Absolutely incredible film - thank you for presenting it. Only 13 years after 'the event'. Earliest known surfing footage - so much makes this a priceless historical document.
Such bittersweet memories harkening back to a time when Hawaii was a completely different place, land in time. The twentieth century is still in its infancy. Everyone old enough remembers their life and lives in the 19th century, a time of cowboys, horse-drawn carriages, and oil-lit lamps. Everyone eagerly anticipates the changes that advancements in technology will bring. Hawaii has been a U.S. possession for barely ten years yet has rapidly been absorbed into the rest of America. The local people, still a large number of remaining native Hawaiians, are bemused by the increasing numbers of haole (Caucasian) tourists, wearing their heavy, head-to-toes clothing in the tropical Hawaiian climate which would have been torrid if not for the year-round trade winds that help cool the islands. It's not like 2022 where the tourists happily stroll the streets and beaches in shorts, t-shirts, tank tops, and flip-flips, scanty clothing that would have scandalized their haole forebearers. It's not all rosy memories of course. The middle class is small in the Hawaiian islands. Most locals live at a simple level of existence, just making ends meet yet accustomed to their way of life. No one in 1906 can even begin to imagine the vast social, economic, political, and technological changes coming their way in mere decades. Even thirty years from then, Hawaii will be much different. Another thirty years will see an unrecognizable Hawaii and then into the 21st century, everything before is a dim, distant memory.
The Hawaiians at this time had the first railroad west of the Mississippi and the electric lights in the Governor's Mansion and the people were very fluent in 2 or 3 languages, Hawaiian, English, either Chinese or Japanese or Portugues...it was far more civilized than most know. They have so many more accomplishments Mahalo nui loa Aloha
@@RVTraveler Sanibel Island was another place spoiled by development. I used to vacation there back in the 60's when we could rent private cottages by the week . Most of the time you had plenty of room on the beaches and could find nice sea shells. Went back 25 years later and it was a bunch of high rise hotels where the cottages were ...and people lying on the beach lined up like so many walruses . It was really sad. Have no desire to go back.
I am hawaiian born and raised.. and this for some odd reason is really cool to watch and sad at the same time. A more simple time... can still fish, live off the land, the beaches i am sure the reefs were more healthy. Better waves back then..
I was in Waikiki for three years a few years ago. Lived on a boat in the Ala Wai and in Kewalo Basin before Wailana Cafe and Chart House were pau (RIP) Had a moped and rode it from Waikiki to the North Shore and back. I think Israel's song Hawaii '78 sums up modern Hawaii perfectly - beautiful and sad. The most Hawaiian thing I saw was a rodeo at Kualoa Ranch. Hawaiians are 100% comfortable on horses and Ill bet they freaked out when the first horses came to Hawaii. And i'll bet they had the cowboy thing dialed in no time. I have watched all these films at the Bishop and modern Waikiki makes me sad because I know what was there when it was feral and wild and still Hawaiian. Imagine if they turned Hanalei Valley into Waikiki? That's how sad it is,. We need that megatsunami to sweep over from the Big Island and take it all back to palm groves and swamps.
Wow that's back when my grandfather was born there. I was born there in the 60's and is still way different than today. I end up tears every time I go to Waikiki and see how it has become.
Participants????? I doubt there were any contracts for participation. But if you're interested to know more, a publication called "The Atlantic" claims that The Honolulu Advertiser of 1906 AUG 12 encouraged surfers to come and be filmed surfing at Waikiki that afternoon, and that The Daily Pacific Commercial Advertiser had an item about it the next day. You can find and read those 1906 newspapers on microfilm at UHM, and maybe at the HSL main branch.
I arrived in Hawaii in 1944 (Navy).There were fancy stores on King St., but the second floors were Cat Houses ( $2, I think.) The shore patrol was stationed there, to keep the long lines of Sailors from blocking the store entrances,
It's still that way today it's just kept on the down low. Every single club, bar, spa and massage parlor is a brothel, trafficked women are pimped out for sex in the back rooms. And nobody seems to care. Hell century tower is a 40 story brothel! The cops raid one or two a year to make it look like they and the city council members aren't regular customers. Human trafficking is Hawaii's 2nd industry behind tourism, which kind of feed each other.
@@Lw2201 Corruption goes all the way to the top when it comes to trafficking. Out of country syndicates and ties to DC, Wall Street, and Military Industrial Conplex, anyone whose grown up here can tell you. If not for the syndicates that do exist, we would have cartels and mainland street gangs. I would take our current situation over cartels and organized mainland street gangs any day. Too much military and white collar heavy hitters here for trashy street gangs and cartels
@@crouchingwombathiddenquoll5641 Yes thats true, Im 57 born and raised on Oahu since I was born. My mom passed away last year, two of my brothers and my sis have all passed away. I long for the times when we were young playing on the beach at Sandys or the North Shore. Let me tell you, it goes by so so fast. My mom sis and bro are buried in Punchbowl and one bros ashes was spread off of Waimea Bay, so thats brings me a sense of peace atleast.
@@ikaikamaleko8370 you have some wonderful memories of your childhood and family. Sorry for your loss, my Father passed 2004. I think more about him and our good time's more now than when he was here. I just look at the breeze in the tree tops and he is right here , reminding me of his good advise. 🤙🌴🌅
To be Hana’s has given me a chance to understand the values taught by my father, he was a fisherman and we always supplemented our simple lifestyle with food grown on our land. 1960’s in Hau’ula, Hawaii.
Wow, did that take me back home. I wish there was some films from Kailua, also. But back then it was just a mule trail to get to Kailua. Terrific, THank you for posting this video.
As recently as the mid-60s there was a group of native Hawaiians that lived up by Paki School that would go out in their catamarans early each morning and land, loaded with fish, midmorning on Waikiki by the 12 coconuts. It was fun being a kid in those days.
This is so freaking cool! Love this! And now I’m researching more and learning even more. I would love to visit and learn more history than the touristy stuff! These amazing scenes are priceless.
George R Carter was territorial governor at this time and was married to the daughter of Eastman Kodak's co founder, Henry Strong, also a good friend of Edison's. Eastman Kodak provided Edison with the company's new 35mm celluloid film around 1890. This connection may have been the reason Edison traveled to Hawaii.
Coulda thrown it in the water would make no difference for the camera man. To be fair the net was thrown in the water, what difference did the reef make?
I must have posted before on my wife's email. My mom still lives in Kailua, Kaimake Loop, which used to be a horse racing track back in the day. Way back. But about the time of this film for sure.
Back before Hawaii wasn't flooded with tourists 😔 such a beautiful people Hawaii nei was back then. It's still beautiful, but not as much now as it was back then.
@@benjaminmarcus17 im talking about there being nothing around it. I lived on Oahu for several years and you had to be right up on it to see it unobstructed but in this video they are pretty far away.
@@JackofAllTrades1 That pier was a bit obstructed. But the typical picturistique view we always had of diamond head is still the same today, unobstructed.
@@house_greyjoy I would be willing to bet back then you could stand in what is now the Ala Moana area and see Diamondhead easily. You couldn't do that today, too many tall hotels and apartments.
24:05 that's Moana Surfriders resort...it's still there, of course renovated....I stayed there...Beautiful Hawaii you are the diamond of the earth first chance I get I'll visit you again
Robert Bonine. He went to Alaska to shoot the 1896 Klondike Gold Rush. I've been up there and have some idea of what he went through the drag all his gear up there. Came back to find his camera was out of register and he got bupkiss. Edison was pissed and fired him, but apparently they kissed and made up and he shot this 10 years later.
This reminds me of my first trip to Hawaii. I shot over 80 rolls of slide film alone. I also shot 200 rolls of negative film. I was so taken by Hawaii that I moved here over 30 years ago. I haven't been to the mainland in over 24 years. Hawaii is like home to me.
A few years before my time but I still remember a lot of it - a time when life was good, we trusted people - those days are gone - that’s what is called “PROGRESS”!!!
Filmmaker had the camera on a tripod with pan head and didn't wave it about the way cell phone shooters seem to like to do. The rule is to move at about 1/10th the speed you were thinking of. Moving camera makes viewers ill at ease. Let the action do the moving. Your device is not a fire hose. Tom Edison told me that. (Is my nose getting really long?)
Ok the video is definitely historical. Looking back on to what hawaii once was before the heavy influence of America. But the fact that Thomas Edison was behnd the camera makes it even more interesting
Tahiti and Bora Bora sort of seem like Hawaii of old. Only because it's more expensive to get there, so it hasn't been as built up and crowded with tourists.
Thanks for this footage. Impressions: 1. Everyone is wearing full dress suits with ties. Wow. When it's mid-summer, no wind, no cold drinks available around every corner...you'd fricking die. 2. Everything seems so much drier: haole koa and keawe trees everywhere. You see this in the old pictures as well. Now instead of fields of pili grass to make your shacks you just have houses. 3. Working for the sugar plantations was no joke. Hot, cruelling, mind-numbing work, day after day. 4. Interesting how the vestiages of this time can still be seen...the bridge going into Haleiwa Town, the corner of Kalakaua Ave and Monserrat at Kapiolani Park, Queen's Surf....all recognizable, but different. 5. I don't know why the filmmakers thought all the images of industry were so interesting. Has to be the arrogance of US haoles back then who were saying: "Look at how industrious everything is!!! Progress!!! Hard work!!! We're making so much money here!!" Ugh.
5. No. These films were shown in New York City in Edison's store for 5-cents a viewing. Lots of businessmen around Wall Street were the customers (because they had the spare cash), so there was always interest in industry and how things were made, processed, transported.
@@davidb2206 Hmmm...that's interesting. Thanks for the info. I didn't realize that the making of these films had that type of an angle, especially when the "industry" clips presented here were grouped with footage of waves crashing on rocks, people goofing around in the water, surfing, Pa-u riders, and so on. Edison was always looking for ways to make money. But you think about it, charging 5 cents to view clips of industrial processes with people (whom Wall Street types at that time certainly viewed as inferior) working shitty jobs in some far off place kind of has the same connotation, doesn't it? IDK...just my take on it.
@@jaydubya3698 No. Huge fascination of the Wall Street and business guys with foreign peoples and simpler ways at this time. This is what led to the huge capital investment in the Panama Canal and the full-on investment in the Philippines for DECADES before WWII gave them independence. You will find there were even hit songs (on Broadway, in NYC of course) in that 1906-1920 era that claimed to be "island music" or "Hawaiian songs" or "Pacific melodies."
Yes it will be better in a few years. After all the wars that are coming, there will be peace for millennia. Man has created weapons to destroy himself.
Look at Europe. You’ve still got a lot of slender people because they live how the human body is designed: you’re constant moving and you can eat what you please… as long as it’s healthy.
or with Princess Ka'iulani , he was friends with her father, Gov.Archibald Cleghorn , also from Scotland. R.L.S. wrote a poem for her before she was shipped off to Europe.
@@bernieweber4663 How interesting! Fun fact: My great uncle through marriage was the chief electrical engineer who put electricity on Maui. I was told the year was 1912. Later he headed the company (MECO)
@@Cherrysmith2809 that's great that you have that history. It would be neat for Honolulu to have electric trolleys again. And on King Street some light rail with lines running down to the beach. Same in Maui too.
@ 12:50 Hawaiians looked very different back then before intermarriage. I think the only place where they still look like this is on Ni'ihau, also the only place where Hawaiian is spoken on a daily basis. This film was made just 13 years after the monarchy was overthrown.
I was thinking the same thing, I have lived in Hilo Hawaii and still do, for 45 years and no one looks like that anymore, my how we have left our footprints..
At the 01:10 time code mark. and in the center far distance of the image, can be seen the scaffolding erected for the expansion of the "Sans Souci Guest House", into what would become the first multi-story "luxury hotel" on Waikiki Beach - the Sans Souci Hotel - the hotel that is famous as Robert Louis Stevenson stayed there in 1893 on his 2nd trip to Hawai'i... sometime in the 1980's, it reverted to the current "Sans Souci Condominium Complex". The first hotel on Waikiki Beach was the Moana Hotel (now the 2 times larger Moana Surfrider Westin Resort complex) but the Moana Hotel of 1906 was not even close to being "a luxury hotel". The makai side (oceanfront side) of the Moana Hotel can be seen at the 01:25 time code mark.
Apparently the first time surfers filmed and maybe first time bodyboarder too. Little would they know of how the surfing culture would be in 117 years, or that they would be seen in 117 years!!
38:46 What to say? I cringe at how roughly they seem to be handling the sheep, but I'm sure they are under pressure to move them through and, to be honest, the sheep probably have easier lives than the shearers do. If the sheep are bothered by it, they don't show it much. But, despite industrialization having been well underway in some places, it's a glimpse of what life was like before electricity, before the internal combustion and steam engines, and before all the things we take for granted, for better or worse, today. There were almost no fat people; these guys were a lot stronger and fitter than most people their age are today, but the line between employment and slavery was even more blurred then than it is today.
I'm old enough to remember having pork lau lau and poi at the old Kona store. Went back in 2017, a whole lotta haolis and chi chi. Sad, not for what was lost, that's gone, but for all the haolis who sit there with no idea what was lost or what it was like then.
That is a US-centric electric lamp I think. At the time, they looked a lot like gas lamps. They were all over the US, Hawaii, Philippines, etc. The Spanish versions in the Philippines were pretty cool looking, as Phil had some electric lighting pretty early (tho' they could have been gas street lights- not sure).
What you meant to say was..."13 years after America overthrew our Queen." Thus causing us to eat cheap, easy to make, shitty food, because we now have a minimum amount of land to work, for it to provide for us. Then introducing drugs to our native people so they run a continuous loop of poverty while forgetting the language and culture. P.S Spam is great .
@@kanakahawaii6860 This has happened to many tribes, not just Kanaka / Hawaiian... leading to obesity and diabetes. And more diseases due to continual over consumption of non traditional / unhealthy foods. :: Can't stand the stuff. Too much like the crappy food forced onto American servicemen known as "rations".. Other countries servicemen get real food.
12:50 Great point. You see this what they're pounding here. Thats the stuff my ancestors used to cultivate daily. Now they have machines to do it 🙄 The good part is we can still teach the children of today these ways . But you're right , it's some crap shit given to our native people. Mahalo for your knowledge 🤙🤙
What would you do if you were born in 1886 and saw these films at the ago of 20? I would escape from my hum drum 1906 life and go to sea. I would have wanderlust. The call of the sea is relentless. Yet, the number of people who actually do anything for the love of wanderlust is probably 1 in 1,000.
great documentation of the terrible American invasion of Hawaii. 100 years later basically nothing has changed just new investors keep the demolition of culture and traditions in the name of development and science.
Yup, they used to call it - Manifest Destiny. A noble title to sugar coat taking advantage of natural resources while subjugating the indigenous people for military and financial gain .
@@harryknackers7892 could live without Apple phone and would gladly eat poi all day long...and surf in unpolluted waters all day long ..and be happy to never see a white boy
And while you're at it, don't use the white man's toilet paper, toothbrush, deodorant, shampoo, soap, plumbing, electricity, gas, clothing, stove, refrigerator, AC, TV, microwave, guitar, radio, stereo, CD, DVD, computer, phones, car, truck, van, SUV, bus, train, rail, airplane, jet ski, fiberglass surfboards, housewares, tools, medicines, foods, and drinks. And of course, don't use the white man's internet and UA-cam.
![The beautiful Hawaiian islands in 1906 in color! [AI enhanced & colorized]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Y2dcFlJ2pso/mqdefault.jpg)
![The beautiful Hawaiian islands in 1906 in color! [AI enhanced & colorized]](/img/tr.png)
Absolutely incredible film - thank you for presenting it. Only 13 years after 'the event'. Earliest known surfing footage - so much makes this a priceless historical document.
Such bittersweet memories harkening back to a time when Hawaii was a completely different place, land in time. The twentieth century is still in its infancy. Everyone old enough remembers their life and lives in the 19th century, a time of cowboys, horse-drawn carriages, and oil-lit lamps. Everyone eagerly anticipates the changes that advancements in technology will bring.
Hawaii has been a U.S. possession for barely ten years yet has rapidly been absorbed into the rest of America.
The local people, still a large number of remaining native Hawaiians, are bemused by the increasing numbers of haole (Caucasian) tourists, wearing their heavy, head-to-toes clothing in the tropical Hawaiian climate which would have been torrid if not for the year-round trade winds that help cool the islands. It's not like 2022 where the tourists happily stroll the streets and beaches in shorts, t-shirts, tank tops, and flip-flips, scanty clothing that would have scandalized their haole forebearers.
It's not all rosy memories of course. The middle class is small in the Hawaiian islands. Most locals live at a simple level of existence, just making ends meet yet accustomed to their way of life. No one in 1906 can even begin to imagine the vast social, economic, political, and technological changes coming their way in mere decades. Even thirty years from then, Hawaii will be much different. Another thirty years will see an unrecognizable Hawaii and then into the 21st century, everything before is a dim, distant memory.
The Hawaiians at this time had the first railroad west of the Mississippi and the electric lights in the Governor's Mansion and the people were very fluent in 2 or 3 languages,
Hawaiian, English, either Chinese or Japanese or Portugues...it was far more civilized than most know.
They have so many more accomplishments
Mahalo nui loa
Aloha
Yes a very astute and informative revelation that has more than likely and notably unknown to
But I do believe that the railroad came to Deadwood SD by the 1880s...
Wasn't the governors mansion. It was the queens palace that had electricity first.
@@aprilfogel4317 Iolani Palace had electric lights before the White House did .
They composed and played music on instruments that were very new to them , and did it so beautifully .
It's awesome to see actual footage of the harbor before the Aloha Tower, and Waikiki before the Ala Wai.
So tragic what's been lost. This was paradise back then!
So was California
So were the Florida Keys
Just the difference I've seen from the 80s until now is sad.
@@RVTraveler Sanibel Island was another place spoiled by development. I used to vacation there back in the 60's when we could rent private cottages by the week .
Most of the time you had plenty of room on the beaches and could find nice sea shells.
Went back 25 years later and it was a bunch of high rise hotels where the cottages were ...and people lying on the beach lined up like so many walruses . It was really sad. Have no desire to go back.
sean-except for the mistreatment of animals I would agree.
I am hawaiian born and raised.. and this for some odd reason is really cool to watch and sad at the same time. A more simple time... can still fish, live off the land, the beaches i am sure the reefs were more healthy. Better waves back then..
I was in Waikiki for three years a few years ago.
Lived on a boat in the Ala Wai and in Kewalo Basin before Wailana Cafe and Chart House were pau (RIP)
Had a moped and rode it from Waikiki to the North Shore and back. I think Israel's song Hawaii '78 sums up modern Hawaii perfectly - beautiful and sad.
The most Hawaiian thing I saw was a rodeo at Kualoa Ranch. Hawaiians are 100% comfortable on horses and Ill bet they freaked out when the first horses came to Hawaii.
And i'll bet they had the cowboy thing dialed in no time.
I have watched all these films at the Bishop and modern Waikiki makes me sad because I know what was there when it was feral and wild and still Hawaiian.
Imagine if they turned Hanalei Valley into Waikiki? That's how sad it is,.
We need that megatsunami to sweep over from the Big Island and take it all back to palm groves and swamps.
Amazing how well-preserved this is
Wow that's back when my grandfather was born there. I was born there in the 60's and is still way different than today. I end up tears every time I go to Waikiki and see how it has become.
Yep, all you see is Japanese people and Gucci stores.
And fat white tourists
@@rayman17578 Saying a Japanese person is Japanese... is now "racist" ? You sound like someone who is too easily offended.
@@rayman17578 Being that you incorrectly wrote "your" instead of "you're" ... you're probably an idiot.
@@orion7873and that’s a great thing for Hawaii
This was a gem to watch, I saw a structure in Chinatown from the video still standing today. Damn
Thanks!
Thank you very much for your generosity and support. It’s much appreciated. 🙏🏼
Born and raised in Maui! Thank you for sharing!
So sorry and sad about the devastation in Lahaina!
My thoughts and prayers to the families who lost their loved ones and homes!
I love seeing this old film. But as Native Hawaiian, I feel bittersweet that the names of the participants are not recorded anywhere.
😢
I don't believe anyone was identified.
Participants????? I doubt there were any contracts for participation. But if you're interested to know more, a publication called "The Atlantic" claims that The Honolulu Advertiser of 1906 AUG 12 encouraged surfers to come and be filmed surfing at Waikiki that afternoon, and that The Daily Pacific Commercial Advertiser had an item about it the next day. You can find and read those 1906 newspapers on microfilm at UHM, and maybe at the HSL main branch.
It really is sad. Its a loss. and selfishly unaware.
Why would they be?
Wow. Back in the day when there were still people who remembered when Hawaii was free.
china will come... if you let her. Then after, there would be nothing left.
I arrived in Hawaii in 1944 (Navy).There were fancy stores on King St., but the second floors were Cat Houses ( $2, I think.) The shore patrol was stationed there, to keep the long lines of Sailors from blocking the store entrances,
It's still that way today it's just kept on the down low. Every single club, bar, spa and massage parlor is a brothel, trafficked women are pimped out for sex in the back rooms. And nobody seems to care. Hell century tower is a 40 story brothel! The cops raid one or two a year to make it look like they and the city council members aren't regular customers. Human trafficking is Hawaii's 2nd industry behind tourism, which kind of feed each other.
@@Lw2201 Corruption goes all the way to the top when it comes to trafficking. Out of country syndicates and ties to DC, Wall Street, and Military Industrial Conplex, anyone whose grown up here can tell you. If not for the syndicates that do exist, we would have cartels and mainland street gangs. I would take our current situation over cartels and organized mainland street gangs any day. Too much military and white collar heavy hitters here for trashy street gangs and cartels
@@Lw2201⁰
I was just there in November of 2020, still feels great to have been in that exact location!!!
Feels weird watching this. Crazy to see all these young ppl and to know most of them have passed away by now, trippy.
All those young people saying ok boomer comes to mind. We all get old , if we are lucky.
@@crouchingwombathiddenquoll5641 Yes thats true, Im 57 born and raised on Oahu since I was born. My mom passed away last year, two of my brothers and my sis have all passed away. I long for the times when we were young playing on the beach at Sandys or the North Shore. Let me tell you, it goes by so so fast. My mom sis and bro are buried in Punchbowl and one bros ashes was spread off of Waimea Bay, so thats brings me a sense of peace atleast.
@@ikaikamaleko8370 peace my friend. I am 1963 also.
All the best from Australia 🌏
@@crouchingwombathiddenquoll5641 🤙🌴🌅
@@ikaikamaleko8370 you have some wonderful memories of your childhood and family. Sorry for your loss, my Father passed 2004. I think more about him and our good time's more now than when he was here. I just look at the breeze in the tree tops and he is right here , reminding me of his good advise. 🤙🌴🌅
To be Hana’s has given me a chance to understand the values taught by my father, he was a fisherman and we always supplemented our simple lifestyle with food grown on our land. 1960’s in Hau’ula, Hawaii.
Thank you for this FASCINATING film !!
thanks so much for posting. A great recording of history.
Certainly won't see that time again, WOW that was cool
I love this film of the old days of Hawaii amazing and inspiring
"The Float" at 27:42 looked like the stage at a Minor Threat show in the early '80's. Great video, mahalo for posting.
Hahaha it realise does the first slam dancers for sure should add some threat tunes to it
Such a good call 🤙
Wow, did that take me back home. I wish there was some films from Kailua, also. But back then it was just a mule trail to get to Kailua. Terrific, THank you for posting this video.
Serious? You lived back in 1906?
Big Island or Oahu? My Dad is from Kailua, Oahu
@@The.Hawaiian.Kingdom totally(I'm from Cali)lol
@@The.Hawaiian.Kingdom my dad passed in 2017 he was born in 1939 graduated in 1957 ❤️ Paul Reyes
@@The.Hawaiian.Kingdom 😂thingy. Possibly, that is if she went to Kailua HS? If she did, I have his Year Book and I can find her picture ⚡
As recently as the mid-60s there was a group of native Hawaiians that lived up by Paki School that would go out in their catamarans early each morning and land, loaded with fish, midmorning on Waikiki by the 12 coconuts. It was fun being a kid in those days.
footage was pretty good for 1906. Cool to see bits of the sugar and cattle industry.
wow @29:12 you can see a guy pumping to try to stay in the wave as it flattens out
It kinda gave me goosebumps at 16:12 & 21:17..... Passing through Halawa/Aiea Pearl Harbor and King Street Downtown Honolulu
This is so freaking cool! Love this! And now I’m researching more and learning even more. I would love to visit and learn more history than the touristy stuff! These amazing scenes are priceless.
they paved paradise and put in a parking lot !!!
Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone?
🌴😎🌈Aloha
George R Carter was territorial governor at this time and was married to the daughter of Eastman Kodak's co founder, Henry Strong, also a good friend of Edison's. Eastman Kodak provided Edison with the company's new 35mm celluloid film around 1890. This connection may have been the reason Edison traveled to Hawaii.
Apparently Edison sent a cameraman, Robert Bonine, and did not visit Hawaii himself.
That is a very amazing piece of information, and would agree probably the reason the Edison Company filmed these stunning scenes.
It makes me glad I grew up in Hawai’i. It was a great childhood, and young adulthood. But also glad I moved to CA in 1972.
Just unbelievable video you have hear will save for sure
Aloha
super video, j'adore thomas edison!!!!!!!!!
the cast netting scene probably done for the camera man, no cast netter would deliberately throw nets on rocks
Coulda thrown it in the water would make no difference for the camera man. To be fair the net was thrown in the water, what difference did the reef make?
Love to know more history of the islands!
I must have posted before on my wife's email. My mom still lives in Kailua, Kaimake Loop, which used to be a horse racing track back in the day. Way back. But about the time of this film for sure.
Amazing footage
Fishing in Hilo: Ow, Ow, Auwe! Rocks are sharp!!
I currently live in Waikiki, but I was surprised that the nature of the beach and the city view of King ST are completely different.
Well it has been 115 years.
You can't be serious...smh
Now the natives live in tents on the beaches. And we live in condominiums looking down on them. I’m sad.
What an amazing movie of old Hawai'i 🏝️ I thank You very much for sharing 🌺 mahalo nui 💐 and I love Your YT-channel focusing surving the waves 🌊
Mark
it's crazy thats 120 years ago
Back before Hawaii wasn't flooded with tourists 😔 such a beautiful people Hawaii nei was back then. It's still beautiful, but not as much now as it was back then.
It was even more beautiful before humans showed up to colonize the hawaiian archipelago.
@@sunnysied713 , Serious? When you say humans, do you mean Hawaiians?
Statehood was granted in 1959 .
@@hoksipgau. Hawaiians are humans.
Tourists aren't the worst issue for us hawaiians, they bring income. But the foreigners that came to hawaii and stayed are the problem
Beauty in the raw ❤️
Wow, never saw diamond head so unobstructed before.
Actually Diamond Head remains one of the most untoched Hawaiian monuments on Oahu. Doesnt look much different then to now, which is good.
@@benjaminmarcus17 im talking about there being nothing around it. I lived on Oahu for several years and you had to be right up on it to see it unobstructed but in this video they are pretty far away.
@@JackofAllTrades1 That pier was a bit obstructed. But the typical picturistique view we always had of diamond head is still the same today, unobstructed.
@@house_greyjoy I would be willing to bet back then you could stand in what is now the Ala Moana area and see Diamondhead easily. You couldn't do that today, too many tall hotels and apartments.
24:05 that's Moana Surfriders resort...it's still there, of course renovated....I stayed there...Beautiful Hawaii you are the diamond of the earth first chance I get I'll visit you again
Amazing isn't it? Waikiki's first hotel!
Edison himself shot this? fine quality for its day, even without soundtrack
Robert Bonine. He went to Alaska to shoot the 1896 Klondike Gold Rush. I've been up there and have some idea of what he went through the drag all his gear up there. Came back to find his camera was out of register and he got bupkiss. Edison was pissed and fired him, but apparently they kissed and made up and he shot this 10 years later.
This reminds me of my first trip to Hawaii. I shot over 80 rolls of slide film alone. I also shot 200 rolls of negative film.
I was so taken by Hawaii that I moved here over 30 years ago. I haven't been to the mainland in over 24 years. Hawaii is like home to me.
As a Hawaiian dis makes me sad to watch to see what our Aina has became today😔💪🏾💪🏾💪🏾💯
I’m not Hawaiian but makes me sad too!
Although my wife and I live there
Ho bruddah!
@@hroman5 Aloha Palala
@@IM-eo2vg Stupid Comment . Republican that hates California , aren't you?
A few years before my time but I still remember a lot of it - a time when life was good, we trusted people - those days are gone - that’s what is called “PROGRESS”!!!
Saw a dude doing the Huntington hop. Over a hundred years ago...Yeww!
that was rad , thanks
Filmmaker had the camera on a tripod with pan head and didn't wave it about the way cell phone shooters seem to like to do. The rule is to move at about 1/10th the speed you were thinking of. Moving camera makes viewers ill at ease. Let the action do the moving. Your device is not a fire hose. Tom Edison told me that. (Is my nose getting really long?)
I was taught never to drop names. In fact, it was Bob Hope who told me that.
Hawai'i was overthrown only 13 years prior to this video.. these people lived it.. makes me sad.
1:29 they cast the nets for the camera. Never would one cast a net over rocks like that as it damages the net... only over sand or mud.
32:03 lol all the Silva's and Tiexeira's riding horses.
This really makes me wish I never moved away
You see that traffic jam leaving the luau? It’s like the H1 but more lanes.
All those surfboards and small boats were made of wood. All the clothing was cotton, linen, wool or leather.
The old timers of 1906 probably decried the development pictured here. And the old timers before them probably did the same. Maybe not.
Ten minutes in and I have seen maybe one overweight person - and he was one of two passengers on a rowboat.
Ok the video is definitely historical. Looking back on to what hawaii once was before the heavy influence of America. But the fact that Thomas Edison was behnd the camera makes it even more interesting
Apparently it wasn’t him but instead someone who worked for him
Da days of pidgin in progress!
I think that in 1906 this was the longgest film at time
Interesting.
Seeing this film at that time would have been an event.
The Moana Surfrider at 24:13
The paniolo are really tough!
The men walking around in suits baffles me? Just sayin...
PS love the railroads...wish they would bring back!
the precursor to JOB Vlogs
I was expecting him to suddenly pop out of nowhere and yell "start the music!"
@@willybabbit totally! :)
Even Hawaii today looks nothing at all like it did in 1969 when I first visited there.
Tahiti and Bora Bora sort of seem like Hawaii of old. Only because it's more expensive to get there, so it hasn't been as built up and crowded with tourists.
1986 was first time for me when I got married there
I can eat butter watching this all day 👍
Good man.
Just imagine what it was like before man.
it was made FOR man
@@rudybegonia2544 the film or the island?
@@InnisArden the girls
@@rudybegonia2544 k
Thanks for this footage. Impressions:
1. Everyone is wearing full dress suits with ties. Wow. When it's mid-summer, no wind, no cold drinks available around every corner...you'd fricking die.
2. Everything seems so much drier: haole koa and keawe trees everywhere. You see this in the old pictures as well. Now instead of fields of pili grass to make your shacks you just have houses.
3. Working for the sugar plantations was no joke. Hot, cruelling, mind-numbing work, day after day.
4. Interesting how the vestiages of this time can still be seen...the bridge going into Haleiwa Town, the corner of Kalakaua Ave and Monserrat at Kapiolani Park, Queen's Surf....all recognizable, but different.
5. I don't know why the filmmakers thought all the images of industry were so interesting. Has to be the arrogance of US haoles back then who were saying: "Look at how industrious everything is!!! Progress!!! Hard work!!! We're making so much money here!!" Ugh.
5. No. These films were shown in New York City in Edison's store for 5-cents a viewing. Lots of businessmen around Wall Street were the customers (because they had the spare cash), so there was always interest in industry and how things were made, processed, transported.
@@davidb2206 Hmmm...that's interesting. Thanks for the info. I didn't realize that the making of these films had that type of an angle, especially when the "industry" clips presented here were grouped with footage of waves crashing on rocks, people goofing around in the water, surfing, Pa-u riders, and so on. Edison was always looking for ways to make money. But you think about it, charging 5 cents to view clips of industrial processes with people (whom Wall Street types at that time certainly viewed as inferior) working shitty jobs in some far off place kind of has the same connotation, doesn't it? IDK...just my take on it.
@@jaydubya3698 No. Huge fascination of the Wall Street and business guys with foreign peoples and simpler ways at this time. This is what led to the huge capital investment in the Panama Canal and the full-on investment in the Philippines for DECADES before WWII gave them independence. You will find there were even hit songs (on Broadway, in NYC of course) in that 1906-1920 era that claimed to be "island music" or "Hawaiian songs" or "Pacific melodies."
jaydubya3698's words -----> "Has to be the arrogance of US haoles"
are very obviously RACIST.
The world population in those days was around 2 billion. Now it is 7.7 billion. Hawaii will never be the way it used to be. No place will.
Yes it will be better in a few years. After all the wars that are coming, there will be peace for millennia. Man has created weapons to destroy himself.
@@freerepublicusa2064
Weapons?
COVID-19: Here, hold my Corona. And I don't mean beer
@@tommypetraglia4688 Covid is a weapon... All biochemical are weapons created to destroy humanity. Yay scientists slaves for the military.
Scenes 3 and 4 correct spelling: Laupāhoehoe. On Big Island, there was a port there at the time.
Great
it's amazing back then everyone is slender before the food corporations starting pouring sugar into all the food to make it addictive.
No more computer back then
Yes then came sick man with sick food plan
Look at Europe. You’ve still got a lot of slender people because they live how the human body is designed: you’re constant moving and you can eat what you please… as long as it’s healthy.
It’s both diet and exercise. Everyone had to walk a lot to get anywhere. Work was very physical. And no AC to keep you from sweating.
I saw somebody on a cell phone....must be a time traveler.......
Mahalo
Jack London was probably on the Waikiki beach somewhere around this time.
Jack Lord, maybe??? NO WAY!!!
or with Princess Ka'iulani , he was friends with her father, Gov.Archibald Cleghorn , also from Scotland. R.L.S. wrote a poem for her before she was shipped off to Europe.
I meant Robert L.Stevenson , not Jack London, sorry .
Wow, horse and carriages and a trolly on King Street, and that new invention, electricity.
I think Honolulu was he second city on the world to have electricity as after Paris. Maybe third after Rome. Can't remember.
@@bernieweber4663 How interesting! Fun fact: My great uncle through marriage was the chief electrical engineer who put electricity on Maui. I was told the year was 1912. Later he headed the company (MECO)
@@Cherrysmith2809 that's great that you have that history. It would be neat for Honolulu to have electric trolleys again. And on King Street some light rail with lines running down to the beach. Same in Maui too.
@ 12:50 Hawaiians looked very different back then before intermarriage. I think the only place where they still look like this is on Ni'ihau, also the only place where Hawaiian is spoken on a daily basis. This film was made just 13 years after the monarchy was overthrown.
I was thinking the same thing, I have lived in Hilo Hawaii and still do, for 45 years and no one looks like that anymore, my how we have left our footprints..
@@hotsand4u That made me suspect that all was filmed in Hawaii.
Native Hawaiians make up only 11% of the population now, more people of Japanese heritage there than Hawaiian...
Talk about some tough feet to not get sliced up on that lava rock
At the 01:10 time code mark. and in the center far distance of the image, can be seen the scaffolding erected for the expansion of the "Sans Souci Guest House", into what would become the first multi-story "luxury hotel" on Waikiki Beach - the Sans Souci Hotel - the hotel that is famous as Robert Louis Stevenson stayed there in 1893 on his 2nd trip to Hawai'i... sometime in the 1980's, it reverted to the current "Sans Souci Condominium Complex". The first hotel on Waikiki Beach was the Moana Hotel (now the 2 times larger Moana Surfrider Westin Resort complex) but the Moana Hotel of 1906 was not even close to being "a luxury hotel". The makai side (oceanfront side) of the Moana Hotel can be seen at the 01:25 time code mark.
bodyboarder at 29:18!
Apparently the first time surfers filmed and maybe first time bodyboarder too. Little would they know of how the surfing culture would be in 117 years, or that they would be seen in 117 years!!
38:46 What to say? I cringe at how roughly they seem to be handling the sheep, but I'm sure they are under pressure to move them through and, to be honest, the sheep probably have easier lives than the shearers do. If the sheep are bothered by it, they don't show it much. But, despite industrialization having been well underway in some places, it's a glimpse of what life was like before electricity, before the internal combustion and steam engines, and before all the things we take for granted, for better or worse, today. There were almost no fat people; these guys were a lot stronger and fitter than most people their age are today, but the line between employment and slavery was even more blurred then than it is today.
Whoever owned that property, I hope leased it rather than sale.
I'm old enough to remember having pork lau lau and poi at the old Kona store. Went back in 2017, a whole lotta haolis and chi chi. Sad, not for what was lost, that's gone, but for all the haolis who sit there with no idea what was lost or what it was like then.
Wow, Older than my uncle's pictures which were taken way before the Pearl Harbor attack...
24:34 looks like a traffic light.
Probably street lights, also brought to you by Edison.
That is a US-centric electric lamp I think. At the time, they looked a lot like gas lamps. They were all over the US, Hawaii, Philippines, etc. The Spanish versions in the Philippines were pretty cool looking, as Phil had some electric lighting pretty early (tho' they could have been gas street lights- not sure).
It would be cool to upscale and colorize the footage.
🔝
The long lost time before Hawaiians were introduced to Spam ( the tinned “food”)....
What you meant to say was..."13 years after America overthrew our Queen."
Thus causing us to eat cheap, easy to make, shitty food, because we now have a minimum amount of land to work, for it to provide for us. Then introducing drugs to our native people so they run a continuous loop of poverty while forgetting the language and culture. P.S Spam is great .
@@kanakahawaii6860 This has happened to many tribes, not just Kanaka / Hawaiian... leading to obesity and diabetes. And more diseases due to continual over consumption of non traditional / unhealthy foods. :: Can't stand the stuff. Too much like the crappy food forced onto American servicemen known as "rations".. Other countries servicemen get real food.
12:50 Great point. You see this what they're pounding here. Thats the stuff my ancestors used to cultivate daily. Now they have machines to do it 🙄 The good part is we can still teach the children of today these ways . But you're right , it's some crap shit given to our native people. Mahalo for your knowledge 🤙🤙
@@kanakahawaii6860 Teach the children and the adults will follow.
@@chrissonnenschein6634
Thats my goal braddah!
Thank you. No film of the whales or sea life?
the first one is waikiki
nice view of Pearl Harbor before the USN took over!
It took a lot of horses to get anything done.
and nearly every kanaka had one. The women were stunning as the galloped along dressed in pa'u and wearing flowers on their way to luau .
What would you do if you were born in 1886 and saw these films at the ago of 20? I would escape from my hum drum 1906 life and go to sea. I would have wanderlust. The call of the sea is relentless. Yet, the number of people who actually do anything for the love of wanderlust is probably 1 in 1,000.
great documentation of the terrible American invasion of Hawaii. 100 years later basically nothing has changed just new investors keep the demolition of culture and traditions in the name of development and science.
Yup, they used to call it - Manifest Destiny. A noble title to sugar coat taking advantage of natural resources while subjugating the indigenous people for military and financial gain .
😢
So give away your Apple phone and eat your soy poi.
@@harryknackers7892 for white boys like you to never step foot on the islands...I would gladly give up your
@@harryknackers7892 could live without Apple phone and would gladly eat poi all day long...and surf in unpolluted waters all day long ..and be happy to never see a white boy
The guy who threw his net on the rock lol
So the difference between Hawaii then and Hawaii now is the same as the world then and the world now. Too many people !!
Much love to the Kanakas, the time has come to reign again. Dont eat the spam, or take the shots.
And while you're at it, don't use the white man's toilet paper, toothbrush, deodorant, shampoo, soap, plumbing, electricity, gas, clothing, stove, refrigerator, AC, TV, microwave, guitar, radio, stereo, CD, DVD, computer, phones, car, truck, van, SUV, bus, train, rail, airplane, jet ski, fiberglass surfboards, housewares, tools, medicines, foods, and drinks.
And of course, don't use the white man's internet and UA-cam.