Pan Pacific Union (PPU) Records
Scope and Contents
The Pan Pacific Union records are not complete. Large portions, particularly those pertaining to the 1910-30 period and to the organization’s conferences, are missing. Local newspapers and the PPU’s own publications appear to be the only remaining sources of original information.
In the early 1970s Professor Paul Hooper of American Studies found the unsorted Pan Pacific Union materials in Sinclair Library. With permission from the library staff, he undertook an initial, preliminary, arrangement of the jumbled documents. Although archival staff rehoused the collection, no further organizing nor processing was done. In 2007-08, Dr. Hooper volunteered in the Archives; among other projects, he weeded and reorganized the PPU materials into eight major categories: Background Materials; General Finances; Conferences; Other Programs; Publications; Correspondence; Related Activities; and Scrapbooks, Photos and Clippings. Several of these categories have sub-categories within. Generally speaking, the materials are arranged chronologically within the sub-categories and categories. While an effort was made to properly separate these materials into the appropriate specific sub-categories, some overlap remains especially in the publications and correspondence. Users should therefore read in related areas rather than narrowly under single topic sub-categories.
Dates
- Creation: 1917 - 1942
Conditions Governing Access
Material with personal information may be redacted by the Archives staff. Some fragile items may need to be handled by the staff only.
Conditions Governing Use
All requests for permission to reproduce manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Archives. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the University of Hawai'i Library as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must be obtained by the user.
Biographical / Historical
During the first half of the 20th century, Hawaii experienced a remarkable surge of interest in international and intercultural relations that gave rise to the creation of a number of related organizations and activities which in turn generated considerable attention abroad and periodic reference to the Islands as the “New Geneva.” The pioneer among these organizations was the Pan Pacific Union (PPU). The PPU was dedicated to establishing connections among the Pacific Rim nations leading to the formation of a regional international organization akin to the Pan-American Union.1
The principal figure in the creation of the PPU was Alexander Hume Ford, an imaginative and energetic, if somewhat haphazardly organized individual who believed that multi-ethnic Hawaii was a compelling model for improving relations in an increasingly interconnected world. Ford was determined to find a way to promote his belief. Buoyed by the successful launch of Mid-Pacific Magazine in 1910 as a platform for his ideas and the positive reception of a number of his inter-ethnic activities by Hawaii’s social and business leaders, he founded the PPU in 1917. With the fortuitous support of a member of President Woodrow Wilson’s cabinet, enough publicity was generated that presidents, prime ministers and governors from throughout the region were willing to serve as the new group’s honorary officers, and a loose regional network of Pan-Pacific Clubs was organized. Aided by appropriations from Hawaii’s territorial legislature and from the U.S. Congress, in 1920 Ford initiated the first in a series of international conferences concerned with a variety of regional issues. As Pan-Pacific clubs began to function in various areas and as conferences brought regional leaders together on matters ranging from science to women’s rights, Ford and his colleagues foresaw the realization of their internationalist dreams.
This did not occur. A combination of Ford’s lack of attention to administrative detail, inadequate long-term funding arrangements, declining governmental support (compounded within a few years by the global economic depression), and, perhaps above all, a shift in support on the part of Hawaii’s socio-economic leaders from the PPU to the new Institute of Pacific Relations, resulted in the group’s slow decline. By the advent of WW II, PPU had withered into insignificance and, with Ford himself in rapidly declining health, it simply disappeared. This does not mean the PPU and Ford were at last irrelevant. As a local newspaper editorialized at the time of Ford’s death in 1946, he “did more than any other man to acquaint the whole wide world with the importance of Hawaii in the Pacific theater.”2
1. For details, see Valerie Noble, Hawaiian Prophet: Alexander Hume Ford (Smithtown, NY: Exposition Press, 1980) and Paul F. Hooper, Elusive Destiny: The Internationalist Movement in Modern Hawaii (Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1980), pp. 65-104.
2. Honolulu Advertiser, 18 October 1946.
(Note by Paul Hooper)
Extent
8 Linear Feet (eight records center boxes, one 2.5-inch document box)
Language
English
Custodial History
It is not clear how the Pan Pacific union records came to the University of Hawai‘i. The earliest Archives accession records consisting of individual sheets entitled “Archives Accession Sheet” for each collection, show that “Transfer #5” records the transfer of the PPU materials from the Hawaiian Collection in the library to the Archives. The date of this transfer is November 1968. The information on the donor on this sheet is “not known.” The next oldest accession is a summary record of some twenty transfers to the Archives labeled “Archives Accessions.” Transfer #5 here includes the following for donor: “Unknown: Fred Riggs from Satterthwaite estate ?” Upon the archivist’s contacting the Hawaiian and Pacific Collections to request any information from their records, Ms. Joan Hori, the department chair and curator of the Hawaiian Collection, reported back that no accession records for dates as early as the 1960s now exist for the department or for the Hawaiian Collection.
The only Satterthwaite entered into the Deaths section of the Honolulu Newspaper Index between 1963 and 1967 is for Ann Yardley Satterthwaite for whom obituaries appeared on 21 Oct. 1963 in both the Star Bulletin and the Advertiser. Ann Satterthwaite had served as a secretary for the Pan Pacific Union for several years. The “best guess” scenario is that she maintained the records after the demise of the Pan Pacific Union, probably in her home.
- Description rules
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
- Language of description
- English
- Script of description
- Latin
Repository Details
Part of the University of Hawaii at Manoa Libraries Repository