uwmspeccoll:

Hau’oli Lā Kamehameha!

Kamehameha Day was established by royal decree on December
22, 1871 by King Kamehameha V in order to honor the memory of his great
grandfather Kamehameha (Kalani Pai‘ea Wohi o Kaleikini Keali‘ikui Kamehameha
o ‘Iolani i Kaiwikapu kaui Ka Liholiho Kūnuiākea) (c.1758-1819), the chief who
had united the Hawaiian Islands and became the first king of Hawai‘i.

The first celebration of Kamehameha Day was held June 11, 1872 and continued
until a group of white businessmen and descendants of missionaries carried out the illegal overthrow of Queen Lili‘uokalani in 1893. In 1904, the
holiday was reinstated by Prince Jonah Kūhiō Kalaniana‘ole and it continues to
be celebrated on June 11 to this day.

To commemorate the day,

we are sharing images from our first edition copy of Voyagers by Herb Kawainui

Kāne

(1928-2011) depicting King Kamehameha.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin may seem a bit removed from the festivities of the day, but perhaps not as much as one would think. First, UWM Special Collections holds a considerable collection of Native American, First Nations, Inuit, and Hawaiian literature (of which Voyagers is a part). Secondly,

Kāne’s mother’s family were farmers from Wisconsin, and Kāne spent a good part of his childhood in the state. He also received his MFA not too far from here at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago/University of Chicago. He is among the first Native Hawaiian artists to achieve international repute.

Growing up, Kāne dreamed of
rebuilding a double-hulled sailing canoe similar to the ones his ancestors had
used to sail from Tahiti to Hawai‘i, but it had been over 600 years since these
canoes had last been seen. In the 1970s, Kāne founded the Polynesian Voyaging
Society where he and others combined their research and knowledge in order to make their dreams a reality. They were
successful in their efforts, ultimately building the sailing canoe Hōkūle‘a, of
which Kāne became the first captain in 1975. In 1976, with the help of Mau,
a traditional navigator from Satawal in Micronesia, Hōkūle‘a sailed to Tahiti
where they were greeted by over half of the island’s population at Pape‘ete
Harbor. Herb
Kawainui Kāne’s work was so important to the Hawaiian community that he was actually elected a Living Treasure of Hawai‘i in 1984. Kāne died on March 8, 2011, the 36th anniversary of the launch of the Hōkūle‘a. His place in history and that of King Kamehameha, however, remain forever in the memories of the Hawaiian people.

-Kalani