24 Abolition of sex discrimination
25 A challenge to the Fire Goddess Pele
27 Featherwork of ruling chiefs
29 How Captain Cook died a god
31 Kamehameha: Hawaii’s first king
32 The ancient art of petroglyphs
34 A way of escape in old Hawaii
35 Diamond Head: symbol of Hawaii
36 Oahu’s miraculous water system
37 A love marriage of princess and commoner
38 Hawaii and its many flowers
40 Paniolo and the pa’u riders
41 Old Ironsides visits Honolulu
42 The upside-down falls of Nu’uanu valley
43 Skiing in Hawaii on real snow
46 America’s only royal palace
49 Oahu’s most sacred burial place
50 The saga of Hawaii’s shipping lanes
52 Hawaii’s cosmopolitan people
THE INCREDIBLE IS A PART OF AMERICAN HISTORY AND tradition-and our 50th State is certainly no exception. This unique little book, incredible in its own way, brings together the talents, knowledge and experience of two well-known Hawaiian residents, artist-illustrator Ray Lanterman and author-anthropologist Terence Barrow.
Whatever their subject, the authors sail along with justifiable confidence, opening to the reader, page after page, vistas of a little-known Hawaii. At times light-hearted, at other times serious, it is always a readable and lookable book.
The authors delight in the unusual fact, whether it be Oahu’s marvelous and unusual water system, song-making monarchs, or skiing on real snow on the slopes of Mt. Mauna Kea, the highest point in the Pacific area, reaching 13,796 feet above sea level-and this is the essence of their book.
Tourists and residents alike will find Incredible Hawaii a source of much pleasure which will lead them to a greater awareness of these utterly fascinating islands.
THE AUTHORS, BOTH WRITER AND ARTIST, WISH TO acknowledge the help they have received in the making if this book. Mr. Charles E. Tuttle conceived the idea if Incredible Hawaii, then arranged for the book to become a reality.
The authors wish to thank Mrs. R. A. Apple (better known to readers in Hawaii as Peg Apple) for reading the manuscript and for making suggestions for changes,· and Mrs. K. A. Jordan, also if Honolulu, for typing the manuscript in a creative way. Mr. Robert E. Van Dyke, Hawaiiana collector and historian, lent valuable documents and gave if his wide experience. Mr. Joseph Feher of the Honolulu Academy if Arts kindly checked the illustrations. Thanks are also due for permission to quote from the popular song ‘’My Little Grass Shack in Kealakekua Hawaii” (Copyright 1933, Miller Music Corporation: copyright renewed 1961, Miller Music Corporation). For the.finished book, whatever its shortcomings, the authors assume full responsibility. Their aim is to provide an accurate yet light-hearted glimpse if some unusual and little known aspects if incredible Hawaii, hoping that the traveller will be entertained and the reader made more aware if these remarkable islands.
1 A Hawaiian story of creation
AN ANCIENT HAWAIIAN CREATION CHANT CALLED THE “Kumulipo” tells of the emergence of life out of cosmic darkness. In poetic terms it relates a story of evolution resembling the general concept of modern biology which is far from the Calvinist missionary doctrines that replaced it, namely that Adam and Eve and the world were created in a flash about five thousand years ago. Traditional Hawaiian thinking was more advanced on the subject.
The Hawaiians believed in Po, the fecund cosmic night in which was created the primitive forms of life such as coral animals, sea-urchins, barnacles and mollusca in general. The higher animals such as fish, reptiles and birds followed. Man and the gods emerged with Ao, the cosmic day which spread light, both physical and mental, over
