[Music: drumming, flute]
So the skillset, known today as dry-set masonry
also referred to as Uhauhumu Pōhaku
was certainly a skill, a set of skills
that was handed down,
really over the generations
and really itʻs almost impossible to say
when or who exactly started this
because these traditions have been rooted in
Polynesian architecture and building for so many centuries
Hello, Iʻm Lori Miculka and Iʻm an archeologist
here at Puʻuhonua o Hōnaunau National Historical Park
As an archeologist, that means that I work with a team of resource management
professionals from a variety of backgrounds
to care for and protect our natural and cultural resources
for future generations.
The resources that we manage vary from the stone walls
to platforms to terraces, holua, and heiau.
and these sites range from habitation sites,
ceremonial sites, processing and manufacturing sites,
and many other types of sites and features.
and what makes these unique are that many of them were constructed
using dry-stacked masonry, so thatʻs a method
where no cement, or mortar was used. Instead each rock interlocks with the next.
So, the preservation work that we do is using the existing historic materials
and the form of the structure to dictate the work that we do.
So for dry-stacked masonry, that means weʻre going to be
removing the damaged stones. Weʻre going to be following the foundation
thatʻs existing on the surface. We'll be using
historic images, any documentation that we have, while we are repairing the structure.
And all the stones and materials that we use go back
and we won't repair using mortar or cement, only using traditional methods.
The work that we do at our park follows a set of standards
called the Secretary of Interior Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties.
And these are based within the National Historic Preservation Act.
These standards offer four different approaches to the treatment of historic properties.
This includes restoration, rehabilitation, reconstruction, and preservation.
So, primarily, the work that we do here at our park falls under preservation.
And so that means, that we're maintaining and we're repairing
historic materials. But, we're retaining the properties from its original form
that's evolved through time.
At Hawaii parks, for a long time, the parks have known that
it does take unique skills to be able to preserve these structures for future generations.
Following a large earthquake in 2006, the Hawaii parks came together
and formalized what we now call the Hawaiian Legacy Program
So, this program is made up of historic preservation specialists,
including stone masons and park archeologists that work together
in order to maintain and preserve cultural sites according to traditional skills
and knowledge and methods.
The 2006 earthquake did a lot of-- big impact on the stone structures here.
All the walls, the sites, there's a lot of damage
And took down a lot of stuff. It scoured out the whole base of the wall, the niho
Just destroyed it. Throughout the whole park.
Till today, we're still working on it. There's still damages.
We've been, you know, trying to do a little at a time.
There's a lot of damage that happened. It just scoured everything out at the bottom.
We've repaired a lot of them, but there's more to be repaired.
In 2006 when the earthquake came in, a lot of people was glad to be
on the rock wall because some of them didn't have the experience
to do it so when they came in, we showed them how to do it.
That's when they fell in love with dry-stacked masonry.
They didn't want to fill it with concrete like in modern days.
At that time, yeah, there were a lot, there was of people.
A lot of people came out, interested in masonry. That's where I came on.
Actually a lot of us.
It's humans [laughs], climbing over the walls.
You know, and using it, you know, to get back and forth.
And then, high surf. Here, a lot of high surf.
People, high surfs, earthquakes, goat problems, like now we have in the park [laughs].
Each mason have their own protocols, yeah. Some of them,
you know, they have the opening oli, chants, that they do to
ask for permission to get started on the project.
You don't want to pick up some rocks and not knowing that it don't belong in the wall.
It's just protection and just asking for permission.
We don't take a big chunk of the wall off.
We always say look, go back to the way the original wall is
if it's not disturbed, you know, and come back and just go with the flow.
You know, don't make like--for instance there's a lot of, you know, waves
inside the wall. So we keep that, that wave look.
We don't make it like straight up and down or, you know, angled.
Just look at the whole wall itself and see
When we start building the wall, we gather up and talk about the wall.
Try to give everybody a specific job. One do the hakahaka
that means filling in in between the setter, the guy who is setting the stones.
He's the one building the wall and then the guys that come from behind
they put the hakahaka in so that when you build the wall up
it doesn't collapse. Because at the same time you're up, the wall being filled
to the same height and that makes the thing easier to set the next stone
Because if you keep setting stones on top of each other when you're building
it's going to fall over. So that's why we have other people doing other jobs.
The process is, to build a wall, starts on the bottom-up.
After you get the general idea of where you're building at
if it's a new wall, the alignment-- You start from the bottom,
you use the bigger rocks, we call it the niho.
Then, like, niho is teeth in Hawaiian
and we-- that's the bottom layer alignment rocks, the big ones.
And the fill it called hakahaka in Hawaiian
and the front stones are facing [mumbles].. two side face
they're called alo. Cornerstones, they're called kihi kihi
and the top flat rocks are called papale. And as you gathering your rock
you can sort them out as you go, but with a trained eye you could
see those rocks as you working with it-- what they're good for.
It's a good alo, it's a good hakahaka, it's a good niho, or a good papale.
If you look at the wall, you can tell what the size and the shape of the wall is supposed to be
You could try -- nowadays in the park you can't just put a batter board up there
and set a string to find the measurement, the height and everything.
So everything is by eye-- eye sight. For instance, you're facing the
the ocean, you look at the ocean, the horizon. That's the height of your wall.
And that's the level of the wall. And then the width of the wall
it's common sense to the builder, how much rocks you have is how far you could go out.
If you don't have too much rock, you bring it in maybe two, three feet wide.
So that way you have enough rock to set. We can't just get rocks anywhere in the park.
We must make use of what we have.
Stones come from right here in the area of where you're making your wall.
It's all volcanic basalt rock, pōhaku in Hawaiian.
Some of it is water-worn. Some are from the land
Yes we have -- different masons... The styles...
I think it all depends on which part you come from.
There's different rocks in different areas. Like Kalaupapa we worked on
was more like pebble rocks and heavy and big and round.
So the rock wall like more like -- different shape and sizes
Over here, Hōnaunau it's more like squares and angles
because the rocks are more small, like square kine.
And if you go down at Kaloko park mostly by the water,
So it's water rocks. It's different. Green limu on it.
You can tell the difference in the masons that did the work.
It means to, I guess. It kind of holds the two walls together-- the front and the side walls.
And you need two flat surfaces, actually, to make the nice corner.
And it's kind of tricky to do the cornerstones -- set the cornerstones.
[Chris] There's lots of meanings to the cornerstone.
You got to know exactly how to set them, how to put them.
It goes back in ancient times where it comes from the mana.
You have feeling in the rock, when you build the rock wall.
To me, cornerstone plays an important role in it.
[Didja] Cornerstone is to find-- usually they use a cornerstone when
they building a dry-stacked wall. That's to find the boundary of your property.
Some people likes to have it triangle, some likes to have it a round corner.
So it's depending on the site that you are building.
[Midge] I remember working on the wall and I started here. Working with Vic Bio
and Naoto was here. And our job every morning, I remember,
was to go out there and walk the whole perimeter of the wall
mostly in the Royal Grounds area. Whatever rocks was on the ground
take all the small rocks like this [shows rock], and use it--
they were chinking the wall back then-- we had to pick them up
and fill up each--wherever the hole was-- just fill it up [laughs].
We did that for YEARS, I remember. [Didja] Everybody's job that was.
[Midge] We had too. Yeah, go in there and chink the wall, the Great Wall.
So that's why you see, when you go out there in the palace ground area
you'll see the wall, there's a lot of small rocks like this [shows rock].
They did not want white rocks in that wall at all. Had to be black, small black rock.
[Lolana] Fill up all the gaps. [Midge] to fill up all the pukas-- fill them up.
I mean, that's why you see a lot of small rocks out there.
[Lolana] Amongst the big rocks. [Midge] Amongst the big rocks.
That's there to hold it more solid. But that was, you know, somebody else's idea
I mean... ways of building the rock wall. But, after that, we didn't do it
We stopped. We didn't do--we don't do chinking now in the walls that we do here.
We just-- if the rock sits, you see a big hole, it's just the beauty of it. Let it go.
You know, we're not there to make it pretty, you know [laughs].
Main thing like Lolana will say if it's solid, pa'a. And you get that natural look.
[Lolana] Every stone fits in that spot. Like putting a puzzle together. You cannot force it--
a different part of that puzzle there, if it don't belong there.
You know. And so it's satisfaction doing it right.
[Midge] Yeah it's like, you know, fixing a puzzle and juggling balls.
Because when you're there, you're juggling the rocks.
Flipping, flipping, flipping. Turning, huli, huli the rocks, you know.
Oh! And the other guys across is like, "oh I could use that rock"--
Even though you'll use 'em--"that fit perfect over here" so we toss the rock over there.
and boom, it fits. You know. So we all work together. We watch, like
"oh, I like that rock." By the time you get to that rock, somebody else grab 'em.
it's like "oh! That's my rock." [laughs] But, we all work together.
Difficult to lift up when you're building a 5- 6 feet wall. Hard to get the rock from here to there.
[Lolana] Probably Uncle Peter can get it up. [Midge] Uncle Peter can do that
Cause, you know, he's the master. [Lolana] Somehow he gets them up there.
[Lolana] He has since retired and he has died, so kind of miss him.
He was the old timer. [Didja] Yeah, he did a lot of work on these walls.
[Midge] For here, he's the [one] who taught us, the Park Service, about rock wall building.
Dry mason, Uncle Peter. He was the key man down here.
He was an amazing man. [Lolana] He was a man of few words.
so you gotta look. Like the Hawaiian way of learning is don't be asking too much questions.
[Didja] He'll tell you once, that's it. [Lolana] Observe and you imitate...
[Midge over Lolana] Nānā ka maka. Watch with your eyes.
Hāmau ka leo, nānā ka maka Shut your mouth and just watch. [Laughs]
[Lolana] Hana ka lima [Midge] Work with your hands
[Lolana continues] Hoʻolohe ka pepeiao. Listen with your ears.
Work with your hands. Paʻa ka waha. Zip your lip.
[Midge] That's the kind of person he was. And you just do that, you're all good.
I think for myself, and probably Didja too, when we started learning
was from working at [Didja] West Hawai'i SYET [Midge/Didja] Summer Youth
[Midge] Employment Training Program in Miloli'i during the summer.
For, you know, two months, maybe I think, back then.
[Didja] Yeah, I think back then was like three months in the summer.
[Midge] And there was a lot of high surf damage in the village
That's where I started learning rock masonry. [Didja] That's where we all learned.
From like Uncle Waha, pretty much for me. [Midge] And then, you know,
working there several summers, you know, I gained experience
building rock walls and then transitioning over here to the Park Service.
To me, working with the rocks, it's like meditation time.
Where you can take-- it's like picking coffee-- you know, you just--
all these things come running through your mind
you know. And you're just building, working, working. And at the end of the day
you look at it like, "wow, I realized this, I realized that, maybe I gotta change my ways,
and this and that." But you look at the finished product
"I did this AND I realized how to be humble" [Laughs] and appreciate everything.
[Lolana] Every rock you put is-- you're almost like you have the chance to be
a creator, an artist or whatever. But, it's all going to look the same,
But, it's all your experience of placing that right rock on the wall
that gives you satisfaction. That you placed the right rock on the wall.
Not the wrong rock. Cause if it's wrong, it don't want to stay there
it will fall down. And you start all over again.
[Ukulele music]
[Chris] Great place to teach people that willing to learn
You can give them back your manaʻo that means how you work
And I think that's great to teach all the younger people to get involved.
Because there's not to much rock wall masons out there anymore.
[Midge] I think I made a small impact on the younger generations that been here.
Taught them what I was taught a little bit. But, I'm sure there's more.
And I think if we have more masons come out and more younger generation,
young kids come out with the master masons and learn their different techniques
and how important it is to set a rock.
To me the pōhaku, the rock, is really sentimental. There's a lot of mana in
every rock that you pick up and you set into the wall. There's a lot of meaning to it.
It's not just an old, you know, rock from-- there's --every rock is a special rock.
[Ukulele music fades in]
[Ukulele music]
[Midge] Perfect! [Someone else] CHEEEEEEHOO! [Midge] Cut it! Cut it!