Everyone Was Affected

The Chronicle published before and after pictures of the fire.

It's not an exaggeration to say that everyone who's lived in Hawaii for at least a few years is affected by the destruction of old Lahaina. I've visited Maui often (though not this century) and know people who were born there and live there.

To them Lahaina is special, much like San Francisco is special to its region. Lahaina and San Francisco each have roughly 10% of the population of Maui and the Bay Area, respectively, but punch way above their weight in cultural and economic influence.

Sarah's diary, circa 1917

My maternal grandmother moved from Honolulu to Lahaina to stay with her older sister Ruth before Ruth went off to Boston to study nursing.

According to her diary Sarah, then an 8th grader, was "the pianist, the office helper, and the sewing assistan[t] to the pupils" at King Kamehameha III elementary school, which did not survive the fires this week.

Benjamin O. Wist (1889-1951), then principal of the school, helped my grandmother transfer to McKinley High in Honolulu. He later became the President of the University of Hawaii and wrote "A Century of Public Education in Hawaii, 1840-1940." Wist Hall on the UH campus is named after him.