Let me STRUM YOU A WIKI WAKI TUNE

Here we have another snapshot of Jean on her Hawaiian adventure. Ukulele's were very popular at the beginning of the last century so maybe she already knew how to play before her exotic vacation. I sure wish she'd taken the opportunity to go a bit more native in her clothing. She should have kicked off her shoes and gone a little wild and left the pearls at home. But casual Hawaiian clothing for tourists was still a few decades away. Think Aloha shirts and brightly printed muu muus. Let her hair down, put a flower behind her ear, a brightly colored dress, and bare feet and the folks back home would have thought she'd gone absolutely pagan.

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I don't know who these fellows are, but I'm suspicious they were drivers for either the Royal Hawaiian or the Moana since each hotel was owned by the Matson Lines. Tourists could get a package deal by going on the Matson ship to Hawaii and then staying at one of Matson's hotels. I'm imagining it was the job of these fellows to drive the visitors to various spots on the island and bring them back happy and exhausted each evening to a nice meal at the hotel and the setting sun.

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And nothing said Hawaii to a Mainlander more back in the 1930s than Bing Crosby with his faux Hawaiian songs. These old songs and old clips for me are as much ephemera as the printed piece. I know technically they're not, but they're all part of times long ago now all but forgotten. They put the people in the photos in some sort of context and it gives me a moment to step-back-in-time and experience that world.