My post earlier this week about the closing of the Petland store in Kahala reminded me of my mother’s 2002 recollection of Jiro Matsui from the mid-1930s. Matsui went on to start Petland, later operated by his son, Kenneth.

After graduating from Kamehameha in 1931, my mother entered the University of Hawaii at Manoa and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in 1935. She then took a position in what was then the Home Economics Department, but left in about 1942 to raise a family. Much of her time at UH was spent in Hawaii Hall.

In 2002, more than half a century later, she recalled those Hawaii Hall years as part of the

The following was first published in a March 2014 post, just over a year since she died.

Yet another bit of history recorded by my mother, Helen Lind, and found in one of the last folders I packed up at my parents’ former home in Kahala.

In this brief vignette, she tells of her time in Hawaii Hall in the years prior to WWII. I’ve retyped this from her notes, and I expect that any typos are mine.

But I’ll let her tell the tale of Hawaii Hall.

To get oriented, here’s a photograph of the Manoa campus published in a 1937 booklet for the occasion of the university’s 30th anniversary. I’ve circled Hawaii Hall in green. As usual, click to see a larger version.

From her recollections.

I spent a great part of eight years (1931-1939) in Hawaii Hall, four as a student and four as an instructor in the Home Economics department, which was the housed in the building. There were two sections in the Home Economics program, Household Science (food and nutrition) and Household Art (clothing), both in Hawaii Hall.

Carey D. Miller, who headed the department, had a separate one-story cottage where she conducted experiments on laboratory rats and did chemical analysis of tropical and oriental foods. In the fall of 1939, Home Economics moved out of Hawaii Hall into its new building, which years later was named Miller Hall.

The Household Science section had a large food preparation laboratory and dining and all purpose room on the Diamond Head end of Hawaii Hall’s second floor. Lectures for large classes were scheduled wherever a room was available in Gartley or Dean Hall.

The clothing section was on the first, or main, floor at the opposite end of the building, occupying a large workroom, a storage room, and a small office. There are numerous window which let in the sunlight and the Manoa breezes which supplied natural air conditioning. On many days it was not necessary to turn on the lights in the food laboratory. Miss Katherine Bazore (later Mrs. Gruelle) was in charge of the food program. Madame Dahl, who conducted classes in clothing design and construction, was an older woman, small and wiry, with a heavy French accent, and much loved by the students.

On the second floor, the rooms across the far end, facing Tantalus, were home to the art department, then headed by prominent artist Huq Luquiens, a man of slight stature, a stereotype of a dapper Frenchman. Toward the end of the 1930s, Ben Norris joined the staff and over the years enjoyed considerable fame as a local artist.

The Art Department was always closely allied with Home Economics, of which it had once been a part. When the “College of Agricultural and Mechanical Arts” (which later became the University of Hawaii) was first formed in 1907, art was part of Domestic Science (Home Economics), one of the original departments.

Also on the second floor were classrooms and faculty offices. Dr. Leonora Bilger, best known as professor of chemistry, served as the Dean of Women with an office on the second floor. The location of the German language classroom was common knowledge, as each fall Maria Hormann’s students supplemented their book learning with singing the songs of the Christmas season in German. The music drifted down the length of the building.

The building did not have sufficient space for faculty offices, so there was some doubling up. In a fairly large room adjacent to the Home Economics food laboratory, I shared office space with three professors in the business department. In each corner of the room as a desk, chair, and a file cabinet. Dr. Harold Hoflich, Dr. William Taylor, and Mr. Graham were my office mates. The room didn’t have a telephone. Business and administrative offices were located on the main or first floor, with the office of the president on the Diamond Head end.

My memory is somewhat vague about the lower floor. It wasn’t a damp, dark, dungeon-like basement, for the classrooms there had high windows that let in the light and breeze. I definitely remember the mimeograph room under the watchful eye of young Jiro Matsui. Faculty members left their papers to be copied, and Jiro always had the job completed and delivered on time. It is interesting that after leaving the university, he became an entrepreneur and founder of the Petland stores.

I am quite sure there were two other service rooms on the lower floor. Kazuo was the guru of the mail room where he sorted incoming mail prior to delivering it around the campus. Masao Miyamoto, the university photographer for many years, had a workroom and a darkroom. In his off-hours, he was a popular Boy Scout leader in Kaimuki.

Faculty and staff adhered to a dress code. Women were dressed and in my department were required to wear stockings. No jeans or slippers.

Helen Y. Lind
February 2002