EOS Features

1890: “I WAS INITIATED IN THE MYSTERIES OF SURF-RIDING,” HENRY CARRINGTON BOLTON, FAMOUS CHEMIST, REPORTS FROM NIIHAU

New York-born chemist and bibliographer Henry Carrington Bolton visited Hawaii's Niihau, the privately-owned "Forbidden Isle," in 1890. The text below is from Bolton's academic article "Some Hawaiian Pastimes," published in the January 1891 issue of The Journal of American Folk-Lore. Surfing at this stage was at or near its low point; the revival would begin around the turn of the century. Also, B...

1873: “THE MORE DARING RIDERS STOOD ON THEIR SURF-BOARDS, WAVING THEIR ARMS AND UTTERING EXULTANT CRIES," BY ISABELLA BIRD

British explorer and writer Isabella Bird, the first woman elected to the Royal Geographical Society, visited Hawaii in 1873. Six Months in the Sandwich Islands, Bird's 1875-published book, was immensely popular in its day, and for decades to follow. In his book Pacific Passages, however, surf historian Patrick Moser notes that Bird's account of surfing "appeared entirely derived from previously p...

1868: TSUNAMI DESTROYS BIG ISLAND TOWNS, CREATES BIG-WAVE LEGEND

The 7.9 magnitude earthquake that hit Hawaii on April 2, 1868, centered near the southern tip of the Big Island, was the largest to ever strike the island chain. The resulting landslide and tsunami killed 77 people. The account below is from History of the Hawaiian Islands (1872), by James Jackson Jarves. It has been shortened and edited. * * * At about 10 A. M., on [March] 28th, a series of ear...

1865: “SUCH RIDING OF MAN AND WOMAN ON THE SAME WAVE RESULTS IN SEXUAL INDULGENCE,” J. WAIAMAU

"Ancient Sports of Hawaii Such as Surfing, Jumping, Sledding, Betting and Boxing," by J. Waiamau, was published in the missionary-funded Hawaiian language weekly newspaper Ka Nupepa Kuokoa on December 23, 1865. Little is known of Waiamau, but the purpose of the Kuokoa itself, according to founder and publisher Henry Whitney, was "the publication of all things educational for the benefit of Hawaiia...

1861: “THEY CAN SPRING UPRIGHT ON THE SURFBOARD AND COME IN ERECT!" AN EXCERPT FROM "THE VICTORIAN VISITORS,” BY SOPHIA CRACROFT

Sophia Cracroft, an adventurous and well-connected upper-class Londoner, visited Hawaii for two months in 1861 and wrote about her experiences in a book of letters titled The Victorian Visitors. While there, Cracroft and her traveling partner, Lady Jane Franklin, were guests of King Kamehameha IV. The scene below takes place in Kailua, on the Big Island. * * * At twelve, we [headed off] to a bay...

1849: “TRUELY A FAMOUS AND ANIMATING DIVERSION,” EXCERPT FROM "TRAVELS IN THE SANDWICH AND SOCIETY ISLANDS," BY SAMUEL S. HILL

British travel writer Samuel Hill spent six months in Hawaii, starting in December 1848, and visited areas well off the beaten track, including the Keauhua village on the Big Island, where Hill was introduced to surfing. As noted by surf historian Patrick Moser, Hill's observation as to the level of engagement here with the ancient sport suggests that "while surfriding had declined in the areas po...

1846: “THO' THE MOTION IS SWIFT, IT IS VERY PLEASANT,” BOOK EXCERPT FROM CHESTER LYMAN

Connecticut-born Chester Lyman, an astronomer and physics professor at Yale who designed and patented a machine demonstrating how waves move through water, spent a year in Hawaii in 1846 and '47. This excerpt is from Lyman's posthumous 1924 book Around the Horn to the Sandwich Islands and California. It has been lightly edited. * * * By invitation of Mr Douglass, took a ride with the young Chief...

1843, HENRY T. CHEEVER: “THE SPORT IS SO ATTRACTIVE AND FULL OF WILD EXCITEMENT”

Henry Cheever of Maine is best known as the author of The Whale and His Captors (1850), written a few years after Cheever voyaged the Pacific on a whaler; Captors was an important source for Herman Melville's Moby-Dick. Cheever's Life in the Sandwich Islands, his follow-up book, was published in 1851 later and includes this passage on "surf-players," set in Lahaina, Maui. * * * It is highly amus...

1841: NAVY MAN CHARLES WILKES: SURFING TOO CLOSE TO "LASCIVIOUS THOUGHTS AND ACTIONS"

High-ranking New York-born naval officer Charles Wilkes—an ill-tempered explorer, writer, and commander who was court-martialed twice and said to be the model for Moby-Dick's Captain Ahab—spent seven months in Hawaii, in 1840 and 1841. In his multi-volume Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition, Wilkes briefly discussed surfing. It is clear that the sport, by this time, was in decline....

1836: “PEOPLE, TO ENJOY LIFE, WANT AMUSEUMENT." A MISSIONARY CRITIQUE BY WILLIAM RUSCHENBERGER

William Ruschenberger was an American doctor, botanist, writer, and naval officer. From 1835 to 1837 he was fleet surgeon for the East India Squadron, which for a period was stationed in Hawaii. This 1836 entry, written in Honolulu, was published in Ruschenberger's book A Voyage Round the World, and was likely among the first pieces of criticism leveled against the missionaries, whose influence in...