Every now and then I pause to share some interesting reader comments, questions or leftovers from past columns.
Kiana Wong wrote and thanked me “for igniting a fond memory of a past experience that a girl of thirteen had.”
“I was a true fan of the Monkees,” she told me, “with posters on every wall in my bedroom and every type of merchandise available.”
“My most special memory was waking my sleeping mother around midnight after hearing on KPOI radio that the Monkees would be stopping by the station on their way to their hotel the next morning. I begged her to take me there.
“There was a small crowd, and as the group was entering the back lot of the station, they signed autographs.
“A shy, excited, star-struck teenager found herself looking into the eyes of Davy Jones who hugged and kissed her … ON THE LIPS!!
“I floated away from that parking lot. (Yes, I told my mother and she laughed). Needless to say, no one believed me until I showed them the autographs.
“The memory of that night was one that neither I, nor my mother, forgot, but hadn’t mentioned until your article (Feb. 19), which she gave me to read.
“Mahalo for the flashback of a childhood crush and a mother who let her teenage daughter drag her out of bed to see the Monkees!
“It was my first kiss on the lips and I did go to the concert, but all that I heard was the excited screaming of fans like me!”
— Kiana Wong.
In researching the article I wrote about Waialae Drive-in (Feb 26), I chatted with local theater historian Lowell Angell. We discussed the Royal Theatre on Kuhio Avenue and Kanekapolei Street, where a restaurant stands today. I remember seeing Disney’s “Fantasia” there.
Royal Theatres once had a dozen theaters in the islands. “The Royal was their beautiful flagship theater,” Angell recalled. “It had a room in the lobby with full length portraits of Hawaii’s royalty. I wonder whatever happened to those paintings?
“The theater opened Oct. 15, 1964, and closed in October 1982 — a very brief 18-year lifespan. I assume it was on leased land. It was the last freestanding, single-screen theater to open (I don’t count the Waikiki 1 & 2 multiplex in that), and was never twinned.”
I’ll be speaking to the Friends of Honolulu Botanical Gardens at their annual meeting on March 19. I usually create an interactive quiz for groups like this, and in my research, I came across something I had been looking for for a long time – the original location of the Queen’s Hospital.
William Hillebrand started what we call Foster Botanical Gardens in 1855. He was the first physician at Queen’s. I knew that Queen Emma and King Kamehameha IV opened the Queen’s Hospital temporarily on Fort Street while the current site was being built.
In one of Hillebrand’s writings, he mentions the hospital was near his office at 69 Fort St. The street numbering has changed since then, but that address would have placed the temporary hospital near the foot of Fort Street, near Queen Street I believe.
The legislature approved the founding of a hospital but had no money. Queen Emma and King Kamehameha IV went door-to-door soliciting money to build the hospital. The original site had 18 beds and opened in 1859.
I’ll write more about Hillebrand, the Queen’s Hospital and Foster Gardens in future columns.
Joan Takamori, branch chief of the Public Health Nursing Branch, wrote and asked if I knew why Mabel Smyth is buried next to Lucy Ward at the Makiki Cemetery. They’re not related by blood, she told me.
Mabel Leilani Smyth was her predecessor, the first director of the Territorial Public Health Nursing Department in 1927, at the young age of 35.
My readers may recognize her name, for it adorns the auditorium on the makai grounds of the Queen’s Medical Center.
Smyth and Ward — one of Victoria Ward’s daughters — both directed the Hawaiian Humane Society a decade earlier. Perhaps they were close friends. Do any of my readers know why they are buried next to each other?
On Jan. 29, I wrote about local boy, Alan Lloyd, who remembered B-29s flying over his Makiki Heights home in 1944.
He told me something about runways that I didn’t know. I assumed runways are numbered 1 through however many an airport has. Not true, Lloyd told me. They’re numbered by their compass direction.
“Runways are numbered by their magnetic compass bearing divided by 10. So today at Honolulu Airport there are runways 4 right and 4 left. They are so numbered because they are approximately at 40 degrees on the compass. Runway 8 is pointed at 80 degrees, nearly due east.
“If you had a compass in your hand, and a compass on the airplane’s instrument panel, the runway number (divided by 10) would be the same.”
Most of our planes take off and land into the tradewinds. If Kona winds are blowing, they take off or land in the opposite direction. The same runway is numbered differently for the opposite direction.
Because it’s 180 degrees in the other direction, you add 18, confirms Honolulu air traffic controller Jennifer Shiraishi.
“We use runways 8 left and 8 right, and 4 left and 4 right at Honolulu during trades,” Shiraishi says, “and runways 26 left and 26 right and 22 left and 22 right during Kona winds.”
I’ve written about Read Aloud America before in my column (Dec. 28, 2012). Read Aloud America is a Hawaii-based nonprofit that puts on programs in island public schools. It urges parents to turn off electronic screens Monday through Thursday and read to their children.
Founder Jed Gaines told me this week that 10 authors have gotten together and created a new book. All the proceeds benefit Read Aloud America and its Hawaii programs.
“Paradise, Passion, Murder: Ten Tales of Mystery From Hawaii” is available at some local bookstores and Amazon.com.
Bob Sigall, author of the Companies We Keep books, looks through his collection of old photos to tell stories each Friday of Hawaii people, places and companies. Email him at Sigall@Yahoo.com.
