Here’s an oldie. I’ve posted it before, but it’s worth repeating.

It’s a photo of my great-grandmother (my mom’s maternal grandmother), with two of her children. The older girl is my grandmother, Heleualani Eva Cathcart, and the younger is her sister, Helen Mary Kahooilimoku Cathcart.

The photo was taken in 1891 while on a trip to San Francisco. Just click on it to see a larger version.

My mother described that 1891 trip in a brief essay about my great grandfather (and her grandfather), Robert William Cathcart. It’s one of those bits of history that ties together family and community. She tells how Cathcart got to know a young part-Tahitian man, John Henry Wilson, and encouraged him to pursue a higher education. In 1891, Cathcart and Kina accompanied Wilson to California, where Wilson enrolled in the first entering class at the newly opened Stanford University.

Wilson later was elected mayor of Honolulu three times between 1920 and 1954. Family history merges with island history.

Neither girl had a legal birth certificate, which was not standard at that time in history, or if the births took place at home. So in 1948, both Lani and Helen applied for “Certificates of Hawaiian Birth,” which could then be used the same as a regular birth certificate. The process of applying required compiling evidence and witnesses to the birth.

One of the witnesses supporting their applications was Jennie Wilson, wife of then-Mayor Johnny Wilson. She testified she had been a “schoolmate” the Cathcart sister’s mother, Kina, my great grandmother.

You can view a copy of the documents here.