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Wood Craft
A warm, friendly crowd turned out at Don Ho's Brickwood 4’s
in tune at Ho’sIsland Grill for the Brickwood Quartet's first Friday-nighter last weekend. Working with Brickwood are Imaikalani Young, Hale kaneaikala and Gordon Alfapada. The group's tight, jazzy harmony is reminiscent of what the Richard Kauhi Quartet dished up in the 1950s. Brickwood Galuteria's mom, Juliette, is Richard's sister. She walked in with Richard's widow, Betty. Don also showed up. He is responsible for bringing the group to the grill. The quartet did about half a dozen of Kauhi's tunes in the first set. The music was pretty. I liked "Hawaii Calls" best. "When I First Met You" and "Nani Waimea" were other winners. "I really like it," Don said. "They're playing real nice music. (People) gotta come over here to find Brick. When they find him, they can forget me" ...
Old Timers, Piikoi kids reunite
Thursday Dec. 7 will be a day to remember because that's when the 2000 Old Timers Reunion will be at Murphy's, starting at 4:30 p.m. ... I wonder how many of those Old Timers were here on Dec. 7, 1941. Hank and Mark Auerbach and I were kids playing on Piikoi Street when the attack started 59 years ago. Hank, retired Pan Am Airways exec, flew into town from Seattle and hosted a nostalgic reunion of the Piikoi Street gang Thursday at the Hawaii Prince. Besides the three of us, others attending were the Auerbachs' brother, Shay, Jie Sing "Sonny" Chun, Miles Marshman and Henry Zerbe and his sis, Phyllis. We gave Phyllis a hard time in those small-kid days because, who wanted to play with girls? ...KCCN FM100's Charly Espina reports that her uncle, Danny Aranio, came from Georgia for the recent Aranio family reunion. Danny played in Sam Kapu's band, the Lei Men, in the 1960s. Sam, of Hawaiian 105 Kine, invited the old band -- Rudy and Marcelo Molina, Roland Aton, Frank Medrano and Danny -- to his famed "Sam's Garage" last Saturday. Sam also called Don Ho, who zipped over to jam with the guys ...
Levi Chang, principal of Nanakuli High & Intermediate and father of UH quarterback Timmy Chang, has been watching his son play up close at Aloha Stadium all season. Levi is a Western Athletic Conference-assigned broadcast media timeout coordinator. Dressed in a red shirt, his job is to let officials know when to resume the game after commercial breaks. Both Levi and Timmy are St. Louis grads ... Isle golfer Michelle Wie, 11, the youngest amateur ever to compete for a woman's U.S. Golf Association title, is featured in the Nov. 27 issue of ESPN magazine. Michelle, who has driven the ball 300 yards, says her favorite golfer is Tiger Woods. "I think I can beat him in the near future -- like when I'm 15," says Michelle ...
Barbi's mom knows her stuff
The Kauai/Oahu Chaine des Rotisseurs, a gastronomic society, had another of its fabulous dinners last Saturday, this one at the Marriott Ihilani's Azul Restaurant. Carole Brooks heads this group. Barbi Benton, who was Playboy founder Hugh Hefner's girlfriend some 30 years ago, attended with her mom, Helen Klein, 82. Years ago, Helen did the appraisal on what is now the Playboy Mansion before Hef bought it. Helen said she told Hef to offer $1.1 million and he paid $1.15 million. Six months later, after improvements, he was offered $10 million for the property, Helen added. Barbie, asked about her career, said, "I still sing in the shower" ...
Ben Wood, who sold the Star-Bulletin in the streets
of downtown Honolulu during World War II, writes of
people, places and things every Saturday.
E-mail him at bwood@starbulletin.com