User:Mliu92/sandbox/Moʻoheau Park

Needs redirects from "Mooheau Park" and "Russell Carroll Mooheau County Park"

Mooheau Park is the first park established by the County of Hawaii in Hilo, Hawaii, dedicated in 1905. It is one of several parks in the South Hilo district along the central southern shore of Hilo Bay, alongside the adjoining Hilo Bayfront Beach Park. The park areas are bounded approximately by the Wailuku River on the west, Kamehameha Avenue on the south, and Waiākea Pond/Wailoa River on the east.

History
The area that is now occupied by the two county parks was once a single contiguous beach (except Cocoanut Point, at the extreme western end next to the mouth of the Wailuku River) with sand more than 40 ft deep in places until development began in the 1860s. A landfill (1861), pier (1865), and sewer outfall (1906) were constructed at Cocoanut Point, blocking the natural eastward movement of sand from the river which had been replenishing the beach. The town of Hilo also began to encroach on the beach by 1880. After continued shoreline erosion, houses and the pier at Cocoanut Point were damaged by storm-driven waves in 1892 and 1894, prompting the relocation of the pier to east of Wailoa River. The Hilo Railroad Company extended its line along the beach from Waiakea to Hilo to facilitate sugar shipments, completing construction by 1903; after the completion of the sewer outfall in 1906, the railroad built the first revetments on the beach by dumping stone where erosion was continuing.

Originally, when the Hawaii Territorial Legislature set aside land for a park, it was to be named Hoolulu Park; Admiral Beckley stated that Mooheau was a son of Hoolulu, prompting a public debate over whether to rename the park to "Mooheau Park" to "perpetuate the name of a prominent 'hereditary' chief of Hilo" in April 1904. Admiral Beckley claimed those chiefs were among his ancestors. Territorial Senator Cecil Brown of Hilo introduced, then withdrew a resolution to rename it accordingly, and Senator Lincoln McCandless jokingly proposed the name "Brown Park" after its Senate champion. The resolution was taken up the next day, converted to a concurrent resolution, and after Kealawaa introduced it in the house, the concurrent renaming resolution passed.

Citizens of Hilo felt the name was being forced on them, and The Hilo Tribune held a plebiscite to propose alternative names. Admiral Buckley wrote that he would build a band pavilion at his own expense. The Hilo Board of Trade countered by asking if the pavilion could be ready by July 4, to which Buckley replied "Wait till I get there", which he later explained meant "the surroundings [first should be made] suitable for a prettily designed pavilion". In October 1904, the Department of Public Works announced it had received US$2695 1904 to fund the construction of the pavilion (to be named "Mooheau Hall"), of which US$1,000 had been contributed by Beckley. By December, the grand opening ceremony had been scheduled for January 2, 1905, marked by a new composition, "Mooheau March" by Prof. Joaquin Carvalho, a speech from Admiral Beckley, and a grand ball. The first trees were planted at the park in August 1905.

The 7000 ft long breakwater protecting Hilo Harbor was authorized in 1907 by an act of Congress and completed in 1929. At approximately the same time, 239000 yd3 of sand were removed from the beach for two large reclamation projects (Waiolama Sanitation Project and Ponahawi Reclamation Project). Tsunamis in 1921 and 1923 led to continued erosion, and the major tsunami of April 1, 1946 caused by the earthquake in Alaska completely destroyed the Hilo waterfront and bankrupted the railroad, which could not afford to repair its lines. The Hawaii Belt Road was constructed in 1957 over the former railroad right-of-way, and additional revetments were added to slow further erosion; since then, the eastern portion of the park has continued to accumulate more sand than the relatively barren western end, likely occurring as a result of gradual deposition from the Wailuku River.