Aloha! Please join us and our friends from the Historic Hawai‘i Foundation on Thursday, July 8, to learn about the most endangered historic sites in Hawai‘i and efforts to save them. That’s the date for Pau Hana with a Purpose, 6 p.m.-8 p.m. at the Design Within Reach Studio on the top level of Ala Moana Center (next to Nordstrom). This event is free and open to the public; no reservations are required. Wine and refreshments will be served. Meet some of us from the Friends of the Natatorium and from HHF, and talk also with the dedicated folks working
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HPR reports on Memorial Day service at the Natatorium
Hawai’i Public Radio’s Adrienne LaFrance was on hand for Sunday’s 22nd annual Memorial Day ceremony at the Natatorium and filed a report that aired Monday and Tuesday. The story does a fine job of both capturing the spirit of the event and updating listeners on the natatorium issue. One excerpt from the story seems particularly worth thinking about. It quotes our keynote speaker at Sunday’s ceremony, Lieutenant General Benjamin Mixon, commanding general of the U.S. Army, Pacific. LaFrance observes that “veterans from World War I, the soldiers the memorial was built to honor, are no longer alive to see it.”
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Photos from the Natatorium's Memorial Day Service
Mahalo to everyone who joined us at the Natatorium on Sunday for our 22nd annual Memorial Day observance! It was a beautiful day and a memorable morning: thought-provoking addresses by our speakers, Lieutenant General Benjamin Mixon and Kim Napier; beautiful, meaningful vocal and hula performances; the inspirational participation of our military men and women and the King’s Guard; the presence of so many veterans. Here are just a few photographs from the ceremony. To see more on Flickr, click here. For a slideshow, click here. Another set of photos is available on Picasa here. A Picasa slideshow here. Thanks again!
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Events, Hula, Images, Memorial Day, Uncategorized, and Veterans.
Benjamin Mixon, Kim Napier, and Memorial Day.
Benjamin Mixon, Kim Napier, and Memorial Day.
Join us: Memorial observance at the Natatorium on Sunday
Please join us this Sunday morning, May 30, for the 22nd annual Memorial Service at the Waikiki Natatorium. We remember Hawai’i’s soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines with music, hula and oratory. And we do so at the place dedicated to their memory by the people of our state. A music and hula prelude starts at 9:30 a.m. and our moving formal ceremony begins at 10 a.m. This year’s theme is “Ku pa’a i ka ho’ihi, ka ho’omana’o, me ka ho’ala,” or “Committed to Respect, Remembrance and Renewal.” Our keynote speaker, representing veterans and active duty military personnel, will be Lieutenant
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Events, Hula, Memorial Day, Uncategorized, and Veterans.
City Contracts Demolition EIS as Memorial Day Weekend Begins
Honolulu Weekly is out with an update on the Natatorium fight. The bottom line: As we head into Memorial Day weekend, the city is inching ahead with efforts to (unbelievably) demolish Hawai’i’s official memorial to World War I soldiers and sailors. Veterans, preservationists, environmentalists and — importantly — the law and regulations stand in the way of those efforts. As you’ll read in the Weekly’s story, the Friends of the Natatorium are still fighting. We’re confident of victory, but the fight may be a long and hard one. What can you do? You can contribute to the cause. You can
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Swimming at the Heart of "Living Memorial" Design
It was a bold, out-of-the-box decision to build a pool – a pool “of Olympic proportions” – as Hawai’i’s official World War I memorial. The story of the Natatorium’s conception, design and construction is told in the final chapter of the 1928 book Hawaii in the World War by Ralph S. Kuykendall. That chapter is available online here. In fact, the entire book is online, starting here. It’s well worth reading. And it’s well worth remembering the words of Gov. Wallace Rider Farrington to the Territorial Legislature of 1927, arguing for the rapid completion of the entire memorial: “We should
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Save the Date! Memorial Day Service on Sunday, May 30th
You are invited to the 22nd annual Memorial Day Service at one of Hawai’i’s most important monuments to America’s military heroes: The Waikiki War Memorial Natatorium. Mark your calendar: 10 a.m., Sunday, May 30 (the day before Memorial Day), in Kapiolani Park right outside the Natatorium’s gate. We gather there every year to commemorate Hawaii’s honored war dead in speech, ceremony, song and dance. We gather there because the Natatorium stands as a symbol of the freedom and of the American way of life preserved for us by the men and women who have fought in all our nation’s wars.
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Hokule'a Crewman, Beachboy and Waterman: Clifford Ah Mow is Remembered at the Natatorium
Hundreds gathered at the Waikiki War Memorial Natatorium Sunday to remember an icon: waterman, lifeguard and surfer Clifford Ah Mow. Ah Mow was one of the 17 original crewmen of the canoe Hokule’a; in 1976, they piloted the double-hulled craft from Hawai’I to Tahiti without modern instruments to demonstrate that Polynesians could indeed have navigated far and wide across the open Pacific long before the arrival of Europeans. It was a feat intended not only to support an important historical theory about the origins of the Polynesian people, but also to focus pride and revitalize Hawaiian culture. After remembrances at
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The Natatorium: The place to be
Here’s a slideshow of some wonderful historic photos of the Waikiki War Memorial Natatorium, unearthed in the collections of the Hawai’i State Archives. Several of them show the Natatorium as it was meant to be: A living memorial to Hawai’i’s honored war dead, a lively, active fun place where families and athletes and all of us could enjoy the freedom preserved for us by our warriors’ sacrifices. For so many years, the Natatorium truly was the place to be. It can be again. It should be again. For so many reasons: Because of the debt of honor we owe to
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Natatorium dancers seek courageous followers!
Here’s something fun… with an important lesson. Check it out. Yeah, sure; it’s true. Sometimes, we here at natatorium.org feel like the Dancing Guy, the lone nut out there trying to tell people how important it is to pay attention to one of the Hawai’i’s great treasures, how important it is to keep faith with the men and women who died, how important it is to be true to our history and culture. And the lone nut needs a first follower. And a second. Because, after all, “Three is a crowd, and a crowd is news.” And a crowd can
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