Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 6, Number 5, 1 May 1989 — Bishop Museum Visual Collections [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Bishop Museum Visual Collections

Photographs—Visual Keys To Unloek The Past

This article is the third in a seriesfocusing on the collections at Bishop Museum. Covered below is the museum's Visual Collections department, vuith emphasis on the photographic resources that are especially useful to individuals. For Honolulu poliee officer Glen Kamana'o, Bishop Museum's visual collections provided the key that unlocked an important part of his family's history. The Kamana'o family has its roots in Halawa Valley, Moloka'i, and Kamana'o has been researching his family history for a number of years. He developed an interest in genealogy, and first heard about Bishop Museum's visual collections department, in 1972, while in the Hawaiian studies program at the University of Hawai'i. The visual collections are a multifaceted resource comprised of photographic images, art and moving images (film and video) that document 200 years of dramatic change in Hawai'i and the Pacific. The moving image co!lections, about 800 films and videos ranging from scientific documentaries to promotional films, are distinguished by rare footage of Hawaiian dance taken in the early decades of this century. The art collections encompass some 3,200 separate pieces and include some of the earliest paintings, drawings and prints created by expedition artists during exploration of the Pacific. The photographic collections contain about 750,000 images that document 150yearsofchange and diversity in the Hawaiian Islands; Kamana'o found what he was looking for in these collections. He had discovered last year, while sharing his family's genealogical record with his parents, that his mother and father knew very little about their grandparents. "When you have parents who don't know very mueh about their grandparents, and you know everything about your grandparents, you get curious," Kamana'o recalled. "I Iearned a lot about my 'ohana from my grandmother, and I wanted to fill in the gaps for my mother and father — 1 wanted to take away the mystery about their grandparents." To do that, he eame to the visual collections late last year, after friends and relatives told him they'd seen photos of his Halawa Valley relatives during their own visits to the department. Kamana'o brought his genealogical record to the collections, and using family names in the record, staff members helped him find photos of his greatgrandparents and a number of other relatives in Halawa Valley. The photos were part of the Louis Sullivan Collection, and included a picture of the Po'omaikai Church and cemetery in Halawa Valley, where Kamana'o's greatgrandfather was buried. Using an enlargement of the church photo, Kamana'o and his father were even able to pinpoint the location of his greatgrandfather's grave. Kamana'o and his family and friends plan to return to Halawa Valley to clear overgrowth and replant around his greatgrandfather's grave, and spend

time in the family's ancestral homeland. Approximately 4,000 people used the visual eollections last year, and the majority of them, like Kamana'o, used the photo collections for personal research projects. The Sullivan Collection (portraits of identified Hawaiian people taken in 1920 and 1921) is an invaluable resource for such projects, especially for people engaged in genealogical research. The index to the eolleehon lists the names of ali known people in the photos, and besides looking for names of close relatives, visitors often browse through the index to find names of extended family members. "Sometimes one of our visitors will find a portrait of a family member they didn't know about, and all the other visitors will get caught up in that person's family story," says Betty Lou Kam, manager of the photo collections. "For me, that's when it's really gratifying to work with our eolleetions — when you realize that people are finding parts of their past that they didn't even know about, or that they thought were lost." Another collection that will soon be useful as a genealogical reference is the On Char Collection. Hawai'i photographer On Char took thousands of portraits of loeal residents between 1911 and 1954, and staff and volunteers are creating an index now for this collection.

Some people visit the department to learn what Hawai'i looked like in years past, and how things have changed over the decades. Others eome to look for artwork or old photos of traditional skills and crafts, such as weaving, kapa making and the making of musical instruments. By studying these historic images, artisans ean uncoversecretsofan ancient craft, or see how those crafts and skills have evolved into what we have today. The collections' most frequent professional users include authors, scholars orscientists, other museum professionals, newspaper and magazine editors, and television and film producers. Other professionals eome to gather documentation on historic sites or buildings, and many visitors eome simply to look for attractiveor historic images they ean display in their homes or give as gifts. Besides sharing the collections with visitors at the museum, staff members also take the eolleetions to communities throughout the state in an effort to make them more accessible and to identify unknown people in the photos. For example, Big lsland photographer Morito Koga took pictures of Japanese plantation families between 1908 and 1934, and the Koga Collection will be taken to 'Ola'a, Hawai'i this summer so long-term residents ean help identify family members in the photos.

The visual collections department, on the third floor of Paki Hall, is open to the public free of charge from 1 to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday and from 9 a.m. to noon to Saturday. Staff members are available during these hours to help you acquaint yourself with the collections and find what you need. When you arrive, you'll be asked to provide your name, address and phone number, and the reason for your visit, so that staff members ean contact you if interesting materials are found after you leave. Photo reproductions and enlargements ean be made to meet your needs, and processing charges are calculated in advance. Prices may seem higher than for standard commercial printing, but this reflects the cost of caring for fragile negatives, photos, and other fragile original materials.

Honolulu poliee officer Glen Kamana'o works with visual collections staff members Betty Lou Kam (L) and Clarice Mauricio (C), who helped him last year to find photos of his greatgrandparents taken by Louis R. Sullivan in Halawa Valley, Moloka'i around 1920.