David Laʻamea Kamananakapu Mahinulani Naloiaehuokalani Lumialani Kalākaua (1836 - 1891)

Born 16 Nov 1836 in Honolulu, O'ahu, Kingdom of Hawai'i

Ancestors

Husband of Julia Kapi'olani Napelakapuokakaʻe — married 8 Dec 1863 in Honolulu, O'ahu, Kingdom of Hawai'i

Died 20 Jan 1891 at age 54 in Palace Hotel, San Francisco, California, USA

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Biography

David Kalākaua is Notable.

His Majesty, King David Kalākaua I, the last reigning king of the Kingdom of Hawai'i, was born in Honolulu, on the island of Oahu, Kingdom of Hawai'i, in 1836. He was the second surviving son of High Chief Caesar [Kaiser] Kaluaiku Kapaʻakea and his cousin-wife, High Chiefess Analea Keohokālole. His family descended from the High Chiefs of Kona, island of Hawai'i, who had supported King Kamehameha I in his successful bid to unify the Hawaiian islands under his rule, ca. 1794. His full Hawaiian name (largely ceremonial and an indication of personal qualities more than a family name) was ali'i David Laʻamea Kamananakapu Mahinulani Naloiaehuokalani Lumialani Kalākaua.^[1]

According to Hawaiian customs, as a child of the high-ranking ali'i (nobility), young David was adopted at birth by High Chiefess Haʻaheo Kaniu and her husband, Keaweamahi Kinimaka. They lived in Lahina, Maui, the royal capital of the Kingdom of Hawai'i. When his hānai (adopted) mother died childless in 1843, she bequeathed all her estates and sizeable fortune to the young prince, thus securing his future. Later, after his adopted father also died, Prince David returned to O'ahu to his birth parents, attending the Chiefs' Childrens' School and later studying law. He became fluent in Hawaiian and English, the two official languages of the Kingdom, already subject to significant British and American influence based on the New England Christian missionaries, who had converted most of the Hawaiian population in the 1820s, the whale trade that boomed in this period, and the growing interest by the United States in the excellent Pacific port of Pearl Harbor on Oahu.

As a young man, Prince David Kalākaua became a Major on the General Staff of King Kamehameha IV in 1856. He was also the leader of a native-based political group known as The Young Hawaiians, whose motto was "Hawai'i for Hawaiians". David also served as a royal minister, heading the Post Office and Communications department. As such he was very aware of the growing foreign economic presence and influence in his native land.

David Kalākaua married an ali'i widow named Kapiʻolani (her name means "rainbow" or "heavenly arch") on December 8, 1863, in a small ceremony conducted by an Anglican priest (most of the royal family were Anglican Christians, having adopted the British royal family as their model of kingship). Kapiʻolani had been Queen Emma (Queen consort of King Kamehameha IV)'s first lady-in-waiting but had fallen out of favor when the couple's son, Crown Prince Albert Kamehameha, took ill and died in August 1862, just 4 years old. In her grief, Queen Emma blamed Kapi'olani as negligent in caring for him. King Kamehameha IV never fully recovered from his son and heir's untimely death and himself succumbed on November 30, 1863, at only 29 years old. The kingdom was still in deep mourning when David Kalākaua and Kapiʻolani married, defying the dowager Queen who never forgave either of them, and creating a bitter personal and political enmity between them.

Princess Kapi'olani and David Kalākaua were childless so they adopted, in the ali'i tradition of hānai, two of her sister Victoria Kinoiki Kekaulike's three sons: David Kawānanakoa and Jonah Kūhiō Kalanianaʻole. In 1883, King Kalākaua named all three of Queen Kapiolani's nephews, Princes of Hawaii, with the style of Highness, in honor of his coronation.

In 1874, after King Kamehameha V, the last of the direct-line Kamehameha dynasty, died without an heir, it was decided that the Hawaiian people would elect their next monarch. Prince David Kalākaua, now 38 years and in the prime of life, became the "progressive" candidate; opposing him was dowager Queen Emma Kamehameha, who represented the conservatives among the political elite. The "progressives" won the election in a landslide; some of Emma's supporters rioted in Honolulu and American marines helped re-establish order.

Among his first acts as King, David Kalākaua secured a favorable trade treaty with the United States, allowing sugar and rice to be imported there duty-free. This helped the Hawaiian economy. That plus his personal charismatic style, very different from the stiff, British-style of the Kamehameha family, soon made him a popular ruler, especially among native Hawaiians. King Kalākaua reintroduced several Hawaiian cultural practices, including hula dancing, banned as exhibitionistic by the Puritanical missionaries and their Hawaiian converts, helping cement his native popularity. He remained, however, a staunch monarchist politically and ruled the Cabinet with a strong hand, favoring native interests and not those of the increasingly-powerful American banking and business leaders, now influential island residents, often inter-married with leading Hawaiian families. Tension between his administration and the "foreign" economic elites residing in Hawaii remained high throughout his reign.

In 1881-82, King Kalākaua embarked on an around-the-world journey to visit other world powers, introducing them to Hawaii, and to compare how they were governed. He was, in fact, the first crowned head-of-state to circumnavigate the globe. Traveling west-to-east he visited the Empires of Japan, China and Siam; the British Raj in India; Egypt, Austria-Hungary, Germany, Belgium, France, Spain, Portugal and Great Britain, returning home via the United States.

He had hardly returned to Honolulu, now the Kingdom's official capital, when he started the construction of the 'Iolani Palace as his royal residence. It cost $300,000 (today this would be over $7.5 million) a scandalous sum for the time. He also held a lavish coronation, 9 years after becoming King, at which he publically acknowledged the hula as Hawaii's cultural treasure and brought a larger-than-life statue of King Kamehameha I to Hawaii.

These measures plus the Kingdom's growing debt, led to a political upheaval in 1887 when American-led businessmen forced the King to sign a new, restrictive constitution, known as the "Bayonet Constitution," because he signed it under military duress. The new constitution reversed the political balance of power, disenfranchising 3/4 of the ethnic native Hawaiians and giving electoral power squarely to white, male citizens, mostly from the United States of America.

These political reversals plus his exuberant lifestyle, took their toll on the aging King's health. By 1890, on the advice of his doctors, he sailed for San Francisco for advanced medical treatment. There, his health took a turn for the worse and he died at his royal suite in the city's Palace Hotel in January 20, 1891. His final words were, "Aue, he kanaka au, eia i loko o ke kukonukonu o ka maʻi!," or "Alas, I am a man who is seriously ill." His remains were returned to Honolulu aboard the American cruiser USS Charleston. Because he and his wife, Queen Kapiʻolani, had no natural-born children, King David Kalākaua's sister, Princess Liliʻuokalani, succeeded him to the Hawaiian throne. She would be the Kingdom of Hawai'i's last reigning monarch.

Sources

1. ↑ Kalākaua on Wikipedia

See also:

• Hawaiian national bibliography, 1780–1900, Vol. 4. University of Hawaii Press. p. 404; by David W. Forbes, ed. (2003).

• Queen Kapiolani

Acknowledgements

• WikiTree profile Kapaakea-5 was created through the import of canotree.ged on Jul 21, 2011 by Charles Ano. See the Changes page for the details of edits by Charles and others.

• Chet Snow created WikiTree profile Kalākaua-1 on July 15, 2015. He merged it with Kapaakea-5 on Dec. 17, 2018, retaining Kalākaua as King David's last name, as per Wikipedia and contemporary usage. Hawaiian ali'i last names are not handed down father to son like Western surnames.