Bob Stone
From:
Gainesville, FL, USA
|
Posted 17 May 2006 1:23 pm |
|
Not an airtight case, but pretty convincing, in my opinion.
Thanks to John Marsden for his close scrutiny of some issues of The Hawaiian Guitarist and The Guitarist magazines from 1935. He established that Jack Kahanolopua was an Assistant Instructor at the Honolulu Conservatory of Music in Philadelphia in August 1935, as The Nov 1935 issue of The Guitarist cites him as such. It further states that he directed a special special radio performance by the "Sunrise Hawaiians" on WPEN Philadelphia as part of the Honolulu Guitar Club's surprise birthday party for William Pace, the managing instructor for the Philadelphia Oahu Studio.
The Sept. 1936 issue of The Guitarist noted that a Mrs. Dorothy Gibson was taking lessons from Mr. Kahanolopua, but didn't indicate whether it was Jimmy or Jack (Jimmy taught there too).
Anyhow, we know that Troman Eason was teaching Hawaiian steel guitar by May 1937, when his daughter Barbara was born. So, in my opinion, it is very likely that Jack Kahanolopua is the "Jack" that his family remembers Troman hearing over the radio circa 1935-36, calling the station and arranging to take lessons from.
As for the spelling of Jack and Jimmy's surname, apparently they used Kahanolopua to make pronunciation easier for non-Hawaiians--a rather common practice among many cultural groups. The correct spelling is Kahauolopua. That's the name Jimmy used on his social security account application in 1938 and is a fairly common Hawaiian name today.
I will also mention Jack Penewell in the book as a possible canditate for being Troman's teacher as he did a lot of radio work within 100 miles of Philly and can't be totally ruled out as a possibility. But the evidence seems to point more strongly to Jack Kahanolopua.
My thanks to John Marsden, Dirk Vogel, Les Cook, Don Kona Woods, and Michael Lee Allen for their help. And, oh yes, to the late Ralph Kolsiana, who took lessons from Jimmy K. He never doubted that Troman Eason's teacher was Jack Kahanolopua, as Jack and Jimmy were the best in the area at that time.
Also FYI, it looks like The Hawaiian Guitarist became The Guitarist in about (not sure) Jan 1936. There may have been some overlap when there were two publications.
[This message was edited by Bob Stone on 17 May 2006 at 02:27 PM.] [This message was edited by Bob Stone on 17 May 2006 at 02:31 PM.] |
|
Bob Stone
From:
Gainesville, FL, USA
|
Posted 18 May 2006 5:29 am
|
|
Don, thanks again for your help and encouragement.
Also, I forgot to thank Michael Wright, who writes historical articles for Vintage Guitar magazine. He's the one who got me started digging into The Hawaiian Guitarist mag.
By the way, looking back at my post above I realized that I had not nade one thing clear: the mention of Jack Kahanolopua in The Guitarist magazine of Nov. 1935 is the first concrete evidence of his existence I had found, other than 1920 Hawaii Census records. Apparently he was one of those rambling musicians who kept "under the radar." |
|
