Manu Highway until Maui said we've already got that name on the highway. And then there's the new Manu Highway which they now call Pali Highway. But they can also consider putting highways through Manoa Valley, Palolo Valley, Aina Hina, Ni'u Valley, Kuu'u'o'o and Hawaii Kai. All were considered valleys because the beautiful beaches that exist on the Waimanalo side. Can you imagine six highways proposed that could have taken us to Waimanalo? It would have taken a lot of money to do that. And there was even a train that was proposed to come down from Kahuku, went to Punalu and then JB Castle was going to bring it all the way down to Waimanalo and punch a hole through Manoa and bring it to Ivala'i so you could ride a train around in a circle on Oahu. It would have been great, don't you think? It would have been. The tourists, anyway, they would have had a great ride. But can you imagine a train going through Manoa? It would have wrecked Manoa as Manoa existed today. I don't think Manoa would be very happy with it. Even Mayor Blaisdell in the 50s said at some point we're going to need a hole through the Koh'olal to Waimanalo. It's just not now that he thought we should do that. Well, obviously, it's probably never going to be done. That reminds me of Kaimuki, Kaimuki 1922 or so, and there was a developer and the developer was trying to sell lots and they were so cheap, you know, two, three, four thousand dollars a lot. $500 for an acre on Waialai Avenue in the 1890s. Thank you. Thank you. Price may have gone up a little bit by the 1990s. I guess so. And he was offering, oh, there was a trolley up the hill there, you know, by the old theater. It came right up to the top of that hill and then down the other side. And this was supposed to incentivize people to buy the lots. And there was a zoo where Luleo Kalani Elementary School was. Right there. And when it rained, they found out that the zebra was actually a donkey. Somebody had painted. But we actually had several zoos that were designed to attract people. Leva Heights in 1915 had a zoo, or at least there was the plans for a zoo. The guy bought three wallabies that were part of a circus coming through Honolulu, put them in a tent. A dog attacked the tent and they escaped. And now we have colonies of wallabies in Kalihi and New Water valleys. Even now today. Yes, to this day. When do you get your material, Bob? You have so much of it. You know, it's about everything and it has great depth and breadth. Where do you get it? Well, a lot of it comes from my readers. You know, Bob Kraus, one of my predecessors of the paper, said if it wasn't for the telephone in his day, now it's email in mind. He said he would have run out of material a long time ago. And we have pictures of him on the phone talking to readers and writing things down or typing them on an old typewriter or making index cards for his system. But for instance, I was told by some people about Pats at Honolulu, which I had never been to but have driven past a hundred times. And so I went out there and met some people who have memorabilia from Pats at Honolulu. And then I put an article in the paper last week about it. And I heard from Paul Masuoka, who was Masu's massive plate lunch. And he said he got his start there. Fresh out of KCC, they hired him to be a weekend chef, kind of took him under their wing. He was 18 or 19 years old at the time. Iris Halloran, Pats' husband, shared some of her recipes with him. He went to work for Spence Cliff, started a catering business and then went into business as Masu's massive plate lunch, where Walmart is today on Keamoku. And then it moved to the Liliha area after that. And so I may write about him. And when I was looking into Pats at Honolulu, I came across a guy called David at Honolulu. Have you ever heard of that name before? David Kaapu. Do you recognize the Kaapu name? Yes. Kikoa was his son, a friend of mine, his daughter Carol's a friend of mine as well. And he wore a malu and a hat and nothing else. And he had a little Hawaiian village of his own out there on a three acre site where he raised chickens and hogs, pounded his own taro, and people would drive up the windward side. And he was the only place to stop in the 20s and 30s. And he would often come to the gate and explain what he was doing to people. And he became famous when FDR stopped there and got a tour of his farm in I think 1934. You know, this history is kind of nostalgic for people because there's a lot of people still alive. Remember, you know, back before statehood, back before, you know, the building boom and the technological boom in our society where we copy so many things from the mainland, you know, the pure Hawaiian of things. And you would mention before the show began that the newspaper has always had a historic writer, a history writer, and you're the last on a long line. You want to name some of the others? You mentioned Bob Krauss. So we have three tailors, Lois Taylor, who's still around. I bumped into her recently at a garden club meeting. Clarice Taylor and Emma Taylor. Emma Taylor was a part Hawaiian woman who wrote about a short of thing called Little Tales All About Hawaii, which was, I think, 12 years long. And there's a stack of them this high in binders at the main library downtown. Great stories. You know, for instance, I was looking for a verification that there had been a Confederate flag that was created by Queen Liliu Okolani for Curtis Perry Ward, Victoria's husband, that he put over his bed. And I found it in one of her columns. Little Tales All About Hawaii. That's great. It defines us. This is the whole thing defines us. And we need to have this. We need to have the nostalgia. We need to have it to distinguish ourselves from any other place that's been paved over. You know, so it's great what you do. And it reminds me of an issue that I think about a few years ago, it was a movie called The Descendants, where George Clooney was there. I was pretty good, you know, not great, but pretty good. And we're done by Hollywood. And I said to myself, gee, that's a story about Hawaii, but the rule against perpetuities, about the land passing through various parts of the family. But what interested me is that just as we have the story of The Descendants, we have 1,000 other stories, 10,000 other stories that are unique to Hawaii that you wouldn't find anywhere else. You cover those things. But I also think that your work, your research, and what you hear and speak about could be a movie, could be many movies. And it could be more important than The Descendants. Don't you agree? You and I could be the stars of that movie. There you go. Oh, by the way, I got to mention this. So in the morning mail, I guess. Oh, congratulations on your award, by the way. Thank you. This award, I think three years ago, maybe it was four years ago. This is the small business advocate of the year for media and journalism. It's a very prestigious small business administration. I was one of the judges until last year for this award when I took a break. And I think I'll go back next year. But I congratulate you on winning this award and following my footsteps. Thank you. I'm delighted to follow in your footsteps, big footsteps. When I retire from my column, you can take it over. I used to write for the newspaper, but I never wrote the historical stuff that you write. I didn't have the material. It'd take off on a tangent. There you go. You probably have tons of material from the show that would make interesting stories. We have 8,500 videos out there somewhere in the cloud. And they're all different. They're all very Hawaii, actually. So let's talk about what people were wearing on December 7, 1941. I need to know. Well, on December 7 of 2018, I was writing about what happened in 1941. And several of the articles I wrote about, people realized that a day, or sometimes even two days later, they were still wearing their pajamas. In one case, the guy that I wrote about on December 7 of this past year had been in the latrine when he saw the bombing. He jumped into an airplane, took off with two other guys, three airplanes in total. And it wasn't until two days later that he realized he was still wearing the pajamas that he had been wearing that morning. He was seriously distracted from his clothing. A lot of people didn't know. And a woman that I wrote about last year was found out at the end of the day that she was still wearing her nightgown from that morning that she had gotten up. The bombing happened. This was at Schofield Barracks. She'd been running around, helping people, jumping in and out of ditches, putting bandages on people, taking care of her children. And then late that night, she realized I'm still wearing my nightgown. You know what? It tells you so much more than you could otherwise read in the history book to know that it means that people were so focused on what was going on. They were so traumatized. They were so in the moment they weren't thinking about their clothing. One of the cutest stories is there was a soldier, last name Taylor, at Schofield Barracks. Another Taylor. Another Taylor, who got into a plane wearing the tuxedo he had worn the night before and had never changed out of. They had stayed up all night. It was a late night. He had rented it from a Korean woman. He said in Wahiwa, who told him if he got it dirty, he would have to pay for it. And he was flying, chasing zeros. And he shot the first one down of the war over Wahiwa. And one of the Japanese planes shot at him. And he got a little blood on his tuxedo. And he thought, which is worse? The Japanese shooting at me or having to face that Korean woman, he decided to rather face the Japanese. She probably yelled at him and took his deposit. He said, I don't remember if I ever returned that tuxedo. I'd like to frame it right now. So many things. OK, I wanted to talk about, oh gee. How about the big yellow taxi references? Well, you know, I love going to Mitchell. They pay a paradise, put up a parking lot. Well, there's several references in it to places in Hawaii. So for instance, they took all the trees, put them in a tree museum. Where's that? The Arboretum up in Manoa. Not lying Arboretum, good guess. You're warm. Foster Botanical Garden is the tree museum that she was talking about. Actually created by the first chief physician at Queens Hospital, William Hillibrand was his name, who thought we could trade trees and shrubs and bushes and flowering plants between South America, Hawaii, and Asia. And he created a triangle of these going back and forth. After 20 years, he left Hawaii, sold it to his place to marry Foster, who donated it to the city. Thus Foster Gardens. Yes. OK, so Foster Botanical Gardens. Joni Mitchell wrote about a pink hotel. Oh, the Royal Hawaiian. A boutique, which we don't know, and a swing and hot spot. What was the swing and hot spot around 1970? Do you remember? We have an idea of what she was talking about. A nightclub. Spats, was the name of it. Spats, I remember the name, but I was never there. Bagwell, next to Bagwell's 2424 at the region. Bagwell's 24, that was a great place. Was Spats in or around Bagwell? It was in the same tower, but it was, I think, a floor below. OK, OK. But Joni Mitchell wrote about the tree museum on her website. And there are theories about the other places. Certainly the Royal Hawaiian would be the pink hotel. But a lot of people hear that song. It was her biggest hit. And yet they don't realize she's making references to Hawaii. Let's talk about sports. You tell me about the interesting origin of sports in Hawaii. And let's see. It was Luther Gulick. And I know Ray Gulick, who was a descendant of Luther Gulick. Luther Gulick was the son of missionaries. His father was a surgeon, a missionary surgeon. And he went to the mainland. I think he graduated from Puneau about 1875. He went to the mainland. He became the head of the YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts. And he noticed that his staff was getting out of shape in the wintertime. They were supposed to do calisthenics, but it was a boring thing to do. So he asked his students and co-workers to come up with sports that could be played in doors in a gym. And one of them came up with basketball, and the other came up with volleyball. Originally called Minotin, as it reminded him of bad men. But Luther Gulick, a local boy, played a role. Now, obviously, we know surfing began in Hawaii. The fourth sport that we have a connection to is baseball. Alexander Joy Cartwright moved to Hawaii within five years of creating the sport of baseball on the mainland. He lived the rest of his life in the islands. I remember that, and after this break, I'm going to tell you why I remember that. But we're going to take a break now, because we can't just sit here and talk. We have to go do some exercise. We're going to do that for a minute, and we'll come right back with Bob Siegel. Aloha. I'm Wendy Lo, and I'm coming to you every other Tuesday at 2 o'clock live from Think Tech Hawaii. And on our show, we talk about taking your health back. And what does that mean? It means mind, body, and soul. Anything you can do that makes your body healthier and happier is what we're going to be talking about, whether it's spiritual health, mental health, fascia health, beautiful smile health, whatever it means. Let's take healthy back. Aloha. Aloha, and welcome to At the Crossroads. I'm your host, Keisha King. I'm live at 5 every Wednesday, where we have entertaining and educational conversations that are real and relevant, both here in Hawaii and across the globe. I'll see you at the Crossroads. Aloha. Out of Oahu Cemetery. And she's a cemetery expert. This is Nanette Napoleon. Nanette Napoleon. Her father was on the jury for the Massey case in the 30s. He had stories to tell. Yeah, I'm sure. Yeah, wow. So I was going to tell you that I became aware of the whole basketball thing through the Cartwright family. Because every year, it's usually in the summer, I think, at the Mission House Museum, they have a couple of researchers up there. They're very good. And they've been on the show, as a matter of fact. And they put on these little one-actor plays about people who were buried in Oahu Museum. And you walk around from tent to tent. And each tent is a different actor and a different person. Wow, that sounds very exciting. It is. It's great. I'd love to do it. Yeah, well, keep your eye peeled for that. Mission House Museum every summer. And it's stuff that you would really like. And the viewers as well. It's very interesting. Oahu Cemetery is our most artistic cemetery. It's Victorian art. It's grandiose. It's beautiful stuff. It's part of that nostalgic legacy that we have. And we should treasure it. And I appreciate that you do what you do. And their researchers do what they do. And it's alive. It's still alive. It's not just a question of looking back to the overthrow and all that. It's the whole 19th century. Those were the days of extraordinary events and transitions. And those transitions continue until statement. So talk to me more about your stories. Let's see. What I liked was, yeah, the one who, YMCA, there's a story there. The original new one of YMCA was the idea of a guy named Lloyd Killiam, who was an assistant secretary of the YMCA in the 1920s. And it was nationally. No, here in Hawaii. And at the time, on one night, on a Friday night, he had a drive from the Chinese YMCA to the Japanese YMCA to the Korean YMCA to the Filipino YMCA. And it started raining. He's driving an old Model T Ford, which was not very secure. He got soaked. And he says, why don't we put all these Ys in one place? Now, that was 150 years ago. We started the YMCA. The new one of YMCA was the idea from this rainy, wet night that he had. It opened up in 1918, 101 years ago. We're going to have a special next week in the Star Advertiser about the YMCA's in general. But the new one of YMCA was the first multicultural YMCA in the country. There was one in Kansas City that was black and white. But this was four different nationalities, Chinese, Japanese, Koreans, and Filipinos. And at the time, we were concerned that Japan had invaded and was occupying Korea. And we weren't sure the Koreans would get along with the Japanese and Hawaii. But they all got along with each other. CKE, who was the founder of CitiMill, was representing the Chinese in that. Shing Min-Ri, the former president of Korea, was representing the Koreans there. We had people representing the Filipinos, people representing the Japanese, Iggy, Mori, doctor here in Hawaii. It was a success. And a lot of people don't realize the new one of YMCA, which, by the way, started in what is now the new vineyard and Polly Highway long, safeway parking lot. That's where it was originally. It wasn't until, I think, 61 that they moved across the street to bigger facilities. But it was a first attempt to bring four different races together in the YMCA. And it was a model for the entire country after its success. And that's Hawaii. We did that effortlessly. And it was a great statement. It still is a great statement. Well, it would make sense that if we did that in the 60s, but we did it 50 years earlier than that. And it worked in 1918. The Y itself is an important part of Hawaii history, don't you think? I mean, I'm glad the paper is writing this up. Are you writing part of it? I wrote two articles for it. I don't know how many there will be, but I'm going to guess eight to 10 or 15 articles. I mean, the Y has been, oh god, there's so many great stories. How about the military Y, the armed forces Y? Sure. That took over from where the Royal Hawaiian Hotel had been downtown on Alakea, Richards, Hotel Street. And it was a place that, you know, Hotel Street was like the main drag for people. And it was a drag in scientific ways. Literally, it was a drag in the full sense of the word as we use it today. Yes. For some of our military personnel, it gave them a place to hang out. And one of the more interesting things about the armed services YMC is after Harry Truman had left office, he came to Hawaii to pay a visit to the governor of Hawaii. And he stayed a week or two at Coconut Island in Kaniawe Bay. And while he was meeting with the governor, he said, you know, is there a place I can get a haircut? And the two of them walked across the street from the palace where the governor was at the time to the armed forces YMC where his barber was. And he waited in line with everybody else at the YMC to get a haircut there. There was a women's Y in Manoa somewhere, upper Moila even. Are you thinking of Fernhurst? Yes, I am. Fernhurst, I've been researching that. Fernhurst, there was a house called Fernhurst, the Cook Home, where the, you know, the bus barn is at King and Olapai Street that's going up right now. That's where Fernhurst originally was. And it referred to the lush foliage of that place. After they decided to move from that house, they donated to the YMCA, which made it into a Fernhurst YMCA. And then the Olapai bus barn expanded and took over the property. But before they could build a bus barn on the site, they built a bowling alley. It became City Bowl. I don't know if you remember in the 50s and 60s, there was a bowling alley on that site. Meanwhile, it moved to the corner of, I believe it was, Makiki and Punahou, right across from Punahou's school, where there had been a Pleasanton Hotel, which was famous in the 1920s and 1930s. And that's where the Fernhurst YMCA is today. A friend of mine, deceased now, came here and stayed at that Fernhurst. And she had pictures of that Fernhurst. And it was a grand circle of palm trees out in the front. It looked like royalty. Oh, it was a beautiful house. It was a beautiful place. And this takes me to the whole thing about the why. It's emblematic of the development of Hawaii, the democratization of Hawaii coming off the plantations. It was something for everyone. It was very important. And in a funny way, it's still important. Just last week, two weeks ago, there was an article in The Times about Julia Morgan, who designed the YWC on Richard Street. So it took my brother was here. And I took him for lunch at Cafe Julia. I was able to hold forth about Julia Morgan as an architect and how this all came to be. But it's a classic building. It's so important. I hope people realize that. It is a beautiful building. And she was the first female architect in Hawaii and created this building 100 years ago. And it's still in great shape. And she was also a famous architect on the mainland. She created some of the buildings at Mills College in the Oakland Bay area. Yeah. That was all in the article, actually, in The Times. So speaking of the Longs Polly area and the Y there across the way, the Longs Polly logo, what was that about? Well, interestingly, I ran across when they opened that longs in 1961. And I didn't know that every longs back then had an individual logo. Now, if they were in a shopping center, they used the shopping center's logo. Like all the Alamoana Center Longs had the Alamoana Center logo. But if they were not part of one, for instance, the one downtown on Hotel and Bishop Street has the Aloha Tower as its logo. And they created a logo of a Hawaiian tiki god, named Maoli, which is a god or tiki of medicine. And it's still in the sign for the entrance off of Fort Street and Kokui Street in that area there. There's a two-sided sign at the very top of it. The logo is about this big of a Hawaiian tiki. They phased all these tikis out in their ads or probably around 1980, 85, or so. They stopped giving them to every store that opened. But it's a remnant of the past that I find really interesting. You know, I'm thinking, you know, so much about so many places, you know, geographical places. It reminds me of Steven Spielberg. He invented something, designed something back in the odd years called Talking Streets. Talking Streets, you walk down a street and there'd be a brass plaque on a house. And I would say, are you interested in this house? Susan B. Anthony lived in this house. So dial this number, and you'll hear about Susan B. Anthony. So you take your cell phone out, you dial the number. It's a radio play about things that happen in this house. And you know, Sony, Sony Corporation, that's been here a long time. They have a special affinity for Hawaii. They were thinking about a similar arrangement here. You could make a map, essentially, or a geographical contact point, pin the tail on the location kind of place, just like that. You know, one of my visions has been to create a timeline of brass plaques along Kalakawa Avenue that might start in the 1500s or the 1400s. You know, as far back as we can know anything that happened. For instance, the first fish ponds were created in Waikiki around the 1400s. And we could take it up through the royal period. We could have plaques for the kings and queens and some of the things they did. And you know, every king and queen that Hawaii had, except for Kamehameha II, left something around that is still here today doing good work. You know, for instance, Queen Emma created the Queen's Hospital. She created St. Andrew's Priory on a school, a couple of other places as well. Lilio Kalani created a home for children. Luna Lilo created a home for senior citizens. Kalakawa did things. You know, every single one of them left things that are still around today, except for Kamehameha II, who died at a very young age of smallpox in London. I love this idea because this idea could make Hawaii, at least Honolulu, a living treasure of historic moments and lessons. And not only the things that are visible still today, like Elon E. Palace, there's a treasure trove in there, but things that are no longer there. On this spot, this happened. You know, somewhere on, you probably know the story, somewhere on, was it Merchant Street? Thomas Edison came around and played his first movie right here in Hawaii, unbelievable. Yeah, he was the first person to shoot a movie in the islands. I think it was around 1898. Yeah. I mean, that's worth a brass plaque right there. I mean, this place, this city, would be bristling with Bob Siegel brass plaques everywhere. I'd like to collaborate with you on that. OK, you know, there's a missing brass plaque that really bugs me, and that is on the Blaisdell Center area. There are several brass plaques, but none talk about the Ward family that lived there. That's a huge story. Can you believe that? A huge story. And unfortunately, you know, it's being paved over, so much is being paved over. So we rely on you to keep these memories alive. You and I will do it together. OK, I'm happy to do that. Any of your viewers who are interested in participating in that, we invite you to join us as well. I'm sure we have the other hosts, too. Let me spend our remaining time here. The Royal School, talk about schools, was founded in 1839. Commandment as a third asked the missionaries to create a school for the children of Ali'i. And so the first children, it was called the Chief's Children's School. It was about where the state capital is today, on the grounds of Ilani Palace. That was 1839, and they did that two years before they founded Punahou, which was for their own children. So it's interesting to me that they created a school for the children of Ali'i before they created one for their own children. But 1839 is an important anniversary. It's 180 years ago this year, so that's a significant deal. By 1850, they had graduated all their students, including Kalakaua, Lilio, O'Kalani, Miriam, Leakey, Leakey, Bernice, Pawahi, Commandment as a third, and Fourth, William, Lunalilo. And they moved to the current location that they have today at the top of Punchbowl Street. And School Street is named for the Royal School. Oh, not for Commandment up the hill, then. No, it started at where Punchbowl is in Royal, and where Royal School is. It slowly moved toward Kalehi. At one point it was just two blocks long. It went to where Fort Street is, which is now Polly Highway, and there was another school at the corner of School Street and Fort Street. What was its name? I give up. McKinley High School. Oh, sure. It was the Fort Street School at the time. Fort Street School. That's a long way off from Fort Street now. That's why School Street has that name. There were two schools. It was two blocks long. You know, you gotta make brass plaques, I tell ya. Because it's a moving target. I mean, when you learn about the history of one particular institution, it doesn't necessarily have to be in the same place. You know, it's the final destination, or the current destination, of that institution. You know, Bob, we're going on a trip in 10 days' time around Yolani Palace. I haven't even started packing. You should come. We have a docent who's gonna take us to the attic. Oh, no kidding. The attic of Yolani Palace. Wow, that sounds interesting. I've done a tour of Yolani Palace, but not the attic. Yeah, the attic is... You know, they say every museum has an iceberg. You only see one-eighth of the collection. Well, there's an extraordinary collection in the attic of Yolani Palace. You know, I was there two weeks ago. A friend of mine was on a tour, and I was picking her up. And a group of school kids was outside the back of the palace, and they started singing. There was somebody playing ukulele, and all these kids sang. The docents were standing at the top of the steps, and they chanted back to these kids before they entered. It was really beautiful. Oh, yeah, a beautiful guy. We have that. You know, we have it. It's a great tradition we have, and we have to keep it alive. And I think, don't you agree that the challenge is ever greater because we are getting paved over, and we're forgetting, and the idea is to try to remember. I definitely agree with that. And that's why I write a column every week to try and capture some of this history before we have lost it. And that's why people write to you and tell you about other stories. That's why you have such a following, Bob. Yes, and I would have run out of material a long time ago if it wasn't for readers sharing their stories with me. Thank you, Bob Siegel. An author, a columnist, and a great student of Hawaii. Thanks for having me on the show. Aloha.