Hawaii was still under martial law in 1944 when my father and other members of the Junior Chamber of Commerce staged a Kamehameha Day celebration on Waikiki Beach. Thousands of servicemen and some local residents jammed the beach for the event, which included canoe and surfboard paddling competitions, although it looks like the beauty contest drew the most attention.
Pearl Lani Stone won the contest and was named “Miss Waikiki” before the appreciative crowd.
Click here or on the photo to see all 18 photographs, all cleared for publication at the time by Army censors.
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Ian-
The enjoyment I get from your pictures is only rivaled by the time I spend being distracted by them. I loved the pictures of the pageant, and on one of those “where are they now” whims I googled the winner, the lovely Miss Pearl Stone.
The top hit is a scanned in Life magazine from 1945. The article is entitled, “Hawaii: A Melting Pot; A Score of Races Live Together in Amity.” There are lots of wonderful pictures of the beautiful people of Hawaii, circa 1945, including Pearl Stone.
Equally entertaining is scrolling through the entire magazine. There are articles on Truman’s honeymoon being over after Potsdam, the myth of Plymouth Rock, and two photos of a shirtless 6-year old Natalie Wood. How times change; would the editors of Life be hauled off to court today for kiddie porn?
Anyway, beautiful pictures, please keep posting these.
http://books.google.com/books?id=xUsEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA103&ots=SsfBeSxFXs&dq=%22pearl%20stone%22%20miss%20waikiki&pg=PA35#v=onepage&q=%22pearl%20stone%22%20miss%20waikiki&f=false
Are you sure about “Ms.” Waikiki? That didn’t come into common use — I don’t think the term was coined even — until the 60s at the earliest.
dang me, that Dorothy Day is a doll
Aloha Ian,
Pearl was my stepmother. I was doing a web search and found your article and amazing pictures. Pearl was married to my father, Harry Allen, and they had 4 children. Patti, Michael, Mark and Katherine. Her middle name is misspelled and should be “Lani”. Pearl was an amazing woman and dearly missed. May I have permission to print the images of Pearl for my family archives? Mahalo, Brynn
My son is her grandson. Michael Allen is his father. She was a beautiful soul.