Mauna Kea Oral History Appendix - Office of Mauna Kea Management

MY: Yes.
JY: All before had tall trees.
MY: Like orchard…
Group: [Discusses contacts made by Leann McGurdy – SCS. She had a map that showed the
house. Her information showed it was a Spencer house.]
KM: Spencer was big out here, had land all over, with the Waimea Grazing and Agricultural
Company. Pu‘uloa was their main place
JY: Yes, right opposite where that house is, they call that Pu‘uloa. Where that big building is
now.
KM: Yes… [pauses] So you think this was a furo
JY: This looks like it, you get the burning place here, and the box and the building stand here.
KM: Interesting. I think the first formal group of Japanese came to Hawai‘i in the 1880s.
JY: Hmm.
KM: Not really that long ago. But you look out here, no more water pipes back then. Where
were they getting the water from And right above us, this is Nalopakanui right above
us
MY/WT: Yes.
KM: And what gulch [indicating gulch just down slope from the site] do you think this is
MY: All of these gulches end up in Pöpo‘o.
KM: Okay… Now on the Ke‘ämoku section, there was also one other big house, right
MY: Yes.
KM: On the rise above the water tank
MY: Yes, above the shearing shed.
JY: That’s the old Ke‘ämoku house. And below that, used to have a shack, a guy used to
stay in there. He used to raise chickens for Ke‘ämoku.
KM: A Japanese man
JY: Yes.
KM: Uyehara
JY: Uyehara, yes. Plenty years, he worked for the ranch.
KM: When we go down there, there’s something I want to ask you about. Off the side of
Uyehara’s house, you go up a little bit, you see all these mounds, stone mounds
MY: That was from the military.
KM: You think that was military
MY: Yes. In the early ‘80s, they had the Koreans, with the Pöhakuloa military, they had three
different branches of service.
KM: Oh, an international training
MY: Right. They went combine and they were all… In fact, they had all old Ke‘ämoku. So all
those mounds, they used to run wires, like booby traps.
KM: Ohh! The way it was made, it was like how before, they plant ‘uala in stone mounds.
MY: Yes.
Mauna Kea– “Ka Piko Kaulana o ka ‘Äina”
Kumu Pono Associates LLC
A Collection of Oral History Interviews (HiMK67-050606) A:576