Live from Waikiki

Colonialism, Race, and Radio in Hawaii, 1934-1963

Bibliographic Data

ID5879541
AuthorsSusan Smulyan (0000-0001-5033-8921, Universitas Islam Nusantara, corresponding author)
Year2007
Volume27
Issue1
Pages63-75
Publication date2007-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueHistorical Journal Of Film Radio and Television (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0143-9685 • E-ISSN: 1465-3451
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/01439680601177148
OpenAlexW2008295205
LanguageEN
Citations received5

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Acknowledgement I would like to thank Dorinda Hartmann and Heather Diamond for their research assistance. Notes 1. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (New York, Verso, 1983). 2. Douglas Craig, Fireside Politics: radio and political culture in the United States, 1920–1940 (Baltimore, MD, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000). 3. Robert G. Lee, Orientals: Asian Americans in American popular culture (Philadelphia, PA, Temple University Press, 1999). 4. Noel J. Kent, Hawaii: islands under the influence (New York, Monthly Review Press, 1983). 5. Craig, Fireside Politics, 126–131. 6. 'Territory will Honor Roosevelt today over National Radio Hookup,' Honolulu Advertiser, March 4, 1934, 1. 7. Lorrin P. Thurston, President and General Manager, Advertiser Publishing Company to Mr. M.H. Aylesworth, President, NBC, March 6, 1934 in 'Hawaiian Tribute to President Roosevelt' Box 28, Folder 5, NBC Papers, Wisconsin State Historical Society, Madison, Wisconsin hereafter cited as NBC Papers. 8. National Broadcasting Company, 'Hawaii Plans Gala Tribute on Roosevelt Anniversary,' Press Release, February 13, 1934; see also NBC, 'Hawaiian Princess Greets Roosevelt from Honolulu,' Press Release, February 6, 1934; NBC, 'Roosevelt to Hear Hawaiian Tribute,' Press Release, February 27, 1934 all in 'Hawaiian Tribute to President Roosevelt' Box 28, Folder 5, NBC Papers. 9. Randall to WJT, NBC Memo, March 3, 1934; for a newspaper description of the success of the program, see 'Hawaii's Radio Aloha Wins Praise,' March 6, 1934, newspaper clipping, all in 'Hawaiian Tribute to President Roosevelt' Box 28, Folder 5, NBC Papers. 10. Lorrin P. Thurston, Publisher, The Honolulu Advertiser, Owner Station KGU to Honorable Stephen Early, White House, February 10, 1934. See also other Thurston memos on the FDR broadcast, Lorrin P. Thurston, President and General Manager, Advertiser Publishing Co. to Mr. Phillips Carlin, Assistant Program Manager, NBC, January 27, 1934; and Lorrin P. Thurston, President and General Manager, Advertiser Publishing Company, to Merlin H. Aylesworth, President, NBC, January 30, 1934 all in 'Hawaiian Tribute to President Roosevelt' Box 28, Folder 5, NBC Papers. 11. 'Princess' Broadcast Widely Praised,' The Honolulu Advertiser, April 1, 1934, 9. 12. Frank E. Mason, NBC Vice President to Mr. M. A. Mulrony, Radio Station KGU, Telegram, March 3, 1934; M.H. Aylesworth, President, National Broadcasting Co. to Mr. M.A. Mulroney, Radio Station KGU, March 3, 1934. For the solicitation of these cables see, M. A. Mulroney, Director, Radio KGU, to Mr. Donald Withycomb, Manager Station Relations, NBC, February 10, 1934. 13. 'Hawaii Calls,' George S. Kanahele (ed.) Hawaiian Music and Musicians (Honolulu, HI, University Press of Hawaii, 1979), 109–114. 14. For $47.50, see 'Hawaii Calls marks 20th Birthday,' Honolulu Star-Bulletin, June 3, 1955; for $37.50 see 'Jim Becker's Hawaii,' Honolulu Star-Bulletin, February 15, 1967, C8; for $22.50 see Webley Edwards, 'Hawaii Calls: Radio program pays weekly "visit" to the Mainland over more than four hundred radio stations,' Paradise of the Pacific, December 1949, 70+. 15. '"Hawaii Calls" 25 Years Old Today; Counts Listeners All Over World,' Honolulu Star-Bulletin, July 2, 1960; 'Webley Edwards Found His Calling in Hawaii,' The Honolulu Advertiser, June 2, 1965, 18. 16. On short wave see, M.A. Mulrony, Director, KGU, to Mr. Donald Withycomb, NBC, April 14, 1934, Box 28 Folder 19 'Honolulu Advertiser Publishing Company,' NBC Papers; Henry C. Putnam, National Radio Advertising, KGU, to Edgar Kodak, Vice President, NBC, January 28, 1936, Box 43, Folder 15, 'Advertisers Publishing Company, 1936,' NBC Papers; after Pearl Harbor, NBC worried about getting the transcriptions through to 'keep up morale' in Hawaii, see John H. MacDonald to Mr. Frank Russell, February 19, 1942; Edward R. Hitz to John H. MacDonald, 'Re: War Department Request for more service to KGU,' February 18, 1942 all in Box 99, Folder 26, 'KGU, Honolulu, 1933, 1937–1940,' NBC Papers. 17. 'It Happened This Way ...' The Honolulu Advertiser Magazine, August 1, 1954, 13. 18. 'Webley Edwards Found His Calling in Hawaii,' The Honolulu Advertiser, June 2, 1965, 18. 19. 'Hawaii Calls Celebrates 15th Anniversary,' The Honolulu Advertiser: this week in Hawaii, September 7, 1950, 1; '19 Years of Hawaii Calls,' The Honolulu Advertiser, June 5, 1954, 4. 20. Elizabeth Buck, Paradise Remade: the politics of culture and history in Hawai'i (Philadelphia, PA, Temple University Press, 1993); Mark Williams, 'Entertaining 'difference': strains of Orientalism in early Los Angeles television,' in Sasha Torres (ed.) Living Color: race and television in the United States (Durham, NC, Duke University Press, 1998), 12–34. 21. Aside from the programs themselves, the covers of the LPs recorded by Hawaii Calls in the 1950s and 1960s are a good source of Orientalist images and constructions. See: Hawaii Calls Orchestra, Hawaii Calls: Hawaiian shores, presented by Webley Edwards, sound disc (Hollywood, CA, Capitol, 1950?); Hawaii Calls Orchestra, Hawaii Calls: favorite instrumentals of the islands (Hollywood, CA, Capitol, 1957); Hawaii Calls: Hawaii today: the new sounds of old Hawaii, presented by Webley Edwards, sound disc (Hollywood, CA, Capitol, n.d. [c. 1970]). 22. Buck, Paradise Remade, 178. 23. Owens' career is very interesting in this regard, see his autobiography, Harry Owens, Sweet Leilani: the story behind the song (Pacific Palisades, CA, Hula House, 1970). 24. '30th Anniversary for "Hawaii Calls",' Honolulu Star-Bulletin, June 30, 1965, 12. 25. 'Hawaii Calls,' Paradise of the Pacific, July 1952, 11. 26. 'Hapa Haole Songs,' George S. Kanahele (ed.) Hawaiian Music and Musicians (Honolulu, HI, University Press of Hawaii, 1979), 106–107; see also Buck, Paradise Remade, 174–177. 27. Hawaii Calls Orchestra, Hawaii Calls at Twilight sound disc (Hollywood, CA, Capitol Records, 1955). 28. Webley Edwards, 'Hawaii Calls: Radio program pays weekly 'visit' to the Mainland over more than four hundred radio stations,' Paradise of the Pacific, December 1949, 70+. 29. Craig, Fireside Politics, 257. 30. 'Hawaii Calls to Malihini and Kamaaina via Radio, Music and Dance,' Paradise of the Pacific, March 1953, 10; see also '30th Anniversary for "Hawaii Calls",' Honolulu Star-Bulletin, June 30, 1965, 12. 31. 'Hawaii Calls Celebrates 15th Anniversary,' The Honolulu Advertiser: this week in Hawaii, September 7, 1950, 1. 32. Tony Todaro, '"Hawaii Calls" from the Volcano House,' Paradise of the Pacific, July 1953, 24+; for a description of how tourist attractions became part of the culture and a draw in themselves, see Rona Tomiko Halualani, In the name of Hawaiians: native identities and cultural politics (Minneapolis, MN, University of Minnesota Press, 2003, particularly Chapter 4, 'From Queens to Calabashes: Touring the native,' 133–194. 33. Lee, Orientals, particularly Chapter 5, 'The Cold War Origins of the Model Minority,' 145–179. 34. 'Hawaii Calls Celebrates 15th Anniversary,' The Honolulu Advertiser: this week in Hawaii, September 7, 1950, 1. 35. M.A. Mulrony, Director, KGU, to Mr. Donald Withycomb, NBC, April 14, 1934, Box 28, Folder 19, NBC Papers. 36. Henry C. Putnam, KGU Radio Service, to Mr. R.M. Brophy, NBC, March 28, 1936, Box 43, Folder 15, NBC Papers. 37. Edward R. Hitz to I. E. Showerman, February 17, 1942, Box 99, Folder 26, NBC Papers. 38. E.R. Hitz to Mr. I.E. Showerman, February 25, 1942, Box 99, Folder 26, NBC Papers. 39. P. B. Gale, Hollywood, to Mr. J. T. Murphy, New York, 'Re: KGU Recordings,' February 11, 1942; and Edward R. Hitz to Frank E. Mullen, 'Re: Station KGU,' February 16, 1942; Edward R. Hitz to John H. MacDonald, 'Re: War Department Request for more service to KGU,' February 18, 1942; John H. MacDonald to Mr. Frank Russell, February 19, 1942; in Box 99, Folder 26, NBC Papers. 40. The television programs, unlike the radio shows, exist on tape at the Wong Audiovisual Center, University of Hawaii, Manoa, Library. 41. See for example, Hawaii Calls, Show No. 8, Videocassette version of a motion picture originally produced in 1966 by Paradise Productions, Director, William A. Bennington, VHS, Wong Audiovisual Center, University of Hawaii, Manoa, Library. 42. Kent, Hawaii: islands under the influence, 170. 43. Williams, 'Entertaining "Difference",' 12–34. 44. Williams, 'Entertaining "Difference",' 20

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