Keawaiki Bay is on the western coast of Hawaiʻi Island. It is the site of a residential complex built for Francis Hyde ʻĪʻī Brown (1892–1976) who was a champion

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping ...

player and legislator.

History

The bay is located at . The area to the north was covered by an 1859 lava flow from

Mauna Loa Mauna Loa ( or ; Hawaiian: ; en, Long Mountain) is one of five volcanoes that form the Island of Hawaii in the U.S. state of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean. The largest subaerial volcano (as opposed to subaqueous volcanoes) in both mass and ...

. It was the site of an ancient temple (''

heiau A ''heiau'' () is a Hawaiian temple. Made in different architectural styles depending upon their purpose and location, they range from simple earth terraces, to elaborately constructed stone platforms. There are heiau to treat the sick (''heia ...

'') and settlement of

ancient Hawaii Ancient Hawaii is the period of Hawaiian history preceding the unification in 1810 of the Kingdom of Hawaii by Kamehameha the Great. Traditionally, researchers estimated the first settlement of the Hawaiian islands as having occurred sporadicall ...

destroyed by the 1859 eruption. Brown was a grandson of

native Hawaiian Native Hawaiians (also known as Indigenous Hawaiians, Kānaka Maoli, Aboriginal Hawaiians, First Hawaiians, or simply Hawaiians) ( haw, kānaka, , , and ), are the indigenous ethnic group of Polynesian people of the Hawaiian Islands. Hawa ...

historian and judge

John Papa ʻĪʻī John (Ioane) Kaneiakama Papa ʻĪʻī (1800–1870) was a 19th-century educator, politician and historian in the Kingdom of Hawaii. Life ʻĪʻī was born 1800, in the month of Hilinehu, which he calculated to be August 3, in later life. He was b ...

. His mother was Irene Kahalelaukoa ʻĪʻī (1869–1922), and father was Charles Augustus Brown (born 1856). He was born in

Honolulu Honolulu (; ) is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Hawaii, which is in the Pacific Ocean. It is an unincorporated county seat of the consolidated City and County of Honolulu, situated along the southeast coast of the island ...

September 16, 1892 and attended Punahou School and

Fessenden School The Fessenden School is an independent day (Pre-K – Grade 9) and boarding school (Grades 5 – 9) for boys, founded in 1903 by Frederick J. Fessenden as a school for the intellectually gifted, and located at 250 Waltham Street, West Newton, M ...

West Newton, Massachusetts West Newton is one of the thirteen villages within the city of Newton in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. Among the oldest of the thirteen Newton villages, the West Newton Village Center is a National Register Historic District. ...

. The lands that John ʻĪʻī had been awarded were put into a trust called the John ʻĪʻī Estate, Limited. After his parents divorced in 1898 his mother remarried, which was the subject of a lawsuit due to ambiguity in the original will. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

Brown served as an ambulance driver in

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. He married Stephanie Wichman in Honolulu on January 30, 1919. He became an involved in several sports, including baseball, swimming, tennis, polo, and golf. He won the Hawaiian Amateur golf championship nine times. In 1924 he set a course record at the

Old Course at St Andrews The Old Course at St Andrews, also known as the Old Lady or the Grand Old Lady, is considered the oldest golf course. It is a public course over common land in St Andrews, Fife, Scotland and is held in trust by the St Andrews Links Trust under ...

and in 1927 he set the course record at

Pebble Beach Golf Links Pebble Beach Golf Links is a public golf course on the west coast of the United States, located in Pebble Beach, California. Regarded by ''Travel and Leisure'' blog as one of the most beautiful courses in the world, it hugs the rugged coastlin ...

. As a member of the

Republican Party of Hawaii The Hawaii Republican Party ( haw, ʻAoʻao Lepupalika o Hawaiʻi) is the affiliate of the Republican Party (GOP) in Hawaii, headquartered in Honolulu. The party was initially strong during Hawaii's territorial days, but following statehood the ...

, he was elected to the

Territory of Hawaii The Territory of Hawaii or Hawaii Territory ( Hawaiian: ''Panalāʻau o Hawaiʻi'') was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from April 30, 1900, until August 21, 1959, when most of its territory, excluding ...

house of representatives in 1925, and the senate from 1927 through 1947, except when an automobile accident in 1935 prevented him from participating in 1936. He purchased on Keawaiki Bay from the territory between 1926 and 1931 as the houses were constructed. Buildings include a main house with two bedrooms, two guest houses, a caretaker house, and other structures. They were built from local lava rock. Swimmer Duke Kahanamoku spent his honeymoon in a guest house and helped design swimming pools on the property.

Helen Desha Beamer Helen Kapuailohia Desha Beamer (September 8, 1882 – September 25, 1952) was a musician, composer of songs in the Hawaiian language, hula dancer and coloratura soprano of Hawaiian ancestry. Her descendants have also become accomplished artist ...

composed a song about Keawaiki. In 1932 Brown also bought a small cottage built for James Frank Woods and Eva Parker at Kalahuipuaʻa about to the north. The cottage is preserved as a museum in the Mauna Lani resort. The resort named its golf course for Brown. The

Ala Kahakai National Historic Trail Ala Kahakai National Historic Trail is a long trail located on the island of Hawaii. It is not yet a single continuous trail, but can be accessed at several broken segments along the coastline of the Big Island. The trail was established to acc ...

runs past the property. The complex was abandoned during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

in 1941, and Keawaiki was sold to nephew Zadoc White Brown (1917–2006). Zadoc Brown founded the first

mutual fund A mutual fund is a professionally managed investment fund that pools money from many investors to purchase securities. The term is typically used in the United States, Canada, and India, while similar structures across the globe include the SICAV ...

in Hawaii. Several animal pens near the beach were destroyed in the April 1, 1946

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater exp ...

. Until 1974 the only access to the bay was by boat or on foot. A private unpaved road now leads from the

Hawaii Belt Road The Hawaii Belt Road is a modern name for the Māmalahoa Highway and consists of Hawaii state Routes 11, 19, and 190 that encircle the Island of Hawaii. The southern section, between Hilo and Kailua-Kona is numbered as Route 11. The section betw ...

that runs inland of the bay. Brown died in 1976 in

Pebble Beach, California Pebble Beach is an unincorporated community on the Monterey Peninsula in Monterey County, California. The small coastal residential community of mostly single-family homes is also notable as a resort destination, and the home of the golf cou ...

. He was called "Mr. Golf of Hawaiʻi" when inducted into the Hawaii Sports Hall of fame.

References

{{reflist Bays of Hawaii (island)