From Our Files
In 1888, King Kalakaua issued a royal charter, commissioning a magazine. Then titled Paradise of the Pacific, this publication became HONOLULU Magazine, making it the oldest magazine west of the Mississippi.
“In the death of the Honorable Wallace Rider Farrington, the Territory of Hawaii lost one of its most able, distinguished and loyal citizens,” writes Paradise of the Pacific. Farrington died of heart disease on Oct. 6, at the age of 62. In 1915, he had become president of the Honolulu Ad Club—a civic organization—where he introduced Rep. Warren Harding as the future U.S. president. Harding had promised that if he won the election he’d appoint Farrington as governor. Harding won, and, in 1921, Farrington became the sixth governor of Hawaii, serving until 1929. His name lives on, in Farrington Highway and Farrington High School.
We think of Magic Island as an extension of Ala Moana Beach Park, but it was originally meant as the first phase of a major resort complex. In 1958, Hawaii’s territorial congress enacted a bill to develop 30 acres of Ala Moana’s 307-acre submerged reef. “Land-making is in the best Waikiki tradition—a product of offshore dredging and sand importation,” writes Paradise of the Pacific. The bill’s supporters wanted to build 10 hotels, doubling the number of hotel rooms in Waikiki But after the peninsula was completed in 1964, resort plans fell through and the land was converted into a public park.
“Back issues of HONOLULU are now making the rounds in China,” observes HONOLULU Magazine. “Sixteen-year-old Wendy May, one of 38 Punahou students to visit there recently, took along copies of the magazine ‘by way of introducing Hawaii to the students we would meet.’” The issues were well-received as freshly taught English-speaking students yearned to soak up as much as they could about the language and culture of the United States, especially Hawaii. HONOLULU’s audience in Asia today? We are currently carried by a small market in Taiwan.