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Tiki Central / General Tiki / From the news archives 25 years ago: Tiki kills

Post #617545 by TikiTomD on Fri, Dec 16, 2011 7:52 AM

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T

Swanky, at the very least, the hotel’s insurance premiums probably ballooned, cutting into a marginal income.

Sven, that falling Tiki warning sign is a gem. Wonder if that was the direct result of the incident in this thread? Pat and I stayed at the Ka`anapali Beach Hotel on Maui in July of 2001. We loved the place; the hotel staff did their best to acquaint guests with Hawaiian culture, art and activities.

As to photos of Tikis at the Kona Lagoon Hotel, I’m hoping that our TC Ohana in Hawaii can help, as I’ve not been successful thus far in finding any.

This 1952 map of Kahalu`u Beach by Henry E.P. Kekahuna at the Bishop Museum was based on field work conducted in 1949 and 1950, before development. It shows an amazing concentration of archaeologically and historically-significant sites on that area of the Big Island’s Kona Coast...


The map details the pre-Kona Lagoon Hotel layout of the Ke`eku Heiau, as well as the tale of the Maui chief’s sacrifice. For dog lovers, there’s kind of a Greyfriars Bobby story here, the Hawaiian version...


Never knew there was such a thing, but Ku`emanu Heiau, a temple of surfing, was sited at the south end of the beach...


The property and all improvements of the Kona Lagoon Hotel reverted to its leaseholder on abandonment in 1995, Kamehameha Schools / Bishop Estate (estate of Hawaiian Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop). The for-profit arm of the leaseholder, Kamehameha Investment Corporation (KIC), took over and eventually also bought the adjoining resort to the south, Keauhou Beach Hotel. KIC decided to demolish the Kona Lagoon Hotel and restore the culturally-significant sites on the properties, but keep the Keauhou Beach Hotel intact, reselling it. That hotel is now known as the Outrigger Keauhou Beach Resort. A KIC brochure from 2008 overviews the project and provides additional details on the historic sites. This map from the brochure shows the concentration of those sites...

A graphic rendering of what the Ke`eku Heiau may have originally looked like was provided in The Honolulu Advertiser, “Heiau's history in jeopardy,” September 15, 2002...

Here’s a photo showing Hapaialii Heiau in the foreground, Keeku Heiau in the background, after reconstruction had just started on Ke`eku Heiau, from The Honolulu Star-Bulletin, “Team re-creates Big Isle Hawaiian site,”, June 13, 2008...

Here’s a later photo by W. Nowicki taken on December 28, 2009 showing how the reconstruction advanced...

-Tom