"Ah! What delicious-looking crabs you have here!"

So said the visitor to Ke Awa Lau o Puʻuloa – but he wasn’t speaking of crustaceans, he was speaking of the fishermen he saw as “fat crabs”, that is, a dainty morsel.

He was Mikololou, a man-eating shark from the Kaʻū district on the Island of Hawaiʻi.

He was part of a large company of sharks who came to visit from Hawaiʻi, Maui and Molokaʻi. Most of these had human relatives and were not desirous of eating human flesh, but among them were some who disregarded the relationship, and learned to like them.

The sharks had planned to make a circuit of the islands and perhaps later to visit Kahiki.  They stopped at Puʻuloa (Pearl Harbor.)

Kaʻahupahau, hearing those words, knew at once that some of the strangers were man-eaters.  Guardians of the area, she and her brother Kahiʻuka went into action to protect the fishermen.

But Kaʻahupahau could not distinguish between the good and the bad sharks; she then she changed into the form of a great net and hemmed in her visitors while the fishermen who answered her signal came to destroy them.

Her brother Kahiʻuka struck at intruders with his tail, one side of which was larger than the other; the fishermen hauled in the nets to shore and Mikololou was cast upon the shore with the evil doers, where they were left to die of the intense heat.

All but Mikololou were soon dead; though his body died his head lived on and as the fishermen passed to and from their work, his eyes followed them and tears rolled down his face. At last his tongue fell out. Some children playing nearby found it. They picked it up and cast it into the sea.

Now Mikololou’s spirit had passed out of his head into his tongue and as soon as he felt the water again he became a whole shark. With a triumphant flop of his tail, he headed for home to join his friends again. When Kaʻahupahau saw him, it was too late to prevent his departure.

"Mikololou lived through his tongue," or, as the Hawaiians say, "I ola o Mikololou i ka alelo." This saying implies that however much trouble one may have, there is always a way of escape.

Kaʻahupahau lived in an underwater cave in Honouliuli lagoon (West Loch.) Kahiʻuka lived in an underwater cave off Mokuʻumeʻume (Ford Island) near Keanapuaʻa Point at the entrance of East Loch

Kaʻahupahau may mean "Well-cared for Feather Cloak" (the feather cloak was a symbol of royalty). Kahiʻuka means "Smiting Tail"; his shark tail was used to strike at enemy sharks; he also used his tail to strike fishermen as a warning that unfriendly sharks had entered Puʻuloa.

Such guardian sharks, which inhabited the coastlines of all the islands, were benevolent gods who were cared for and worshiped by the people and who aided fishermen, protected the life of the seas, and drove off man-eating sharks.

Pukui notes Kaʻahupahau in ʻŌlelo Noʻeau: Hawaiian Proverbs and Poetical Sayings, No. 105: "Alahula o Puʻuloa, he alahele na Kaʻahupahau": "Everywhere in Puʻuloa is the trail of Kaʻahupahau. Said of a person who goes everywhere, looking, peering, seeing all, or of a person familiar with every nook and corner of a place." Kaʻahupahau was noted for traveling about, vigilantly guarding her domain against man-eating invaders.

Puʻuloa also was home to Komoawa, (or Kamoawa,) a large shark who was Kaʻahupahau’s watcher.  His cave, called Keaaliʻi, was at the entrance of Puʻuloa.  (Thrum, Hawaii-edu)  Kualiʻi guards the entrance to Pearl Harbor, while the home of Kaʻahupahau is deeper into Honouliuli lagoon.

Years later, the US Navy, having acquired Pearl Harbor, was working to expand the facilities.  This included dredging the channel, adding a coal station and construction of a drydock.

"The dredging of the Pearl Harbor channel was begun long before the drydock was more than desultorily talked of - in 1900.  It took many years to deepen, straighten and widen the channel into the lochs sufficiently for a man of war to enter. But the work progressed steadily if slowly, and on December 14, 1911, the cruiser California steamed from Honolulu to the entrance to Pearl Harbor, and then, turning her gray nose inward, proceeded majestically through the still tortuous channel and dropped her anchor off the dry dock site."  (Hawaiian Gazette, November 24, 1916)

The drydock was to be the "Largest In (the) World - Less than a decade will have elapsed between the beginning of the great work and its completion. And when the Pearl Harbor drydock is finished it will be the largest and the finest in the world, capable of accommodating any vessel now built or building, or that probably ever will be built by the United States."  (Hawaiian Gazette, November 24, 1916)

But, during construction, disaster occurred.  "Much progress had at that time been made on the construction of the drydock, and success seemed assured. But the contractors had been having trouble with the bed of the drydock … it suddenly blew up with a tremendous explosion. No lives were lost, although there were several narrow escapes. But the work of years had been wrecked … pressure had forced the bottom of the drydock up until it literally burst (on February 17, 1913.")  (Hawaiian Gazette, November 24, 1916)

"For a time it was feared that the entire project might have to be abandoned. But Uncle Sam's engineers refused to be defeated by natural forces, and finally, after long experiment, mean were found for anchoring the bottom of the drydock.  Admiral Harris was one of the board that came to Hawaii to investigate the causes for the explosion and try to find a way of preventing future disasters of similar nature."  (Hawaiian Gazette, November 24, 1916)

They cannot say they were not forewarned.  “While at work three Hawaiian fishermen come to where we were working, one of whom was aged, who asked me what we were doing there. ‘Digging a hole 50 feet deep’ was the reply. He then told me to move away from there; and when asked why, he said, ‘These places are tabu; they belong to shark god, name Kaʻahupahau.’”  (Richards (a worker on the drydock project,) Navy-mil)

“The old man was watching my men working, and talking to them. Again he came over to me with tears in his eyes and asked me to quit digging ‘til my boss came. "I told him, I can't do that." They stayed there several hours, then he said to me that, ‘You people will be punished severely.’” (Richards, Navy-mil)

"Several years ago, some will remember, when work started on the Pearl Harbor naval dry dock, some of the Hawaiians said the location chosen would disturb a "shark god" who would be affronted and they prophesied dire disasters. The work was started and there came a collapse. The forecasters of trouble were prophets. Changes were made in plans and locations."  (Maui News, June 9, 1922)

Merely a coincidence?  Some think not.

One of the workers on the project noted, “As we went along pumping the water out of the dock, we pumped out five feet and cleaned the side and plastered and corked all the leak, 15 to 20 days and then pumped till we got to the bottom which was full of mud and in the middle of the dock where I went through a cave of nine feet diameter. Mr. Hartman, assistant boss, found a backbone of a big shark, 14' 4" long. I came by where they were working when Mr. Hartman said to me, ‘You certainly got the shark. Here it is.’”  (Richards, Navy-mil)

(The Story of Mikololou is from Wiggins, Beckwith)

The image shows Pearl Harbor Dry Dock #1, after the February 1913 explosion In addition, I have added other related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Ke Awa Lau O Puʻuloa

During ancient times, various land divisions were used to divide and identify areas of control.  Islands were divided into moku; moku were divided into ahupuaʻa.  A common feature in each ahupuaʻa was water, typically in the form of a stream or spring.

The Island of O’ahu had six Moku: Kona, Koʻolaupoko, Koʻolauloa Waialua, Waiʻanae and ʻEwa.

ʻEwa was comprised of twelve ahupuaʻa.  Some stories, when first recorded in the 19th- Century, refer to ʻEwa as the first area populated on Oʻahu by the immigrant Polynesians.

Puʻuloa or Ke Awa Lau O Puʻuloa (the many harbored-sea of Puʻuloa) is situated here.

All water sources in each of the twelve ahupuaʻa of ʻEwa met in Puʻuloa.  This was the only moku in all the islands where all waters from its ahupuaʻa did this.

Puʻuloa and Ke Awa Lau O Puʻuloa are just a couple of its traditional names.  It was also known as Awawalei (“garland (lei) of harbors,”) Awalau (“leaf-shaped lagoon”) and Huhui na ʻōpua i Awalau (The clouds met at Awalau.)

Today, we generally call this place Pearl Harbor.

The name Pearl Harbor is one of the few English place names in Hawaiʻi that is a close translation of another of its traditional Hawaiian names, Wai Momi (“Pearl Water.”)

Some of the traditional themes associated with this area include connections with Kahiki (Tahiti,) the traditional homeland of Hawaiians.

Legend tells that Kanekuaʻana (a moʻo, or water lizard) came from Kahiki and brought with her the pipi, or pearl oyster.  The harbor was teeming with pearl-producing oysters until the late-1800s.  (The general belief is that runoff sedimentation eventually smothered the oyster habitat.)

The pipi was called the "iʻa hamau leo" or "fish with a silenced voice." It was not the pipi that was silent but the people who gathered them (if they spoke, wind would ripple the water and the oysters would vanish.)

There are several versions of the chief Kahaʻi leaving from Kalaeloa (Barber's Point) for a trip to Kahiki; on his return to the Hawaiian Islands, he brought back the first breadfruit and planted it at Puʻuloa.

Traditional accounts indicate several of the fishponds in the Puʻuloa area were believed to have been constructed by Kāne and Kanaloa.  Directing the menehune, they made the pond Kapākule (aka Pākule,) which they stocked with all manner of fish.

Puʻuloa Salt Works (property of JI Dowsett) “are at the west side of the entrance to Pearl River, and the windmill is a prominent object in the landscape as we enter. It is also one of the guides in steeling vessels inward.  On the eastern side and opposite to the Puʻuloa buildings, is the fishery, where are a number of buildings inhabited by Chinamen.”  (Daily Bulletin, January 6, 1889)

Puʻuloa was originally an extensive, shallow embayment.  Keaunui, the head of the powerful and celebrated ʻEwa chiefs, is attributed for having cut a navigable channel near the Puʻuloa saltworks, by which the great estuary, known as "Pearl River," was for the first time rendered accessible to navigation.

Puʻuloa was regarded as the home of the shark goddess Kaʻahupahau and her brother Kahiʻuka in Hawaiian legends.  They were said to live in a cave at the entrance to Puʻuloa and guarded the waters against man-eating sharks.

“There is ample evidence that the lonely scenes, upon which we now gaze with wondering curiosity, were once thickly peopled; and at that period the gospel had not reached Pearl River.  Among the objects of their heathen worship was the shark, whoso numbers at Pearl River in those days were very abundant.”  (Daily Bulletin, January 6, 1889)

Moku‘ume‘ume (meaning “island of strife”) is a small island located in Pearl Harbor on the Island of Oʻahu.  It is entirely surrounded by water deep enough to accommodate deep draft ocean-going vessels.  We now call it Ford Island.

The first known foreigner to enter the channel of the Pearl Harbor area, Captain George Vancouver, started to explore the area, but stopped when he realized that the entrance was not deep enough for large ships to pass through.

“If the water upon the bar should be deepened, which I doubt not can be effected, it would afford the best and most capacious harbor in the Pacific.” (Commodore Charles Wilkes, 1840)

In the nineteenth century, the peninsula between Middle Loch and East Loch (part of the Mānana ahupuaʻa) had numerous fishponds, some rice fields, pasture land at the tip, and oyster beds offshore.

As a means of solidifying a site in the central Pacific, the US negotiated an amendment to the Treaty of Reciprocity in 1887.  King Kalākaua in his speech before the opening session of the 1887 Hawaiian Legislature stated (November 3, 1887:)
"I take great pleasure in informing you that the Treaty of Reciprocity with the United States of America has been definitely extended for seven years upon the same terms as those in the original treaty, with the addition of a clause granting to national vessels of the United States the exclusive privilege of entering Pearl River Harbor and establishing there a coaling and repair station. This has been done after mature deliberation and the interchange between my Government and that of the United States of an interpretation of the said clause whereby it is agreed and understood that it does not cede any territory or part with or impair any right of sovereignty or jurisdiction on the part of the Hawaiian Kingdom and that such privilege is coterminous with the treaty.”

“I regard this as one of the most important events of my reign, and I sincerely believe that it will re-establish the commercial progress and prosperity which began with the Reciprocity Treaty."  (Kalākaua)

In 1890 some of the Mānana lands became the first planned subdivision outside of urban Honolulu (Pearl City, named in a contest and developed by Benjamin F Dillingham as a way to increase passenger traffic on his Oahu Railway and Land Company (OR&L) trains.)

The image shows an 1873 map of Puʻuloa (Pearl Harbor.)  In addition, I have added other images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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