In July, the King Kamehameha V Judiciary History Center (Center) launched a new digital archive providing free public access to resources from its historic collections. This collections portal is made possible through a partnership with the Permanent Legacy Foundation, a nonprofit that provides long-term digital storage for historic records to individuals and nonprofit organizations.
The Center stewards historical material dating to the Hawaiian Kingdom, the republic and territorial periods, through statehood. In addition to court-related art, objects, and artifacts, the Center’s archives hold a range of physical and digital resources, unique to the institution, that carry significant educational and historical importance for current and future generations.
Probate record of (the late) Kuhina Nui Victoria Kamāmalu (Kaʻahumanu IV): Dated October 4, 1867. Lists John O. Dominis (Legislator of the House of Nobles, husband of Princess, later Queen, Liliʻuokalani) and Mataio Kekūanaōʻa (father of Victoria Kamāmalu and last to hold title of Kuhina Nui) as co-administrators of Kaʻahumanu IV’s estate, who passed away on May 29, 1866. Later, when her father Kekūanaōʻa died on November 24, 1868, Kaʻahumanu IV’s estate passed to her half-sister Princess Ruth Keʻelikōlani, who later willed it to Bernice Pauahi Bishop, aliʻi and wife of Charles Reed Bishop (document signer), which upon their death later became part of the Kamehameha Schools Bishop Estate.
Curator of Collections & Programs Brieanah Gouveia explains, “The Center’s collections capture Hawaiʻi’s unique civic history, showcasing some of the people, institutions, and events that shaped law, public policy, and government in the islands over the last 200 years. Together these influences created the unique hybrid legal system, and social institutions, that characterize Hawaiʻi today.”
The Center began its partnership with Permanent in 2022, to expand public access to its collections and share the history of Hawaiʻi’s civic story with broader audiences. Since then, more than 10 Judiciary volunteers have helped scan and digitize records to prepare them for the new digital archive.
In February of this year, nonprofit Friends of the Judiciary History Center of Hawaiʻi received a grant from Permanent to hire a student intern from the University of Hawaiʻi (UH) at Mānoa’s Library and Information Science Master’s Program.
Gouveia worked with the client liaison at Permanent to interview students and draft a contract. Morgan Schmidt was the successful candidate from a round of interviews. For three months, Schmidt inventoried, organized, and created content descriptions for previously scanned material, then published them for public access.
The newly digitized resources are just a fraction of the total holdings from the Center’s archives at Aliʻiōlani Hale. In the coming months and years, many more legal records, photographs, maps and blueprints, manuscripts, newspaper articles, and more will be digitized and added to the online portal. One upcoming digitization project includes processing the papers of former Hawaiʻi Chief Justices, including the late Chief Justice William S. Richardson.
While the Hawaiʻi State Archives and UH Mānoa libraries have collections related to historic material held at Aliʻiōlani Hale, most primary sources in this archive are found only at the Center.
For information on how to access material in person, please contact the King Kamehameha V Judiciary History Center’s curator at 808-539-4995.
Those who are interested in volunteering as a collections assistant may apply by sending a letter of interest describing skills and work history, highlighting any related experience with historic collections and/or education, to [email protected].