This poster depicts Hawaii’s famous Waikiki Beach, the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, and the Outrigger Canoe Club in the 1940s. Artwork by Kerne Erickson, © Greg Young Publishing, Inc. 2002.
The poster is a reproduction of an ad for Inter-Island Airways (now Hawaiian Airlines) showing the Royal and the old Club site, with a surfing canoe and a beach boy with an OCC Beach Services patch on his T-Shirt. An Inter-Island plane is shown towing a banner behind it.
The Poster was purchased by the Historical Committee in 2008 during the year of the Club’s Centennial and hung behind the Front Desk in the Lobby for the anniversary year. Its frame is a pebbled blond wood having the appearance of beach sand.
The poster is now located on the wall behind the Controller’s Desk in the Business Office.More about the painting:
More about the painting:
- The year of the painting is 1941.
- The ship shown is the Kilauea of the Inter Island Steamship Ltd.
- The aircraft towing the banner is a Sikorsky S-28 of Inter Island Airways, Ltd. In the same year Inter-Island changed its name to Hawaiian Airlines and acquired DC-3s.
- The mansion next to the Royal Hawaiian Hotel was the Young Family estate later to be bought out by Sheraton for the Sheraton Waikiki Hotel.
- The dining room at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel is shown with its buff and blue roof. In 1942, the U.S. Navy Submarine Force took over the Royal for R&R for its crews. After the war the Royal was renovated with a new dining room now called the Monarch Room.
- Between the Royal and OCC, set back and not shown, was the Uluniu Women’s Swimming Club which was formerly known as the OCC Women’s Auxiliary until 1926. Now located at the site is the Royal Hawaiian Hotel Annex.
- A grass shack is shown between the Royal and the Outrigger Canoe Club which was there for a short period of time until the Hau Terrace was completed. The Club clock is shown adjacent to the shack. The same clock is now located over the Tunnel to the Logo Shop and locker rooms at the existing Club.
- The hau trees between the OCC and the Moana Bath House (behind beach boy) was the scene of yearly Christmas and New Year’s parties lasting for several days with hundreds of people gathering to drink, play music and dance the hula. Party goers would bring booze (placed in a two-man canoe filled with ice) and food.
- The surfboard being carried down the beach by a man is a balsa/redwood board manufactured by Swastika. The symbol was burned in at the tail of the board.
- The Moana Bath House was the gathering place for the Hui Nalu Club until the Moana renovated (1946) the dining room (which previously extended out over the water). The Hui Nalu Club is now located at the new canoe shed at the Maunalua Beach Park boat ramp area.
- The Bath House included a snack bar which was popular with all the beach gang. Stew and rice and rice and gravy were menu items that were popular and inexpensive (40-cents at the time).
- The beach boy is wearing a pre-World War II Waikiki Beach Patrol OCC tank top. After the war it was named Outrigger Beach Services.
- Three canoes are rigged with amas to starboard. The tradition is to rig to port.
Size: 43.5” wide, 32” high (with frame).