Intense Study of the Stars are Part of Traditional Native Hawaiian Culture

Scientific method is a key part of Native Hawaiian culture. (Hosoda, 2018: 1-2). It was traditionally associated primarily with travel across the vast Pacific Ocean and the effective planting and harvesting of crops. The New England missionaries in their schools for both adult and child Hawaiians, introduced Western science to the indigenous population.

World traveling, adventurous, seafaring Henry Obookiah (‘Ōpūkaha‘ia) (source: Dwight, E. W. (1819). Memoirs of Henry Obookiah. New Haven, Conn: Nathan Whiting.) became the first accomplished Native Hawaiian scholar in New England, arriving at New Haven in 1809. Obookiah rose from a lowly sailor to a biblical scholar able to translate the Book of Genesis from the Hebrew language into the Hawaiian language. At the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall, Connecticut Henry flourished. Classes offered included astronomy and mathematics. He farmed in Litchfield County, Connecticut where science was applied to agriculture. Obookiah invited and welcomed the missionaries to come to his homeland. Hawai‘i missionary Elijah Loomis declared that Obookiah sought to send the “light of science and religion” to Hawai‘i.

Americans sent to Hawaii wished to educate the populace on biblical and scientific subjects.The reading room at Rev. Diell’s and Rev. Damon’s Bethel Street Church held books on such subjects (Rose, 1980: 1). In the 1830s science classes were introduced at Lahainaluna Seminary (Laws of the High School, 1835: 18; Corley, 2019: 59). Aspects of Western scientific thought were taught extensively at the Royal School in Honolulu to young Hawaiian chiefs (Cooke, 1937: 281). Courses in natural sciences were also held at Punahou School in the 1840s and 1850s. (Inauguration of Edward G. Beckwith, 1854: 45).

Knowledge that was passed on to the students at the Royal School led Alexander Liholiho (King Kamehameha IV) and Queen Emma to establish Queen’s Hospital in 1859 to further scientific medical practices (Cooke, 1937: 358). After Queenʻs Hospital was established, Charles Reed Bishop made numerous donations to improve medical science there (Kent, 1965: 273-277). During his 1881 tour of the world King David Kalakaua visited Dr. Shobun Goto, chief physician at the Leprosy Hospital in Tokyo, to discuss the critical needs of Hansenʻs disease patients in Hawaiʻi. In 1886, he brought Dr. Goto to Hawaii to treat patients in Honolulu and Kalaupapa. Kalaukaua was also searching for a leprosy specialist in Rome, Italy during his world trip in 1881 (Ing, 2019: 142, 146).

Bernice Pauahi Paki Bishop, a former student of the Royal School, adhered to Western scientific rationalism. In that vein, she and her husband, Charles Reed Bishop, hosted Horace Mann, Jr. and William T. Brigham at their home in 1864-1865, whereby a biological study of Hawaii was commenced (Kanahele, 1986: 86, 97). During a trip to the United States and Europe in 1875 by Bernice and Charles Reed Bishop, Bernice Pauahi was fascinated by the innovative machinery displayed at science museums and at the Centennial International Exposition in Philadelphia depicting scientific advancements (Bishop, 1875-1876: 33,42, 80). Their dedication to scientific studies led Charles Reed Bishop to endow the construction of Bishop Hall of Science at Punahou School from 1883-1885 (Kent, 1965: 233-234). Charles Bishop also provided funds in his will of 1915 for the Punahou School science program and science scholarships for students (Kent, 1965: 236).

David Kalakua (later King Kalakaua) studied scientific subjects, especially lectures on electricity, at the Royal School which piqued his interest in electricity and geothermal power leading to the inventions that he later developed (Cooke, 1846, 6; Ing, 2019: 109-110). Kalakaua met with Thomas Edison while in New York in 1875 (Lowe, 1999: 39). He introduced electricity to Hawaii in the 1880s (Ing, 2019: 167). Kalakaua was an inventor of a torpedo-proof vessel, a ramming advanced torpedo disguised in the shape of a fish, a telescopic range finder and a sealing bottle cap that was patented by another inventor a decade later (Lowe, 1999: 36-37).

His keen interest in science also led to a lunch meeting that he had with Edward G. Youmans, the editor of Popular Science Monthly in New York. This was probably arranged through Youmans' wife, Katherine Newton Lee Youmans, the widow of Hawaiian Chief Justice William Little Lee who Kalakaua had known in Hawaii (Troy Press, January 18, 1875).

Hawaiʻi was first settled by Polynesian navigators who voyaged across the Pacific Ocean using their highly developed knowledge of the stars to direct their sailing. Hawaiians fished, planted and worshipped according to the lunar calendar (Gon III, 2009: 3, 21-22). Therefore, the study of the stars was deeply ingrained and highly developed in the culture of pre-contact Native Hawaiians. The young were trained of this by their elders (Makemson, 1939: 589-596). Liliuokalani mentions this numerous times in her memoirs (West, 2015: 1-3). Umi-a-Līlo, a high chief in the fifteenth century, who united the Big Island under his rule, established two sites specifically for astronomical observations (McGregor, 2014: 87). Kamehameha I was totally versed in astronomical detail (Williams, 1993: 42; Thrum, 1891: 142).

Discussion of astronomy was taught to David Kalakaua and the young chiefs at Royal School (Cooke, 1937: 241-242; Cooke, 1847: 59). This training at the Royal School induced Kalakaua to entertain chief astronomer from England, G.L. Tupman, and his crew of astronomers at the pre- 1882 Iolani Palace (Hale Aliʻi) and provide two sites in Honolulu for viewing the transit of the planet Venus over the Sun on December 8, 1874. The chief astronomer, Tupman, returned to Honolulu in 1883 and was given the honor "Order of Kalakaua" (Frost and Frost, AIA, 1977: 49-50). King Kalakaua visited Lick Observatory at San Jose, California in 1881 (Steiger, 1995: 1). He purchased a telescope from England that was installed at Punahou School in 1884 (Hendricks, 2011: 1-2; Steiger, 1995: 2). This training at the Royal School also led Bernice Pauahi Bishop and Charles Reed Bishop to visit Greenwich Astronomical Observatory in England in 1875 (Kanahele, 1986: 134).

The modern day telescope to be built on Mauna Kea is an extension of the study of the stars as was prevalent in traditional Native Hawaiian culture. Kamehameha I and subsequent Kings and the Queen of Hawaiʻi were very dedicated in increasing knowledge of the stars and passing such scientific knowledge to the younger generations. King Kalakaua, in particular, trained by missionaries at the Royal School, was very dedicated to sponsoring astronomers to study the stars from Hawaiʻi. He visited an astronomical observatory in California and subsequently purchased a telescope from England and donated it to be placed at Punahou School.


With safe respect for everyone’s safety and dignity in these public policy review matters.


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