Even in urban areas, trees are a part of everyone’s life. Their rate of growth is so slow that we cannot clearly see how they steadily increase in size. In fact we rarely even notice them at all until, unfortunately, they experience some calamities. Here are some tales of some high-profile Hawai‘i trees that have attracted attention over time.
A Moreton Bay fig tree, originally from Australia, once dominated the waterfront All‘i Drive in Kailua Kona, Hawai‘i Island. It’s thought that this species could have been introduced to Hawaii in 1851. This particular one was planted in 1910 and obviously found this location to its liking, growing vigorously to a great size as many other related banyan trees tend to do here.
Sadly, an unknown condition eventually would begin to damage this majestic tree. Large branches started to die off, eventually reducing it to a tragic stump.
We’ve all seen the immense Indian banyan trees in various locations whose size alone makes them impossible to miss. They use a rare natural technique to increase their spread, by growing aerial roots from their lengthy branches. These roots extend downwards till they reach the ground, where they’ll enter the soil to form what becomes another trunk of the parent tree. Few locations can accommodate these tremendous organisms but some well-known examples are on the grounds of ‘Iolani Palace and Ali‘iolani Hale in downtown Honolulu. The banyan in Lahaina, Maui, planted in 1873, was undoubtedly the largest in the Hawaiian Islands until about half of it was killed by the disastrous fire of August 8-9, 2023. Its survival has been a sign of hope for Lahaina’s recovery ever since.
One such banyan grew on the corner of Ke‘eaumoku and King Streets in Honolulu. Who planted it, and when, wasn’t known with certainty but some thought it was one of the first banyans of its kind to be brought to Hawai‘i back in 1865. It was definitely in place by 1895 based on it being mentioned in a magazine article that year. By the early 1900s the parklike space it stood in was the location of the Territorial Board of Agriculture and Forestry, and other notable or unusual trees also came to be planted there.
This banyan’s site, directly on this street corner, gradually began to be seen as a problem as Honolulu’s traffic increased. The desire to make streets wider to accommodate more vehicles was stymied in this spot by the oversized tree, which led to repeated plans to take it out.
In 1947 the City & County of Honolulu announced plans to remove the banyan; one member of the Board of Supervisors criticized it as an “ugly-looking thing.” People objected; a plan to isolate the tree on its own corner traffic island with a right-turn lane on the inside was proposed. Nothing happened. In 1959, the City & County of Honolulu announced plans to remove the banyan to widen both King and Ke‘eaumoku Streets. People objected; nothing happened. In 1963 the City & County of Honolulu announced plans to remove the banyan. People objected; a plan to isolate the tree on its own corner traffic island, etc., etc. Nothing happened.
But then … the removal plan surfaced again in December 1966, and this time it was serious. This time, also, the objections from the public were more widespread and serious as well, because by now public protests were growing with general social unrest all over the world. The Outdoor Circle, guardians of urban trees, came up with multiple suggestions of how to save the banyan, including the same old idea of the previous 20 years of isolating it on a traffic island. In addition were some less likely concepts, such as separating it into two trees and moving them a short distance down King Street, or to locations even farther away.
The Association of Honolulu Artists staged a “paint-in” in which members gathered to create depictions of the threatened tree. A youth group called the Student’s Conference for Active Beautification vowed to protect the tree but only four teenage girls showed up to picket with signs in October 1967. The mood of the general public is impossible to know so many decades later, but while some citizens were indifferent or actually supported the road widening there was undeniable resistance to the tree’s death. And this death did finally come on October 29, 1967, starting at 6 a.m. and ending with a bulldozer tearing out the stump by 4 pm. In the end, over time, the streets were widened and today, virtually no one knows this saga ever happened.
It’s worth noting, however, that on that last morning, two teen girls actually climbed into the banyan at 4 a.m. in a last-ditch effort to save it. They were removed by 15 police officers who were on hand in anticipation of demonstrators. Small as this was, it’s undoubtedly the first active environmental protest to happen in Hawai‘i. To placate the many people who objected to the tree’s sad end, five “cuttings” (vertical roots / trunks) of about 15 feet in length were planted in three different locations in hopes that the tree would live on in this way. Two were placed in Kapi‘olani Park in the section at the base of Diamond Head bounded by Pākī Avenue and Poni Mō‘ī Road; neither of these survived. Two more were planted at then-undeveloped Magic Island before it was turned into a public park. The last one was placed at Honolulu Community College behind the auto shop in a small ceremony on October 30, 1967 at 2:15 p.m. HCC had earlier stated its campus would welcome any part of the threatened tree.
This set of tree tales ends with two more trees in this same Department of Agriculture park, just a short distance along King Street from the notorious banyan. The following photos will relate their story well.
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