The pitched historic preservation battles that might seem unique to Hawaiʻi are actually playing out across the Pacific Basin as people seek to preserve remnants of each country’s cultural heritage in the face of development pressures and sea level rise.

There are now 37 World Heritage sites in the Pacific region, including in Palau, Fiji and Vanuatu, most of them designated fairly recently. Two are in Hawaiʻi: Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park and Papahānaumokuākea National Marine Monument in the Northwest Hawaiian Islands.

A new book, “Architectural Conservation in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific Islands,” is a country-by-country review that sheds new light on the successes and failures of historic preservation in Hawaiʻi and around Oceania.

Co-written by Bill Chapman, dean of the University of Hawaiʻi School of Architecture and a specialist in historic preservation, the other authors are a veritable who’s who of heritage experts. Hawaiʻi scholars involved in project included Bishop Museum’s DeSoto Brown; former Guam historic preservation officer Richard D. Davis, now serving on the Oʻahu Historic Preservation Commission; and Don Hibbard, former director of the Hawaiʻi State Historic Preservation Division.

Historic preservation as a field emerged in Europe about 200 years ago when countries motivated by civic pride became interested in trying to preserve their ancient monuments. Many European leaders also came to realize that having authentic historic sites for tourists to visit makes their cities more desirable, walkable destinations, and they have built their marketing programs around making it easier for visitors to engage with them.

In the United States, the historic conservation movement started in the mid-1800s when the Mount Vernon’s Ladies Association rallied to save George Washington’s home in Virginia. Many cities subsequently took measures to protect their historic districts. A groundswell of conservation advocacy across the country led to the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966.

In the early days of the movement, Hawaiʻi was in the vanguard. But in recent decades the state has slipped behind, partially because of a lack of awareness of the importance of historic places not just as the cultural glue that unites the community but also as a valuable tourist draw, Chapman said.

“We don’t market that,” he said. “In Hawaiʻi, we’re advanced in some things and very backward in others. Here we are really driven by development.”

In an interview and in a speech last week at the Honolulu chapter of the American Institute of Architects, Chapman discussed the book and its conclusions. Environmental damage is a growing concern, with many coastal areas threatened with sea level rise, causing anxious discussions about finding ways to relocate treasured sites further inland, he said.

“Everything projects that a lot of these places are going to be underwater,” he said, although he thinks dykes and land-reclamation projects will allow many sites believed to be at risk to be preserved.

Thus far, “the most immediate damage is manmade,” Chapman said, including dredging projects that damage coral reefs and coastlines. For now, the most serious threat is neglect, he said, mentioning a historic wharf in Saipan that is deteriorating and falling down.

In the Pacific region, Australia has been at the forefront of architectural conservation, celebrating its colonial heritage and more recently its Indigenous roots. Chapman said the country has found ways to creatively adapt old buildings to new uses, such as reusing an old asylum by inserting another structure inside it. Australia also has a trained corps of skilled artisans familiar with traditional construction techniques and tools, an essential knowledge base for architectural conservation.

But Australia has had its great losses as well. In May 2020, the Juukan Gorge cave in Western Australia, which had been inhabited for over 46,000 years, was destroyed by the Rio Tinto Mining Co.

Honoluluʻs Losses

Hawaiʻi’s record has been spotty and inconsistent. Early on, residents organized to preserve some important historic sites, including the Queen Emma Summer Palace (pictured above) in 1915, the Hawaiian Mission Houses in 1920 and the Big Island’s Puʻuhonua o Hōnaunau National Historical Park in 1955. Civic activist Nancy Bannock successfully lobbied to protect Chinatown and have it named a historic district. Many Hawaiian sites have been preserved.

Urban redevelopment in the 1960s and 1970s destroyed much of downtown Honolulu, leveling a number of fine old structures and replacing them with boxy office towers. Among the losses were the Old Courthouse, which had also served as the Hawaiian Parliament under the kingdom, and the Alexander Young Hotel.

“In 1966, we could have had one of the most elegant beaux arts cities in the world,” Chapman said.

For about a decade in the 1980s and 1990s, the state participated in the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Main Street program. Downtown Hilo on the Big Island, Wailuku on Maui and Waimea on Kauaʻi were among the beneficiaries, but state funding stopped in 1995. Wahiawā, which could have benefited from help at critical junctures, never got targeted attention and its once-charming historic core was swept away, replaced by fast-food outlets.

On the other hand, Hawaiʻi has federal funding when it chooses to use it and a group of historic preservation specialists who have provided financial support and leadership on architectural conservation to smaller Pacific Ocean islands.

Guam, which also gets federal funding because it is a U.S. territory, is a leader among the Pacific Islands, Chapman said. Its Guam Preservation Trust is an active advocate for cultural conservation, including in traditional towns such as Inalahan and other sites associated with the Spanish colonial era and World War II.

“They do a pretty good job,” he said. “And when Japanese tourists go there, they seek these places out.”

ʻNot Doing A Good Jobʻ

Poverty and a lack of public will to defend historic sites is placing many special sites at risk on the small Pacific islands, he said.

For example, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a self-governing territory of the United States with a rich cultural heritage that blends Chamorro, Spanish, German and Japanese influences, is “not doing a good job,” Chapman said.

It is a place with many significant sites, including the Battle of Saipan, one of the bloodiest conflicts of World War II. The Northern Marianas also served as the launch pad of the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Underwater archaeological sites also date back to the era of Spanish galleons.

But in 2018, the CNMI permitted an Asian company to build a huge casino amid the battlefield site, overwhelming the historic area.

“Nobody’s going there and it’s empty,” Chapman said. “It’s right near the center of the main settlement there. And you know, they had such an important battle there.”

Chapman said some fine historic properties are going to ruin in the Federated States of Micronesia where, for example, a Japanese-built agricultural station designed in Gothic revival style is vacant and “sort of falling apart.”

In Pohnpei, residents have lost the skills to construct their own vernacular architecture, like traditional meeting houses. At one gathering of chiefs, for example, the historic-style meeting house they used was actually constructed with steel, he said.

That loss of traditional knowledge also affected Hawaiʻi, Chapman told the American Institute of Architects audience. When the first Europeans arrived in Hawaiʻi, Hawaiians lived in traditional thatched houses. But that kind of construction fell from style and by 1902, museum curators acquired a rare surviving hale as a museum exhibit, displaying it so that others could later use it as a model for how to build similar structures.

Chapman said architectural conservation only occurs when people decide it is essential for preserving their own past and sense of identity.

“It needs to come from the grassroots, people fighting for this,” he said. “Historic preservation is not just a movement but a belief system.”