The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-05-16
GREAT GAME OF
HAWAIIAN ISLANDS

The Inhabitants of the Hawaiian Isl
lands are MISUNDERSTANDING folk,
and give themselves with greater ener-
gy than is usual in d warm climate to
all manner OF games. The Makiki rec
reation ground at Honolulu is a special
reservation for athletic field sports
which are an important part of every
great holiday celebration. Football.
baseball, golf, rowing and yachting; all
are popular there; but no one. of these
distinctly Anglo-Saxon sports has as
many adherents as polo. This history
of the game III the Hawaiian islands is
filed with interest for devotees of the
game everywhere.
Yet the popularity in the islands OF
this exciting and blood-stirring game is
not distinctly an outgrowth of the new
conditions there, as for more than
twenty years polo has had its enthusi-
astic followers. Up in notch of the
mountains of Hawaii, where snow-cap-
ped Mokuaweoweo sweeps down to meet
her lesser sisters of the Kohala hills
eve should call them mountains here,
the highest Kohala peak being 5,505
feet), there is fertile plain $500 feet
above sea level, where the trade winds
blow fresh and cool and invigorating
all the year round, and here in the early
| eighties a family of Australians lived.
| From the Antipodes they brought the
game of polo; and the country there
abouts being largely settled by cattle
| ranchers, the game was enthusiastically
| taken up. Reckless and daring riders
We're these ranchmen, and they played
a dashing and spirited game. Many
We're the hotly-waged contests they en-
gagged in, while the sport led to the
4 breeding of a very excellent class of
| ponies-fine, little. mettlesome, bang
| tailed ponies. whose descendants are to
! be found in the stables of Honolulu to-
day, with the love and the knack of the
game bred in them.
Then there came a time when polo
| languished. for the Burkhardts, who
had introduced the game, removed to
a ranch on the neighboring island of
Maui upon the slopes of that grand
old monarch of mountains, Haleakala
| (House of the SUM. All the higher
slopes of the great mountain were given
| up to big ranches, and here after a
L
| and flourished amain; for the English,
| American and Scotch population was
Elarge, and was, of course. just the ele-
ment to give it vigor and life. The an
rual games in Makawao brought all the
| foreign residents of the island together,
and echoes of the sport Travelled to Ho-
noltllu and over the whole group. 1t
| was the English game that was played.
and everything was carried out in true
English style.
Two years ago the sport-loving men
Of Honolulu took up the game, and by
leaps and bounds it sprang into favor
| there. The organization of the Oahu
| Polo club was quickly followed by .
| challenge from the Maui men; and in
April of last year the first big inter-
| island match took place at MoanaIua,
| the beautiful country estate. near Ho-
nolulu, of the Hon. s. NJ. Damon, whose
son is the president of the Oahu Polo
| club. Thousands f1ocked to witness the
| match, and the field. which had been To-
| Gated upon a level spot on the golf links
golf is immensely popular in Homo
lulu-was surrounded by hills that gave
a splendid view of the game-E A.
Fletcher, in the Illustrated Sporting
| News.