Editor’s Note: Our Peripatetic Correspondent Mules is back in the Gentle Islands with his bride for Pearl Harbor Day, and went on to The Big Island of Hawaii. For those of us who lived on Oahu, it was a magical time. Even better to see it again through new eyes. There are more stories from other wars, and of bringing home our prisoners at the end of the Vietnam Conflict.

– Vic

The “Parker Ranch” and a POW Story….

In March 1973, during “Operation Homecoming”, Jim Mueller assigned me as the debriefer/escort for Lcdr Edward Martin. After his preliminary medical evaluation and dental repairs, we flew to his home in San Diego via Hawaii.

The stopover in Hawaii was at Hickam Field and everyone debarked for refueling and to stretch their legs. The ramp side, small VIP lounge was opened for the occasion. As I walked my charge toward the entrance I noted the sign above the door that read, “Restricted for General Officers and Navy Captains”. I thought that sign was interesting and I snickered.

After the rush of Hawaii based officers wearing way too many stars, things settled down. Then a calm officer walked up informed (now) Cdr Martin that there was a gentleman and his wife at the door who wished to see him. The gracious ex-POW told the major to escort the couple up to the lounge.

Once hugs were completed, I was introduced to a lovely and gracious lady and her husband… a slim, well dressed older gentleman wearing a “Paniolo” hat adorned with an exquisite ostrich feathered band. His name was Richard Smart.

It was at that moment that I began to realize that “my” POW was not the ordinary run of the mill jet jockey. I was to discover later that Ed Martin was a legacy and destined to be a full Admiral… however during his stint as C6F commander the bombing in Beirut occurred… and the Navy needed a fall-guy. VADM Ed Martin thus retired in Coronado.

Here is Richard Smart….

In 1913, Richard Palmer Smart was born to John Palmer Parker’s great-granddaughter Thelma Parker and her husband Henry Gaillard Smart.

In 1914, young Smart’s parents died, leaving him to become the sole heir of the Parker fortune.
In 1899, Alfred Wellington Carter, a respected Honolulu businessman and judge, had been hired by one of Parker’s relatives to manage the ranch. Carter took young Smart under his wing and showed him the ropes of Parker Ranch.
Over the next two decades the ranch continued to grow, at one point passing the half-million-acre mark, with a purebred herd of 30,000 Herefords. With Carter in firm control of the ranch, Smart was able to pursue his other love: a career on stage.

For nearly 30 years, Smart performed on Broadway and in top cabarets in the U.S. and abroad. He headlined such clubs as the Coconut Grove in Los Angeles , the Monte Carlo in New York and the Lido in Paris . He starred opposite such actresses as Eve Arden and Carol Channing. He eventually married actress Patricia Havens-Monteagle, and the couple had two sons. All the while, Smart kept in close contact with the ranch, and when Carter died in 1949, Smart moved back to Parker Ranch to stay.
Smart began improvements to Parker Ranch. He restructured and expanded much of the cattle breeding and feeding procedures. He improved the ranch headquarters and built the Parker Ranch Visitor Center with its museum, restaurant and saddle shop.

He leased land to Laurance Rockefeller, who was the catalyst to resort development along the Kona-Kohala Coast . He instituted programs to benefit ranch employees in education, health care and culture. And he left his sophisticated, artistic mark on Parker Ranch, adorning his home, called Puuopelu , with the exquisite art and furniture pieces he had collected during his worldly travels.

Smart took his role as Waimea’s biggest landlord seriously. To assure orderly and controlled growth, which Smart recognized as inevitable, he devised a long-range plan called the Parker Ranch 2020 Plan. The Plan’s intent was to set aside sufficient lands to allow for uncongested growth and development. Controlling the growth would allow the community to maintain its rural “village” character yet provide future business, employment, and housing for residents.

To fund ranching operations, Smart authorized the sale of low-yield pasture lands that are now the site of world-class luxury resorts along the Kohala Coast . The thriving community of Waikoloa Village is on former Parker Ranch land. In 1992, Hawaii county approved the rezoning of more than 580 acres of land for commercial, industrial and residential activities in conjunction with the 2020 Plan.

Smart’s death in 1992 marked an end to the Parker reign over the ranch. He left the Parker Ranch, complete with his art collection, in a trust to support healthcare, education and charitable giving through named beneficiaries in the Waimea community.

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… at the urging of the old “kamaaina” here, The Night Tripper …. we headed out this morning, up the hill from our Waikoloa area hotel here (north of Kona) on the ‘Big Island’ …. to the Kamuela / Waimea area (at 2,600′).

The main claim to fame there is the nearby famous and huge “Parker Ranch” and the center of Hawaii’s “Paniolo” (cowboy) heritage ……

file photo …. but there was a bit of snow this AM too …..

The ranch was started in 1847 by John Palmer Parker a New England sailor who ‘jumped ship’ ….. a whaler working the Hawaiian waters.

It’s a long story, but Parker eventually started working for King Kamehameha … to round up the large numbers of wild cattle on the island.

Bit by bit, Parker was allowed to acquire more and more land and develop a very successful cattle business raising and selling beef to visiting ships, folks over in Oahu … and then the army … his marriage to King K’s grand daughter helped in that effort.

The 130,000 acre ranch is still one of the largest in the country and is now being operated, by a charitable trust ….. but most calves are now shipped live to the mainland as feeders.

… fast-forward to WW-II …. and Hawaii is not only the home of critical naval and army bases … on Oahu, but as the war effort builds against Japan, a very large, mid-Pacific ground training base is required for the expanding operations.

The Waimea area is chosen and construction is started in 1943 by the 2nd Marine Division (and Navy Sea Bees), just returning from the Battle of Tarawa ….. hence the name, Camp Tarawa ….

They are off next to Saipan while the 5th MarDiv then moves in, and trains for Iwo Jima …….
Some 50, 000 Marines, sailors and soldiers* trained at the camp during its’ short run …. and a monument just outside of Waimea commemorates the camp, some of which was on Parker Ranch land ……

https://historichawaii.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/8012241_orig.jpg

… a nice little side trip here, and a journey back into some old Hawaiian history…….

Aloha,

Mules

Author’s Note: Camp Tarawa supported training for various units of the 5th Amphibious Corps (VAC) … which included:
* The US Marine Corps and US Army commands that served under the V Amphibious Corps in World War II include:
Marine Corps
2nd Marine Division
3rd Marine Division
4th Marine Division
5th Marine Division
22nd Marine Regiment
Amphibious Reconnaissance Battalion [formerly “Company”]
Army
XXIV Corps Artillery
7th Infantry Division
27th Infantry Division
32nd Infantry Division

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