The records of the Hawaii Public Theater cover the years 1974-1981. The majority of records are paper textual files, most are photocopies. Some budgets are handwritten on ledger sheets.

Series I. Materials on the initial planning and proposal for the formation of a Hawaii Theatre Festival can be found in Series I, "Legal Files," the historical series created for this collection.

Series II. The series called "Hawaii Theatre Festival" is the most substantial of the series created by the organization. The first sub-series contains files of the Board of Directors. These records include minutes, correspondence, materials distributed to the Board, memos, and policies and procedures.

The second sub-series is composed of administrative files, including annual reports, correspondence, and memos. Press releases and public serive annoucement files are included in the administrative sub-series. They appear to be the work of the organizationʻs first artistic director and executive manager, as well as its first Board President, Mr. Kenneth Kanter. His resignation in May 1979 may be a reason for the scarcity of administrative information subsequent to 1979.

Most extensive in size are the files relating to financial matters, and these comprise the third sub-series. There are files of requests for assistance and funding applications to foundations, requests for support to legislators and other government leaders and agencies, and letters of endorsement to support such appeals. Additional financial files consist of budget and tax information.

Within the sub-series, records are arranged in series by type of file (minutes, correspondence, financial) or subject, usually in some order of priority. Within individual files the records are usually arranged in reverse chronological order, which appears to have been utilized by the organization and is maintained herein.

Series III. "Repertory Theater" is the third series, as identified by the organization with the use of blue adhesive labels on the files. It includes correspondence, a file on driverʻs licenses, and a pending file. It is difficult to determine the relationship of this series to Series II, that of the Hawaii Theatre Festival.

Series IV. "Membership and Subscriptions" is the fourth series, as identified by the organization with yellow adhesive file labels. It includes correspondence on memberships of the director.

Series V. "Plays" is comprised of the files on plays produced and not produced, and include stage manager reports, park permits, production, budgets, letters, and books related to each play.