CAPTAIN COOK— Old Hawaii is slipping away as homes, businesses and bridges vanish under the developments of the modern world.
Architectural historians from the State Historic Preservation Division and students from the University of Hawaii at Manoa’s School of Architecture are trying to prevent it from being completely lost, going from community to community, photographing buildings, taking notes and developing a map of the history of the islands.
This is important because a baseline survey like this has not been done in a long time, said Anna Broverman, an architectural historian with the department. Without this project, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to determine how the state has changed, she said.
This initial survey is sticking to areas with large groupings of buildings at least 50 years old, which are threatened with redevelopment or natural disasters and that are primarily residential.
They’re also making sure it’s safe for the surveyors to walk around. Some regions of the island are too dangerous due to no shoulders or other conditions, Broverman said.
One of the areas they surveyed heavily was Hawi, which has gone from a community of Portuguese sugar workers to a art community with specialty crops.
There they found many of the plantation-era homes modified wholly or partially into businesses, she said. That transition from home to business has been common throughout the area, she said.
The “really old-style buildings” serve as landmarks and an icon of their town, she said.
The survey of sugar country is already missing some buildings.
The old Honohina Hongwanji Temple in Wailea, which was a center of plantation life for years, was demolished in the early 1960s, as Yashui “Scotch” Kurisu recounted in the book, “Sugar Town.”
It provided a central place for the bon festivals, he wrote, one of the parts that marked the life of the effectively extinct plantation life.
It’s been replaced with a smaller building.
The Pepeekeo and Hakalau movie houses have closed after providing decades of new and old run English and Japanese movies. English-speaking residents remember going to the Japanese movies, despite having no idea what was going on.
“The surveys will also give us baseline information on what types of historic resources exist. That way we can focus our energy on preserving places that really matter to our communities,” the department wrote.
The effort is creating a digital map of the islands, similar to what was done with Google Maps. Rather than simply note the buildings exist, as Google does, this survey tells a bit of the story.
Each researcher takes photos with a smartphone, which then brings up a set of questions about the building. Information like estimated age, physical condition and additions are all recorded and transmitted to the state database.
Broverman said people have often approached them while they work, wondering why they’re wandering around taking pictures of homes and other buildings. As soon as Broverman explains, residents are often excited to tell about a specific building in their community.
“People come up and tell us stories sometimes,” she said.
That can be very helpful she said, but also distracting, as the current program is focused on developing the map. Additional works over the next 18 months will include meeting with local community groups to gather those stories.
Broverman said they are also accepting comments to the Statewide Architectural Survey webpage on the State Historic Preservation web page. They are also accepting calls at 692-8015.