Our Honolulu
No place for mystery in your photo book

By Bob Krauss
Advertiser Columnist

Today we'll talk about how to handle family pictures.

Some people get around to putting them in albums but hardly ever write on the back to record the date, names of people in the picture or what it's all about. Twenty years later, nobody can remember.

That's what happened to attorney Keith Steiner, who tried his hand at being an author and turned over some memorabilia to publisher Bennett Hymer, who picked out a picture.

In the picture are four men sitting in the Steiner house; Keith's father, Judge Harry Steiner; surfing-swimming legend Duke Kahanamoku; former Lt. Gov. Farrant Turner; and business tycoon Herman von Holt.

No date — just four men who didn't have much in common except that they were about the same age. Why were they sitting together? What were they laughing about?

Keith came to me for help. He said he had a few clues. Years ago, the Steiners lived on Waikiki Beach near the Moana Hotel while the Kahanamoku family lived where the Hilton Hawaiian Village is now. As boys, Duke and Harry must have surfed together.

Second clue: Von Holt went to Yale with Harry at about the same time, just before World War I. Turner went to nearby Wesleyan University.

Third and fourth clues:

Keith had a dim memory of his grandmother telling him that his father did something of which all of Hawai'i was proud. Also, Keith remembered a family legend about a swimming race at Yale. That made sense because all four men were swimmers.

More details came back to Keith as he spoke. Yale's swimming team was the national champion. Somehow, Duke Kahanamoku came to Yale and the Hawai'i boys challenged them to a race.

Von Holt took the first lap because he was the slowest swimmer, his best event being the plunge where you dive into the pool and see who can float the farthest. By the time he finished, the Hawai'i guys were a lap behind.

Harry Steiner held even and Turner, swimming captain at Wesleyan, made up half a lap. Then Duke dived in like a speedboat and finished half a lap ahead.

However, Keith couldn't find any record of this event to prove it happened. It would explain the men sitting together years later reminiscing. The Yale team wouldn't have broadcast the story that a pickup team beat them.

I found an Advertiser story that said Duke visited Hawai'i friends at Yale in 1912 while he was in training for the Olympic Games in Sweden where he won the gold medal. Then Turner's son said his family has a similar legend about a swimming race.

But his father didn't graduate from high school until 1913 so it couldn't have happened in 1912. Now Keith is cranking through microfilm to see if he can find the picture in a newspaper.

See how important it is to write the date and some information on the back?