“You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone,” said the lyrics of Joni Mitchell’s 1970 song, “Big Yellow Taxi.” It was written after her first trip to Hawaii, according to a Wikipedia entry about the song.
The thought certainly applies to Oahu’s original railroad, built by Ben Dillingham’s Oahu Railway & Land Co. Between 1898 and 1947, its narrow gauge trains ran from Iwilei out through Waipahu and Ewa, along the Leeward coast, then around Kaena Point to Waialua and as far as Kahuku. There was also a spur that ran from Pearl Harbor up to Wahiawa and Schofield.
The last train ran in 1947, and the tracks were slowly dismantled in subsequent years.
I just ran across an old pamphlet about OR&L, which featured this map of the rail line around Oahu.
![[text]](http://ilind.net/oldkine_images/train_1946_2.jpg)
That means this photo of a group picnicking along the railroad track in December 1946, probably out near Kaena Point, was near the end of the railroad’s historical run. That’s my father in the striped shirt on the right with my sister, Bonnie.
I discovered my sister had scanned this photo when I was trying to identify the location of another picnic several years earlier, also captured in one of my parents’ old photos. In this photo, a group is spread out in front of a gnarled old tree, with what appeared to be a railroad car visible in the background.
It’s too bad the foresight, and the capital, weren’t available to bring this 71 mile route into the modern age. It’s pretty amazing to look back and think of what might have been.
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Indeed a preferable route at ground level. I so enjoy your old pics. There are two many high rises, autos, and parking lots on Oahu.
I’ll admit to a nostalgic wish that OR&L had kept operating (when I was a kid living at Barbers Point, the Navy was still running trains out to Lualualei), but damage from the 1946 tsunami and the growth of efficient truck transport made it impractical. Sad.
“[I]n 1899 O’ahu sugar baron Benjamin Dillingham opened the elegant Hale’iwa Hotel next to where the now-famous Rainbow Bridge crosses the Anahulu River. The massive colonial retreat, hunting lodge and social center catered to folks who traveled from Honolulu on the Oahu Railroad & Land Co. line, which Dillingham had founded 10 years earlier to haul freight. The hotel and passenger train provided the means for travelers to visit Waialua, which had previously been favored by ali’i and members of the Hawaiian royalty, including Queen Liliuokalani, Hawai’i’s last monarch, who made her summer home on Anahulu Stream.”
— From Honolulu Advertiser, Sunday, January 13, 2002
North Shore border ‘mystery’ unraveled
By Will Hoover
http://the.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/2002/Jan/13/ln/ln14a.html
There’s also the famous Lili’uokalani Protestant Church with its the extraordinary clock she gave, located right across the street from Matsumoto shave ice. By the way, I was up there a couple weeks ago. Aoki’s is gone, that whole block is being renovated, but Matsumoto’s remains open, accessible by a narrow path through dust and construction work. The old Wai’alua courthouse is now owned by OHA but is closed and has been awaiting renovation for several years. Reminds me of my tourist travels through Italy, where it seemed that about half of the historic buildings were “chiuso per restauro” — closed for renovation [but nothing was actually happening].
My dad was the OR&L paymaster and would take the family (before I came along), and sometimes friends as well, on the pay train with its numerous station stops all the way to Kaena Point where a picnic was enjoyed by all. Life was more leisurely then. Once the locomotive hit a car on the tracks by the entrance to Camp Erdman. Two women inside had to be rushed to Waialua Ag’s dispensary facility for emergency treatment. A book on the OR&L that came out not too long ago mentions a report my father prepared for management detailing how the Hale`iwa Hotel had never really operated profitably.
Dang good song by Joni Mitchell. Thanks for sharing the YouTube vid.
Great post and comments… a much-welcomed relief from politics
That old OR&L route was a product of different time and age of Oahu. Sugar and pineapples plantations were the hubs of economic activity. Waikiki had some hotels, but was not yet a resort mecca. Ala Moana was swamp land. Hawaii Kai was mainly pig farms and fish ponds. And with no trans-Ko’olau tunnels, Kaneohe and Kailua were relatively isolated areas.
How times have changed.
What bugs me is the poor planning,corruption and total lack of vision that characterizes Hawai’i development. Iolani Palace was almost a parking lot and Diamond Head came close to being condos. Countries around the globe maintain their natural resources and history while developing modern thriving economies. We need to move beyond destroying what makes Hawaii special for the whim of every developer that comes to town.
Its about time we
Part of the train ran on the North Shore into the 1950s, probably servicing the Kahuku sugar mill. Maybe around 1956, I can remember running from the backyard to the tracks that ran along Kamehameha Hwy. when the train passed by each afternoon. We would wave enthusiastically at the weary field laborers and they in turn would nod and lift a hand to acknowledge the privileged haole Kawela Bay kids as they lumbered by. If I knew then what I know now….
I’ll second the nostalgia thought.
When I was a kid my dad pulled over along Nimitz Highway, near what is now the Nimitz Center, and let me climb all over the flatcars parked along the rail line.
I got to see that heavy hardware up close. Dad was a heavy machinery mechanic, and he explained to me how some of that worked, as well as pointing out the fact that the rails that were used often have shiny surfaces.
Today hardly a trace of the rail line remains at Kaena Point. Some of the road bed can be seen. And what little of the stonework that supported the rail bed and trestles along the way are hardly noticable.
Nature takes things back quickly in a place like that.
Wow you guys know a lot about the OR&L I’m doing a project on the OR&L can any of you on this thread tell me were I can find the OR&L ride away in Haleiwa are there any remnants of of the train track or station there? Also if there are any railroad ties anywhere left on the island beyond the current Ewa active train.
Ref the OR&L tracks: the one on the N shore were destroyed by the 46 tsunami
Have a photo of them
It’s tracks ran just 20 feet from my bedroom at Waialee.
The thought certainly applies to Oahu’s original railroad, built by Ben Dillingham’s Oahu Railway & Land Co. Between 1898 and 1947, its narrow gauge trains ran from Iwilei out through Waipahu and Ewa, along the Leeward coast, then around Kaena Point to Waialua and as far as Kahuku.
The rail did not run after 1 April 1946 from Kahuku to leeward coast for it was distroyed by a 55 ft tsunami. I have a photo of it destroyed by the wave in front of my home at Waialee.
Stafford-Ames Morse
morse.stafford@gmail.com
Hi Stafford,
I would be interested to see photos of the old railroad and especially the photo you have. Have you posted them somewhere I can view?
Mahalo!
Colleen
Thanks for sharing! I’m working on an entry of my blog on the history of Ka’ena Point along with a tidbit of info on the railway, and will be linking back to your blog! 🙂