Ben Finney's interview

Interview with Ben Finney • A Tribute
Interview by Jeremy Lemarie, special editing by John Clark

For the website of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, go to:
www.hokulea.com

Introduction

As a Ph.D. candidate in sociology studying the history of Hawaiian surfing, Jeremy Lemarie conducted taped interviews with major contributors to the field for over six years in California and Hawaii, from 2009 to 2016. During that time Ben Finney was one of the surfing legends he interviewed.

Ben was a special interviewee because he was the first scholar to study Hawaiian surfing thoroughly. His work was not perfect, but Jeremy regard his book Surfing: A History of the Ancient Hawaiian Sport, as a successful attempt to recognize surfing as a legitimate academic topic – a topic that is still disregarded today by most scholars.

While other articles and books were written previously to his, including Hawaiian Surfriders 1935 by Tom Blake, Ben was the first one to have a comprehensive approach with the eye of a cultural anthropologist.

Modern Outrigger Canoes & Surfboards in Honolulu • Photo: Jeremy Lemarie

Looking down the ocean, near Finney's residence • Photo: Jeremy Lemarie

Jeremy first talked to Ben on the phone in Fall 2011, when he was writing a proposal for his Ph.D. dissertation. Three years later, he met Ben on May 11, 2014, at his apartment in Honolulu and Jeremy was warmly welcomed by Ben's wife.

Ben was working on his memoir and was facing a challenge. He could not see clearly anymore and had to work on a very big computer screen, typing font 36 at least.

After a taped interview, Jeremy asked Ben for written consent to publish the transcript someday. Ben agreed upon one condition: he wanted to read the transcript, typed font 36, to make corrections.

He said that almost nobody accepted his condition, since a 45-minutes interview, like the one Ben and Jeremy had, would take more than 50 pages to print out.

Ben was right, font 36 was just too big, since one gets only 3 or 4 sentences per page. Jeremy had to find a solution to narrow it down. He came back to Ben a week later with a printed transcript, but typed in font 28. Ben was able to read it, made a few changes, and signed the consent form.

Ben passed away on May 23, 2017. With his permission and his editing, Jeremy hereby release part of the talk that they had three years ago.

~ A hui hou, e Ben ~

[Beginning of the interview]

1. Your book Surfing: A History of the Ancient Hawaii Sport is among the first works ever written on the history of surfing, back in 1966.
It was a struggle to get it published. People just said: “What? That is not a topic.”

2. Yes. How did you manage to work on this specific topic then?
Well, I will tell you a long story. I was conceived in Hawaii. My father was a naval aviator here, just before the Pearl Harbor attack. My mother was declared pregnant and I was born on the 1st of October 1933.

My father was on a temporary duty here in Honolulu and his supervisors in San Diego sent a telegram to get him back with his wife and his baby daughter. I have an older sister.

They took a ship and got in California in time for me to be born in San Diego. So, I was born in San Diego and, as I grew up, I was totally ignorant about what happened.

All I heard about Hawaii were the stories that my mother and father told me. And their favorite story was how I happened to be born in San Diego instead of Honolulu.

I guess when I learn how to talk, I figured that something was fishy here. Something was missing. I realized: “What? I could have been born in Hawaii and gone surfing?”

I had the impression that Hawaii was a vast and mysterious place, a part of Polynesia, where all these islands were in the middle of the ocean. I was thinking of people sailing around in canoes.

3. Were you surfing in San Diego before?
I was learning how to surf in the early 1950s.

Outrigger Canoes In Lanikai, O'ahu, Hawaii • Photo: Jeremy Lemarie

Not really, I was just one more kid who used to fall off his surfboard. I did not have any special instructions. But when I came in Hawaii, I thought I will learn Hawaiian surfing.

That is where I met Kawika Kapahulehua. He was a man who was born on Hawai‘i Island but he grew up on Ni‘ihau. Therefore, his first language was Hawaiian, which is very rare. Unfortunately, he is dead now. He is the one who told me not only about surfing, but also about canoes and sailing. He was full of stories like how his ancestors sailed up here from Tahiti.

How is that for lighting a fire? That is the genesis of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, which I founded in 1973.

I made the first trip to Tahiti [on the Hokule'a] in 1976 with Kawika as the skipper.

Anyway, to make it relevant to surfing, [this is how] I ended up in Hawaii. After finishing my B.A., I was working in industries, like steel and aircraft. Then, I was in the navy but got kicked out because of budget cuts. So, I never got my wings and I said: “What do I do?”

Well, I had a plan B. I had a dream before coming to Hawaii to do an M.A. in anthropology and maybe a Ph.D., and then start my voyaging project. That actually happened that way.

I was interested in the history of surfing, so I did my M.A. on the history and culture of surfing. The anthropologists immediately recognized my topic as relevant. But other professors at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa did not.

In particular, I had a history professor specialized in Hawaiian history who said to me: “What do you mean by history of surfing? How can you do the history of surfing?”

I knew I had to find sources and I knew there were many legends about surfing. Further, Captain Cook and others described surfing. So, I picked these as my written material, but I also had to do fieldwork and interview people.

I eventually got my M.A. thesis, although one of the members of my committee was set against me. I think he thought I was an impostor who came up here to scoop up the goodies, because nobody had done this before.

Then the work was not published by the University of Hawai‘i Press. I ended up having it published by Tuttle, which is a maverick publisher located in Tokyo. It was not a good deal, but at least my work got published.

Years later it became a rare book. A librarian I knew contacted me and that is the genesis of that paperback published by Pomegranate Communications. I eventually got James Houston, who was a successful novelist, to work with me on both editions.

So, that’s my story.

4. So far, your book is one of the first one that people refer to, because before you there were few things.
That is why John Clark, the author of Hawaiian Surfing: Traditions from the Past credits me as being a pioneer.

I broke the ice and he did incredible. And then I had to go through all the things again with the Polynesian Voyaging Society project. We were more successful there.

Threes and Fours in Waikiki from the Sheraton Hotel • Photo: Adam Rieke

5. Did you ever think of learning Hawaiian for your Master’s thesis?
I did, but believe it or not, the chair of our department said: “No.”

6. Do you know why?
He had a false impression on things. He thought that nobody spoke Hawaiian and that nobody knew much about it. He thought there were no sources for it and that was not worth it. I regret not having done it because that would have been a lot easier to find out about Hawaiian surfing.

Also, when I went down to Tahiti, I would have learned Tahitian much quicker. In fact, some of the Hawaiian I did know helped me in Tahitian and I figured [out] the grammar right away.

7. In your book, you did maps of surfing sites. How did you gather all the data?
At first, I gathered it from random sources. In addition, I met Mary Kawena Pukui at the Bishop museum.

One day, she gave me a stack of index cards with [surfing site] references she had collected from legends. So, I had legendary sites in there, too. Those are the historical sources I used.

But I had more data that I did [not include] in the thesis because I did not want it to make my life’s work. I just wanted to get the M.A. and move on.

8. Did you keep surfing after your M.A.?
No, I kept surfing in the 50s, but then with the Polynesia Voyaging Society project, I had no time for surfing anymore.

9. What kinds of benefits did you get from the Polynesia Voyaging Society project?
I would say an appreciation of how ingenious the Polynesians and their ancestors were to develop the technologies to build canoes and ships and go out into the sea without any instrument of navigation.

Their use of practical meteorology and understanding of the winds were phenomenal. I am much attuned to that and I am going to try to convey that in my memoir.

For our Polynesia Voyaging Society project, there were many who could not imagine how people in those ships, without compasses and charts, could possibly settle these islands.

Thank you very much, Ben, for your answers.

[End of the interview]

For an updated map of Hawaiian surfing in the 19th century, go to: http://www.surfblurb.com/map-of-hawaiian-surfing.html

South Shore, O'ahu, Hawaii • Photo by Fabrice Bouquillon