Memory and Genealogy: Tracking Curtis P. Iaukea's Public Memories

My great great grandfather, Curtis Piehu Iaukea, worked as an international attaché and held over 36 political positions during his lifetime in both the Hawaiian Kingdom and the Territorial Government in Hawai`i, as his political life spanned from 1885 to 1940. This paper analyzes his documented narratives at the turn of last century in order to tease out memory, nostalgia, and tools of indoctrination in Hawai`i. I specifically analyze a speech he delivered in 1937, via radio and trans Atlantic in both London and Hawai`i, that recounted his visit to Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee in London on the 50 years prior. This speech served two primary purposes when it was delivered: it cohesified the Hawaiian Kingdom and British cultural and social communities with the telling of inter-state affairs 50 years prior; and it also ignored some dramatic events that took place after 1887 in Hawai`i, such as the illegal overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom and the instatement of the Territorial Government. The manner in which Curtis P. Iaukea's public memories were shared during the Territorial era becomes complicated because on the one hand these memories were incorporated into the occupying government's linear narrative in order to explain and legitimize their own existence. On the other hand, the man and person recounting these memories also lived and worked in official capacities through Hawai`i's political and social upheavel. This particular speech is filled with silences and renderings that belie his own personal complications associated with living through and representing Hawai`i during this politically chaotic time frame. I look for the impregnated pauses and flowery descriptions in this speech in order to understand these complications, and to analyze the manner in which native Hawaiian national consciousness was changing and evolving in Hawai`i in the early 1900s.