by Phil Jarratt
‘Can you keep this article out of Alec’s reach?’ Duke asked Williams. ‘I’d hate him to think they were talking about his board.’ In fact, as reported, the surf was too flat to be bothered with, and Knute’s board had remained with the vehicles while Duke took to the waves on an islander-style shorter board, meant for assisting in body-shoots, and which the locals told him had been brought out from England, where apparently they were popular at the seaside resorts of Cornwall.
Elsewhere in the Canterbury Times Duke found: ‘World’s greatest swimmer a man of few words … The Duke, with the inborn reticence that might be found in a King Country Maori, eschews interviews.’
‘What’s a King Country Maori?’ Duke asked Williams. They were sitting in the small dining room of the Wahine, crossing the Cook Strait again overnight.
‘A fine fellow, a warrior who stands up for his rights. Some excellent rugby men among them, I might add.’
‘Oh, so this is good?’ He showed Williams the paragraph.
‘Yes, very good. The King Country Maori doesn’t say a lot, Paoa, he lets his deeds speak for him, that’s what it means.’
Duke read aloud: ‘You go to Mr Evans, he’ll give you the dope. I think I may have said that. Sorry, Francis, but the press guys weren’t very friendly in Christchurch.’
It was in Christchurch that the provincial press started to reveal a national (or at least a pakeha—white man) obsession with the idea that Duke was actually a Maori. ‘He would pass muster as a Maori,’ noted the Christchurch Star. The Dominion went even further:
There is no doubt that the Duke would pass for a Maori anywhere, albeit on the land he has a slow and stately mien that is a contrast to his gait in the water, which resembles a tiger in its forcefulness. Conversing with Kahanamoku, I put the question to him: ‘Can you understand Maori?’ The answer was, ‘A little—not very much.’ Considering, however, that he has not been with us more than a fortnight, and probably had few opportunities of testing the matter, it is evidence that the Hawaiians and the Maori have something in common that was perhaps more so in former times.
Duke put the papers back on the table and lay down to sleep on the uncomfortable banquette, trying to tally, as he drifted off, how many Maori words he knew.
Having pleased a capacity crowd at the Te Aro Baths carnival in Wellington the previous day with a fast 100-yards swim, Duke was delighted with the prospect of spending Sunday in the surf at Lyall Bay, but he was equally excited about spending time with a new friend, Chief Tureiti Te Heu Heu Tukino V. The most prominent Maori in that part of the dominion, Te Heu Heu had burst into the official area at the Te Aro Baths and demanded: ‘Where is this Honolulu Maori you call a Hawaiian?’
After Duke had swum, he spent the rest of the afternoon with Te Heu Heu, huddled in a corner comparing cultural similarities and differences, and, as far as Francis could tell from the frequent raucous laughter, telling jokes. The chief had stayed on to make a brief appearance at the civic reception and dinner that followed, but he had told Duke: ‘Tomorrow at Lyall Bay, we celebrate Maori style.’
The Hawaiians spent the night at Alec Ross’s cottage and Duke was on the beach early, Ross at his side, full of false bravado as he strode towards his first surf-shooting lesson. George trailed behind, trying to work out the operation of the Box Brownie.
‘Good Lord,’ said Ross. ‘Will you look at this.’
A team of Maoris was hard at work beside the surf club, digging fire pits in the soft sand and erecting work benches around them. Others were unloading sheep and pig carcasses from a dray and preparing them for the fire. Seeing Duke approaching, they left their work to greet him, until one man shouted a stern message from afar and the workers smiled and resumed their posts.
‘As a general rule, the Maori likes to throw a party,’ said Ross. ‘You wait and see.’
‘And the pakeha likes to surf? Let’s see about that, Alec.’
Surprisingly, it only took three or four failed shoots before Duke was able to position Ross perfectly and thrust him along the green face of a wave with enough speed to enable him to clamber to his feet and stay there long enough for a photograph to be taken. For Duke this represented the start of the lesson, not the end, but when he rejoined Ross, struggling for breath in the shallows, he realised that the automobile dealer was done for now.
‘The spirit is willing, but I’m afraid the flesh is a wee bit weak, Paoa,’ Ross gasped. ‘But you’ve made an old man very happy.’
While the surf grew in size and became more difficult to negotiate as the day progressed, the spectators were delighted to see Duke work through his repertoire, George body-shooting around him, while he was occasionally joined by young Maori boys who squealed with joy as he hoisted them onto the board and rode with them in the shallows. Fleetingly, the thought occurred to him that the crowd here would love to see him lift Isabel onto his shoulders and ride into shore with her holding that ballerina pose that came so naturally.
‘The visitor entertained (the crowd) with a truly wonderful display of shooting the breakers, which, after the spell of southerly weather, were fairly large,’ the Evening Post reported. ‘His renowned standing shoot on the surf board was the particular feature. He stood right up on the board, while the latter shot along at a great speed. By careful steering he prolonged the shoot for a distance of 150 to 200 yards.’
Te Heu Heu’s celebration began with a fierce haka war dance on the sand by the fire pits, and continued through the afternoon with a hongi barbeque feast of pork and lamb, served with huge bowls of a vegetable and root mix that reminded Duke of his beloved poi.
In the evening Te Heu Heu presented all three Hawaiians with traditional Maori cloaks, rubbing noses as a gesture of friendship, and wrote in Duke’s autograph book: ‘Tuika Kahana Moku, Tino nui te koa mete haru o omana ngakau I te kitenga one tutakinga kia mana ki to mana whare.’ (Duke Kahanamoku, we are very glad in our hearts to see you and to meet you at our house.)
He spoke to Duke of their shared ancestry and of the old country, Hawaiki, which Maori had left many centuries ago while Duke’s ancestors remained, but their shared mana, or rangitira, had never changed. And so they sat by the fire, Duke playing his ukulele, and traded songs, the Honolulu Maori feeling as close to home as he had been since the Ventura left Diamond Head all those months ago.
The Hawaiians travelled by train to Harry Williams’s home town of Auckland, where they based themselves for the final two weeks of the tour, staying at the Royal Hotel and swimming at carnivals at the Albert Street Baths, Calliope Dock and, when a second carnival at the dock was washed out, at the Hobson Street Tepid Baths. During this stay in Auckland, Duke clocked some of his fastest times of the tour: 54 2⁄5 seconds for the 100 yards (just three-fifths of a second outside his own world record) and a lightning 50 yards in 23 2⁄5 seconds. The team also ventured off on short excursions to country centres like Hamilton and Napier for exhibitions swims, but Duke only had the opportunity to ride Alec Ross’s board one more time, at Muriwai on the west coast, en route to a swimming exhibition at Wanganui, and in front of a small but fascinated crowd of locals.
As the tour wound down, Duke told Francis Evans that he had one last thing to do before he left New Zealand. He wanted to spend some time in Rotorua, the spiritual home of the Maori. In fact the spa town was virtually the last stop on the tour with no down-time allowed, but with Harry Williams’s assistance, Francis managed to extend their stay by an extra night.
Duke was feted by the local Maoris and welcomed into several homes, but he never felt the spiritual connection he had shared with Chief Te Heu Heu and his family.
On the train back to Auckland Duke wrote a letter home to his father, informing the family that he would soon be home, and signing off with the customary, ‘My aloha nui and don’t forget the boys.’ Then he wrote to Isabel, telling her not about his adventures in Maoriland, but about how much
he had enjoyed spending time and riding the waves with her at Freshwater. He was much older than she, but they shared the same spirit and the same sense of fun, he wrote, and he would never forget her and sincerely hoped they would soon meet again. He finished: ‘My aloha nui to you and don’t forget the Freshie gang.’
Duke read the letter twice, screwed it into a ball and put it in his ukulele case. A porter came down the aisle and informed him that dinner was being served in the buffet car. Duke leapt up to join his teammates.
Chapter 22
Home
The Hawaiians left Auckland on the Niagara on 24 March and were almost halfway home when the Honolulu Star-Bulletin reported on page two of its 31 March edition a short article that left many residents in shock:
IAUKEA SUCCEEDS KAHANAMOKU AS POLICE CAPTAIN: Sergeant Promoted to Job Vacated By Officer to Escape Facing Charges
Frederick H. Iaukea, for years identified with the police department, who has won promotion from roundsman and clerk to first-class sergeant, will tomorrow morning don the star of captain of police, taking over the position vacated by the resignation of Captain Duke Kahanamoku.
The sheriff this morning received and immediately accepted the resignation of Captain Kahanamoku as a police officer. Kahanamoku was charged with conduct unbecoming an officer and gentleman. Investigation of charges had reached a stage where the officer volunteered his resignation rather than face a civil service hearing of a series of allegations filed with the sheriff.
‘Captain Kahanamoku asked to be relieved from further duty,’ said Sheriff Rose today. ‘About all I have to say is that I have accepted his resignation. As far as I know, any charges that may have been filed against the officer in the department have been dropped.’
Although the term ‘conduct unbecoming’ covered a multitude of sins, from failure to pay a debt to consorting with prostitutes, being drunk and disorderly or committing acts of cruelty or indecency, those who had known Duke Halapu Kahanamoku over many years in Waikiki, or who had come to know him over his fifteen years as a dedicated, fair-minded police officer, could not conceive of the man they knew being capable of any such transgressions. But they also did not understand how Halapu could lamely resign and allow the court of public opinion to find him guilty of all of the definitions, rather than stand up to his accusers, unless this was the less painful option for him and his family.
The Niagara docked in Honolulu on Sunday morning, 4 April, and if the sins of the father were a talking point all over town, they certainly were not visited upon the son. A crowd of family and friends, the Royal Hawaiian Band and a big press contingent were on hand to greet the conquering heroes. Duke and George posed for photographs with Francis Evans, but both allowed their manager to handle the press conference alone. He was asked about the Longworth challenge, Duke’s record times, how the antipodeans had responded to the sport of surf-riding and what Australians and New Zealanders were like, and whether the tour was likely to result in more of them visiting Hawaii.
Captain Duke Halapu Kahanamoku, c. 1912. Photo courtesy Honolulu Police Department Museum.
‘It would be impossible to give visitors better treatment than we received,’ Francis told the reporters. ‘They are the squarest sportsmen in the world, Australians and New Zealanders, and we haven’t a single unpleasant criticism to make.’
Of Longworth, he noted: ‘It’s too bad that Duke and Longworth couldn’t hook up for the 220 and 440, but Longworth was sick when they were supposed to have come together, and we travelled around so much that we couldn’t make connections afterwards. In their only meeting, Duke won the hundred easily, Longworth being fourth.’
‘Surfboarding,’ he said, ‘was a big hit in all parts of the continent. At first Australians inclined to the belief that pictures of Hawaiians standing up on a board were doctored, and it took a few demonstrations to convince them. Then they went wild over the sport.’
Although the newspapers failed to get any direct comments from Duke on the success of the tour, the Star-Bulletin attributed to him a rather unlikely and somewhat confused quote about antipodean womanhood a few days later:
There certainly are some pretty Maori maids over in Australia; and lots of them have money to burn, but I didn’t pick one out because I was afraid she’d make me stay in that country. Australia is a fine land and its people are mighty nice, but I’ll never make my home anywhere but here.
It was a big week for the Hawaii boosters, for in addition to Duke’s return, Alexander Hume Ford hosted a ‘Hands across the Pacific’ forum at the Outrigger Canoe Club for delegates from every Pacific nation, with his old friend Jack London, recently returned from the mainland, the keynote speaker. As the most famous Hawaiian ever, Duke was called upon to lead the delegates in a canoe paddle across the bay to launch the meeting.
But for Francis Evans and Duke, an even bigger event was the 10 April presentation of the report on their tour to the president and board of the Hui Nalu Club, as well as to the press and invited representatives of all the leading swimming, athletic and business associations. Francis had kept meticulous records throughout the three-and-a-half-month tour, accounting for every penny (36 pounds and 11 shillings expended over three and a half months on such things as shipboard service tips, laundry, deck-chair hire and meals while travelling), and detailing every race result and important meeting. None of this made him less nervous as he and Duke (along for moral support only) climbed the stairs of the Public Service rooms on King Street to address the meeting.
Francis began by outlining the phenomenal successes of the tour: ‘Duke and George Cunha took part in sixty races, twenty-seven in New Zealand and thirty-three in Australia, and Duke gave eight exhibitions of surfboard riding. Of the sixty events, Duke finished first in twenty of twenty-seven in New Zealand and twenty-five of thirty-three in Australia.’
He then explained that the win ratio would have been much higher but for the admirable handicapping system employed in many of the races. George Cunha had performed splendidly as well, he said, and both men had broken more than a dozen world, national and regional records, as well as improving on their own times. He concluded:
The trip as a whole was a grand success, and the performances of both Duke Kahanamoku and Cunha far exceeded anything that was expected of them under all the circumstances. That their swimming was a revelation to the many thousands who gained admission to the carnivals was proven by the tremendous and prolonged ovation which always greeted them whenever they entered the water. Our Duke and Cunha worthily upheld the prestige of their native land and not only covered themselves with fame and glory, but were a great advertisement for Hawaii-nei.
The prolonged ovation Francis had referred to was replicated in the Public Service rooms. It was, by common consent, the greatest promotion of Hawaii yet undertaken, for while Duke had toured the American mainland extensively, and Europe to a lesser degree, only during his tour of Australasia had the combination of swimming and surfing resonated with the public as a lifestyle choice, with the sheer joy of it communicated to a world-wide audience. Of course the war would get deeper and wider. Within weeks many of the families the Hawaiians had met on their tour would be affected by the slaughter at Gallipoli, and within a couple of years America, too, would be drawn into the conflict. The real growth of the beach lifestyle would have to wait, but the framework had been created, and whatever else he did in his long and fruitful life, Duke Kahanamoku would always be remembered for having planted a seed of aloha wherever he travelled in those champion years—truly the father of surf.
While Duke tried to comfort his father through the first difficult days of his forced and premature retirement, and started training with George for the San Francisco Exposition swim meet, he also had to deal with new demands on him as a public figure that contributed nothing to his financial coffers. This was to be the bane of his existence through the war years, something he began to realise w
hen, at Governor Lucius Pinkham’s request, at the end of April he joined the biannual government junket to the leper colony on the island of Molokai.
As Jack London had made clear to the world in his writings about the Molokai colony, there were serious issues about the way the Territory treated these unfortunates, but the only government response to this so far had been to send a delegation of celebrities and officials over on a well-appointed vessel every second year, bearing a symbolic flag that might well have said, ‘See—we do care!’
What the Star-Bulletin referred to as the ‘Molokai junket’ left Honolulu Harbour on the Maula Lau with more than 100 guests on board, fewer than a dozen of them actually involved in policy decisions about leprosy. The rest were along for the party, soundtrack courtesy of the ubiquitous Royal Hawaiian Band, pupus (snacks) and beverages courtesy of the Territory.
As the party got into full swing on the Molokai crossing, perhaps Duke was in the thick of it, ukulele on his lap, singing those songs and beaming that smile at everyone, or perhaps he was standing on the foredeck alone, contemplating a few regrets he may have had about the recent past, and wondering if, for all his fame, he really had a future you could count on. With Duke, you could never really tell what was going on underneath that big, beautiful smile.
The day after Duke’s departure from Sydney, Claude West and Freddie Williams were sharing patrol duties at North Steyne when they noticed a head bobbing up and down in a strong seaward current just north of their station. Before they could react, Claude noticed a young boy running down the sand and plunging into the same current.
