BURL BURLINGAME / BBURLINGAME@STARBULLETIN.COM Fred Kamaka strums the original Pineapple Ukulele #1.

Ukulele shop grew
into historic status

A decade after creating a small ukulele-manufacturing business out of his Kaimuki home in 1916, Samuel K. Kamaka had a brainstorm. All ukuleles had pinched waists, being tiny version of guitars. What if the body was gently rounded in an ovoid shape, creating a greater resonance?

He made one, and a friend said it looked like a pineapple. So Kamaka had pineapple lobes painted on and then patented the design.

That original patent and that original ukulele -- Pineapple Ukulele #1 -- are sitting on a shelf at the Kamaka factory at 550 South St., along with dozens of other Kamaka designs. It still sounds as sweet today as it did in the mid-'20s.

The pre-war ukulele boom eventually went bust and today only one of the original Hawaiian ukulele factories is still in business. Sam Kamaka and sons Sam Jr. and Fred moved the business to its present site in 1959 and a year later the Hawaii Visitors Bureau put one its signs in front of the shop. It's one of the very few private businesses to rate a HVB visitors marker.

"Why? How? We knew people," laughs Fred Kamaka, whose son Fred Jr. largely manages the business. "The HVB said, yeah, we know it's not historic, but it will be some day!"

The original faded sign was replaced in 1980.

Kamaka ukuleles have been strummed in the hands of Laurel and Hardy, Tiny Tim, Arthur Godfrey, astronaut Scott Carpenter, royalty from Japan and Tonga, and most of the top musicians in Hawaii.

Made of resonant curly koa and crafted mostly by hearing-impaired employees whose sense of touch is attuned to the natural vibrations of the expensive wood, Kamaka ukuleles are not cheap and there's a long waiting list to buy one. With proper care, they last forever.

The factory offers public tours, 10:30 a.m. Mondays through Thursdays.