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Lanakila alumni piece together
By Crystal Kua
the past for the school's birthday
Star-BulletinThe fire began in Lanakila School's basement and ripped through 13 classrooms and the library. It was June 16, 1955. As smoke billowed into the Liliha sky, neighbors and other volunteers rushed to retrieve what they could, hauling out school records, stacks of notebooks. But they couldn't save everything.
Lost in the blaze was much of the elementary school's institutional memory, such as photos of past students that may have been stored in the library. Now, as the school is observing its 75th anniversary, it is calling on graduates to help recover the past, and ensure a history is there for the future.
"We cannot forget the past," said Principal Randall Higa. "We need to remember teachers who worked hard, community members who worked to help our students."
The effort is centered on Alumni Night, which will be held Wednesday in the school cafeteria. Graduates and others with ties to Lanakila have been asked to bring old photos of themselves at the school and their recollections, which will be incorporated in an anniversary booklet.
"We're missing a whole chunk of our history," said alumna Christine Asuncion, who is organizing the event.The school's history began in 1925, when Lanakila opened with 742 students in first through fourth grades (fifth- and sixth-grade classes were added the next year). The campus was surrounded by taro patches, fruit trees and palms, and an "insane asylum" was nearby. Lunch in the wooden cafeteria cost five cents.
When Pearl Harbor was bombed in December 1941, the school became an evacuation center for military wives and children; the cafeteria was turned into an "enumeration and fingerprinting center." Instruction resumed in February and, after the war, in 1947, the first kindergartners were welcomed.
Modernization came after the 1955 fire, and the school now has 402 students in grades K-5.
Lanakila's search for its history may be particularly important since its students span generations of family members, much like schools in smaller communities and more settled times.
Asuncion, for instance, went to Lanakila in the mid-1970s. Her son Joshua now is in the second grade there, and daughter Ashley is in kindergarten. Alyce Ikeoka, her sixth-grade teacher, is still on the faculty.
"She just had a lot of knowledge that she gave me at that time, and I still think about it," said Asuncion, a nurse in another elementary school.State Sen. Suzanne Chun Oakland, an alumna who represents the area, is another whose family has had a long relationship with Lanakila. Her father, Philip Chun, 65, walked to school with horses and cattle on the road, and her own children went there as well.
"There's a connectedness," said Chun Oakland, who got her first taste of leadership as a junior police officer at Lanakila. "My classmates, we grew up together, and now their children are going to that school ... Because there have been generations of families going there, we've developed that bond."
Other anniversary-related activities reflect that spirit. A shirt commemorating the event carries a design by second-grader Rylan Suehisa; a student penny drive raised $599 for the Aloha United Way; and a cookbook was put together, according to Higa.
Philip Chun sees the value of Lanakila, and hopes that its history will be extended further by students to come.
"It's always been good that this school has been in the community so long, and educated so many people who live here, and who grew up and are doing well," he said.
Upcoming events in Lanakila School's 75th anniversary observance include: Anniversary events
Feb. 23: Alumni Night, 6:30 p.m. in the school cafeteria.
For more information, call the school at 587-4466.
