It was another hard-to-get-through day as a smaller group of family and friends joined together at Kailua Beach Park to say aloha to Marty McClain.
In this photo, Marty’s wife, Wendy, holds the ti leaf wrapped container high overhead as the canoe is launched and friends shouted a last goodbye. Two canoes made the short trip to the calm waters just inside Popoia or “Flat Island”.
Click on the photo and you’ll be taken to the larger photo gallery.
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Friends of well-known auctioneer and businessman Marty McClain gathered yesterday afternoon at Murphy’s Bar & Grill to celebrate his life.
McClain died February 20 of cancer.
The afternoon featured food and drinks provided by Don Murphy, whose business is just down the block from the McClain Auctions space at the corner of King and Nuuanu. Henry Kapono, another close friend, performed outside in a section of Merchant Street that was closed off for the party.
Click on the photo for a larger gallery of pictures from the event.
McClain teamed up with auctioneer Steve Rosen to form McClain & Rosen Inc. in May 1992, according to state business records.
The business reincorporated in 2000 with McClain as the sole officer when Rosen retired and moved to the mainland.
McClain Auctions moved to its expanded downtown location in 2005, but has received an eviction notice from the landlord, according to friends. Real estate records indicate the building lease is held by Leong Brothers, a real estate partnership.
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The heavy rain and thunderstorms in last night’s forecast failed to materialize overnight or this morning, at least here in Kaaawa.
But it’s cloudy and windy, and has been all morning. We were able to finish our early morning walk, although unbrellas were necessary to stave off a slight sprinkle falling through much of the hour.
It’s beautiful even with the thick clouds hanging down over Kaaawa Valley. Somehow there was enough muted sunlight to give color to the ocean.
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Yesterday morning, Maui News reporter Ilima Loomis used the networking site, Twitter, to describe a frustrating run-in with another clogged drain in the flow of government information.
It seemed like a simple enough request.
Trying to find breakdown of unemployment numbers for Maui, Molokai, Lanai.
Call the Labor Department, right? Not so fast.
Labor PIO not in. Labor statistics office says they could give info to a member of the public, but I have to get it from PIO b/c I’m media.
They would answer the question if posed by “a member of the public” but they have instructions to clam up if the same question comes from a member of the news media? Something’s wrong over there, if that’s the case, although I have run into the same thing in the past when trying to pry information out of the city. Not sure what city policy is today, though.
And I got an update from Ilima Loomis in response to this morning’s post.
Thought I would give you an update on my search for signs of life at the Dept. of Labor and Industrial Relations yesterday.
As it turned out, the head of the research and stats division DID call me back, and told me the island and state breakdown wasn’t going to be released till next week. The PIO (a new guy) never called me back!!! Lesson reaffirmed: drop as many lines in the water as you can, and see which one gets a bite.
Hope things are nice in Kaaawa. It’s rainy and cold here.
In what is becoming a common sign of the times, news of Neil Abercrombie’s almost official intent to run for governor next year didn’t come from Hawaii’s news media, but from Associated Press writer Kevin Freking in Washington.
Freking apparently learned that Abercrombie was planning a weekend announcement from someone close to House Speaker Nancy Polosi.
According to his story: “Abercrombie told House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of his intentions Thursday night, the official said.”
I hope that we’re not in for a re-run of the nasty 1986 Abercrombie vs. Hannemann campaign. They opposed each other in the Democratic primary for the 1st District seat vacated by Rep. Cec Heftel, who also returned to run for governor. The campaign got dirty, which Hannemann’s campaign spreading images of Abercrombie as a drug user. Everything went to heck. In a wildly implausible chain of events, Abercrombie won the special election to fill the remaining months of Heftel’s term, but Hannemann won the bigger prize, the primary election. But there was a backlash to all the campaign nastiness, and Hannemann was defeated in the general election by Republican Pat Saiki. She served two terms before making an unsuccessful bid for the Senate against Dan Akaka. Abercrombie was then elected to take her place in Washington and has been there since.
Anybody else remember Neil’s campaign as “Super Senator“?
And for something completely different, check out this wonderful blog, “A scrapbook of women of World War II Hawaii“. I noted the site via an entry from several months ago about Hilo Hattie, who happened to live in the house next door here in Kaaawa.