Kapi'olani Park quiz answers

Advertiser Staff

1. False — Contrary to statements by King Kalakaua and Queen Kapi'olani at the park's inaugural event, there were at least three public parks in Hawai'i in 1877.

2. True — The Hawaiian Jockey Club was given the right to charge a toll at the Long Bridge over Ku'ekaunahi Stream to support the park's race track.

3. True — King Kalakaua's court physician raised ostriches that ran free in the park.

4. False — The heiau was not in park but nearby, below present-day La Pietra-Hawai'i School for Girls.

5. False — The 2-acre Kaneloa Natural Habitat and Cultural Gardens, a natural seasonal wetland ecosystem near the Waikiki Shell, is not federally protected.

6. True — A group of businessmen, with the cooperation of King Kalakaua, subdivided the park into leasehold lots for "cottages and marine villas, surrounding a central green." Kalakaua was a shareholder.

7. True — Leasehold lots faced the water, and, in any case, there was no sand, only a sharp coral shoreline.

8. True — and you can see a picture of "Jimmy" in "Kapi'olani Park: A History."

9. True — A plan for wartime housing in the park was about to go out to bid when Japan surrendered.

10. True — Not quite in the park, but in the mansion of wealthy socialite Chris Holmes, which later became the Queen's Surf nightclub and bar, on leased land within the park.

11. True — The newspaper was part of a hui that launched regular daily flights from the park to Schofield Barracks in the 1920s, partly as a publicity stunt.