I’ve been meaning to get this little segment up on the site for a while now. Last time I was in Austin I was invited to come on the morning news!

Author James Michener wrote a very famous book called Hawaii in 1959. Below is the story of how I acquired the last known footage of him before he died.

A few months before his death in October 1997, at 90 years old and on weekly dialysis, he generously agreed to be interviewed at his home in Austin, Texas, by a member of the newly established community theater company of Fredericksburg, in order to help them promote their first performance: South Pacific.

My daughter, a filmmaker, filmed the interview and I finagled the opportunity to meet him by offering to help carry the equipment. We spent more than an hour there filming, but due to my daughters subsequent move to china, to my knowledge, these precious clips are all that remain of that final interview. They include the following topics:

• Receiving a letter from his agent who terminated their contract, saying he had no future as a writer; the same day, it was announced Michener had won the Pulitzer Prize.
• His relationship with Rodgers and Hammerstein
• His response when he, and Rodgers and Hammerstein, were told by all their advisors that the song, “You’ve Got to Be Taught,” (about prejudice) created a bad note and didn’t belong in the play
• About Fredericksburg (where the new theater company would do South Pacific as their first performance) and the Nimitz Museum
• Comparing South Pacific to My Fair Lady
• Welcoming people to visit Fredericksburg and the Nimitz Museum

I had forgotten all about this film. But awhile back, when I was visiting Fredericksburg, walking along the sidewalk with a couple of writer friends, I stopped in my tracks.

My novel, The Last Aloha, is set in the late 19^th century when descendents of American Missionaries plotted to topple the Hawaiian rules. James Michener’s classic book, Hawaii, skips completely over the period of the Hawaiian monarchy and its overthrow. From my research, I believe that’s because he didn’t know about it.

After meeting Mr. Michener and hearing other stories he told that don’t appear on this video, I know that he was totally against the kind of prejudice that suppressed the history of the royal Hawaiians. (Records and documents of the period were seized by missionary families and kept in private collections until well into the 1960’s, and these same families were the source for all “official” Hawaiian history until about the same time. Michener’s book came out in 1959, when Hawaii first became a state, so he likely didn’t have access to that material.)

The moment I stopped on the sidewalk, all that came rushing back to me and I felt like Mr. Michener himself had reached out to remind me: “Use the film clip.” It was like he wanted to be a part of remedying that prejudice that kept the truth from being known.

I visited his grave in Austin and felt the same again. That he would be pleased that something I had from him could bring this little-known period of Hawaii to light and possibly give people an appreciation for Hawaii that they’d never had before.

Take a look at the clip. The footage was taken on 3/4 inch tape so the quality may not be the best, but we hope to upload a finer version soon.

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