I received an email last week from Teene Froiseth, which identified all the kids in this early-to-mid-1950s photo that had appeared here earlier.

He writes:

I am doing some research on Abel and Allen Gomes for an article… and came across your site when I googled Abel!

L to R pictured in this classic photo by Clarence “Mac” Maki:

Mary Sue Brown, Charlene Lewis, Anita Lewis (sitting), Billy Boy Brown, Pat Gomes, Carter Lewis, Kahele Kukea, Mele Kukea, Kala Kukea, Harold Lewis, David Maki, Sherwood Chock, Jan Chock.

You can click to see a larger version of the photo.

Froiseth also added a nice recollection of my dad.

Aloha! Uncle John was a super cool guy and my first job packing ice and delivering it that summer in 1968 made me appreciate my job as a lifeguard and later lifeguard captain… when people complained about their lifeguard job… I told them to try packing ice… picking pineapples or doing labor work…then they would appreciate a job at the beach!

The ice packing job refers to my dad’s ice business, which grew after he was scammed by one of his employees (this story first appeared her on June 6, 2009).

It seems his little company got an order from the Army for four high-capacity ice machines, each capable of turning out 1,500 pounds of ice per day. He doesn’t say what they cost, but it was a lot. He processed the order, sent it off to the factory, the machines were shipped to Honolulu, and he had them delivered to Fort Shafter. That’s where things got tricky.

The delivery was rejected by the officer in charge and he was told to take them back. The Army said they never made such an order.

It turned out that the salesman working for the company had run a scam. He apparently stole an Army requisition form, then filled it out and submitted it to my dad, collecting his nice commission along the way. By the time the ice machines arrived and the fraud was discovered, he was long gone.

But the factory considered these items a special order and wouldn’t take them back. So now my dad was stuck with the four big ice machines and a big bill to pay.

He later told the story.

But anyhow the factory manager said, ‘John, tell you what let’s try and do. We’ll arrange some method where it can be paid for. But let’s hook up one machine and bring in a few merchandisers and go out and find people that could sell ice….So we hooked up one machine. (Laughing). And that started us in the ice business.

Eventually he had two 12×20 walk-in freezers, 10 feet high, with a large ice machine on top. Ice would drop into stainless bins in the freezers, where crews would come in at night a load 10 and 12-pound bags, around 1,500 a night, which were then delivered to service stations and convenience stores around the island.

We had monogrammed T-shirts, we had balloons and gave them to every service outlet using our refrigerated storage bins. We had over 100 accounts all over the island, all over the city. Waianae side. We went to Haleiwa, on that side. And Kaimui and everything at that end. But I remember one Christmas and New Year period, I found myself out delivering ice New Year’s night. People needed ice.

And so they did. And packing that ice into bags was hard work, and I run into a surprising number of people who spent some time bagging ice.