Mr. Robert Chow is well known in our town as a local historian. He was born on March 19, 1922 and lived at the Mauka corner of Furneaux Lane and Kilauea Avenue where the present Garden Exchange stands today. Where the potted plants are located enclosed in a chain-link fence once stood the home of Mr. Chow and family.
Mr. Chow sold newspapers from the age of seven. He was usually found at the corner of Kilauea and Haili Street where Western Auto is located now. After a while Mr. Chow's parents trusted him with selling newspapers at the corner of Kinoole and Haili where the First Foreign Church was located, the site of the present day Sack n Save parking lot. Then he sold newspapers, at the corner of Wainuenue Avenue and Kamehameha Avenue near Hilo Drugs which once occupied the space of the newly closed Lehua Restaurant. Soon after he delivered newspapers in Downtown Hilo from Wailuku River all the way to Ponahawai Street, up to Kilauea Avenue and in the Puueo District. He continued selling newspapers until he was hired by Hilo Tribune Herald to work in the circulation department to handle subscribers. The company changed to a new system where the deliver boy became a merchant carrier and had to go and collect the money from the customer.
During that period of selling newspapers and collecting newspaper fees, Mr. Chow covered the whole city of Hilo and got to know every businesses and every household in Hilo. This is why he is so well versed in the history of Downtown Hilo.
Robert Chow finished high school in 1940. He is the fifth child in a family of seven children. His father came to Hawaii as sugar worker in 1891 and worked in Waiakea Uka. His father eventually set up a shoe repair shop on Kamahameha Avenue across from First Hawaiian Bank. His mother, who was born in Honolulu, was a housewife. His family lived in a four bedroom house that was raised off the dirt ground with five-foot stilts. It was a single walled home made of 1 by 6 foot boards in the tongue and groove (TNG) construction. The ceiling was of TNG contruction, too. Their was a six-foot high chicken wire fence that enclosed their property. In their yard they had an avocado tree, a jabong tree, and a star fruit tree. They raised chicken, too.
In his neighborhood, on the corner of Keawe Street and Furneaux Lane, there was a Chinese laundry where he remembers clothes being pressed with irons heated with coals. Ebesu's Fruit and Vegetable Stand was across the street. They sold fruit, vegetables, and cut flowers. The Ebesu family and the Chow family became close friends. Elsie's Fountain can still be found at the corner of Mamo Street and Keawe Street. This store started in the 1940's by a Mr. Sonohara. Mr. Chow remembers him always wearing a bowtie, a long sleeve dress shirt, and dark trousers. Next to Elsie's Fountain was a Japanese furo (public bath house) and a barber shop. There were over twenty barbers in town. Japanese barbers cut men's and ladies' hair, Filipino barbers cut men's hair, and Haole barbers cut men's hair. There were only a few lady barbers. Haircuts cost just 50 cents. Where Lopaka's is located was a Japanese newspaper company. It was owned by Mr. Tahara who was also a minister and teacher from Papaikou. The editor was Mr. Okubo. There was a Chinese herb doctor on Keawe Street near his home. On Mamo Street he remembers the Yukon Theater, which later changed its name to Mamo Theater and the Yamatoza Theater owned by a Mr. Abe. There were at least five Japanese restaurants on Mamo Street between Keawe Street and Kamehameha Avenue. In town there was a drug store on almost every block. Some that he recalls are Hilo Drug, Standard Drug (formerly known as Chock Chong Drug Store), Mochida Drug, Shindo Drug, and Shiigi Drug.
Mr. Chow received the nickname "Steam Pork" because he was chubby as a boy. A serious car accident, He subsequently lost a lot of weight,but still is known as "Steamy Chow", a shortened version of his former nickname. Mr. Chow became a police officer at the age of twenty one and retired twenty years later because of his disability.
Mr. Chow didn't have time to "hangout" as teenagers do today. Most of his time was spent selling newspapers and when he was not selling papers, like in the morning during the summer months, he would go to Hilo Boarding School were they had a summer program. There they sang songs and did all kind of craft work. His parents kept him busy. Sometimes he and his friends would go to the black sand beach which fronted Hilo Bay and catch crab, fish, and swim. They made their own fun. They played on Kilauea Avenue in front of their home. They would play kamapio where they used a broom stick to hit a object as far as they could. He use to shine shoes, also, in the summer across the Hata Building and charge 10 cents for solid leather shoes and 15 for cents polished shoes.
Most people got around in Downtown Hilo by walking. If you went out of district you would take the sampan bus. The sampan bus didn't have a regular schedule, so you had to go on the street and wave down the bus that came by. If where you were going was on the driver's route he'd take you there for 5 cents regardless of the distance. Now the sampan bus is trying to come back again in which a company is trying to provide the same type of transportation as in the past.
In the 1930's and 1940's before the 1946 tsunami destroyed much of Downtown Hilo, there were stores on the ocean side of Kamehameha Avenue from Waianuenue Avenue all the way to Mooheau Park. The second floor and the backs of the stores were where the owners lived with their families. This population of Downtown Hilo was made of the families of small business people. In those days people help each other and if you are in need of something they're there to help you, just like a family. It was a closely knit town.
After the 1946 tsunami the buildings on the mountain side were standing but most of the ocean side buildings were gone. After the tsunami people helped each other. Mr. Chow couldn't help people with the clean up because he was a policeman and he had to direct traffic because there were alot of people coming out of disaster areas. He was also the security for the businesses who were cleaning up after the tragedy.
Fifty years later, he continues his involvement with Downtown Hilo. At present "Steamy Chow" is known as the manager of the Kress Building. He was asked to take this job by the former Senator Hiram Fong in 1990. He has busy days arranging for special community events at the building and promotional activities for Downtown Hilo. Every Wednesday he sponsors a "talk story" time for old times to gather to talk about the "old days". He speaks to school children about the history of Downtown Hilo and shares with them stories about his memories of our town.
He worked with the Lyman House and the American Association of University Women to provide information for a map of Downtown Hilo which shows the location of businesses just prior to the 1946 tsunami and in 1988, the year of publication of the map.
In 1990 he was elected as one of the Downtown Improvement Association directors. Mr. Harold Fujimoto, who was President of the DIA at the time asked him to serve on the board of directors. During his term as a director, he contributed to the Walking Tour of Historic Downtown brochure which can be found at the Hilo Main Street Program Office on Kamehameha Avenue to the left of the recently closed Ah Mai Store. Hilo Main Street Program is a part of the Downtown Improvement Association. After Mr. Chow served his three year term, Russell Kokubun, the executive director at the time, knew he has a good knowledge of the history of Downtown Hilo and appointed him as an oral history historian for Downtown Hilo. Mr. Chow accepted this position because he would like to preserve the history that he has in his memory. He takes his responsibility as a historian seriously. Whenever he is asked to provide information he tries very hard to be accurate in what he says. He would like to share as much as he can while his mind is still functioning well and he can still remember the things of the past.
He would like to see the day when Hilo would be declared as a historical city where the old buildings can be renovated into the kind of business or the type of building it was when they started instead of tearing it down and rebuilding.
I am grateful to have had the opportunity to have met Mr. Chow. I am impressed with the amount of information about Downtown Hilo that he has been able to recall. He has made our town "come alive" for me. Through him, I have gained an appreciation of our town. I see Downtown Hilo now as a community of people who have lived through hardships but have had fun at the same time. It is no longer simply a collection of old buildings.