Qualla: Chinatown, Honolulu

Chinatown, Honolulu: Introduction

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Paul Sableman from St. Louis, MO, CC BY 2.0. On January 20, 1900, a controlled burn meant to stop the bubonic plague escaped the firefighters' control and consumed 38 acres of Honolulu. The neighborhood it destroyed was Chinatown, and the people it displaced were overwhelmingly Chinese immigrants who had already endured quarantine, forced evacuation, and the suspicion of a government that treated their community as the source of disease rather than its victim. That Chinatown still exists -- rebuilt in masonry, reinvented through successive generations, listed on the National Register of Historic Places -- is a story not of preservation but of sheer persistence.

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Image: Paul Sableman from St. Louis, MO | CC BY 2.0

Chinatown, Honolulu: Before the Fire

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Janine from Mililani, Hawaii, United States, CC BY 2.0. The area near Honolulu Harbor and Nuuanu Stream was home to fishermen in ancient Hawaii, though little evidence of that era survives. Kealiimaikai, brother of Kamehameha I, lived here at the end of the eighteenth century. One of the earliest foreign settlers, the Spaniard Francis...

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Image: Janine from Mililani, Hawaii, United States | CC BY 2.0

Chinatown, Honolulu: Plague, Fire, and Forced Removal

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit boaski from Oslo, Norway, CC BY-SA 2.0. On December 9, 1899, a 22-year-old Chinese bookkeeper named Yon Chong fell ill. Doctors confirmed bubonic plague on December 11, and Chong died on December 12 -- the first recorded plague death in Honolulu. The Board of Health, granted emergency powers by President Sanford Ballar...

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Image: boaski from Oslo, Norway | CC BY-SA 2.0

Chinatown, Honolulu: Rebuilding in Brick and Ambition

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Daniel Ramirez from Honolulu, USA, CC BY 2.0. The Chinatown that rose from the ashes chose masonry over wood -- stone and brick do not burn the way timber does. Many former residents, unwilling to risk another catastrophe, moved to the suburbs, but others returned and rebuilt. New businesses established themselves, and some ...

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Image: Daniel Ramirez from Honolulu, USA | CC BY 2.0

Chinatown, Honolulu: Wartime Shadows and Postwar Neglect

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Salty Lens (Jonny), CC BY 4.0. During World War II, the neighborhood around Chinatown transformed into a red-light district catering to American servicemen stationed in Hawaii after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Landmarks like Smith's Union Bar and Club Hubba Hubba gained notoriety from the troops' patronage, an...

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Image: Salty Lens (Jonny) | CC BY 4.0

Chinatown, Honolulu: The District That Endures

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kahskydream, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1973, roughly 36 acres of the district were listed on the National Register of Historic Places. By the late 1970s, the Maunakea Marketplace helped draw commerce back to the neighborhood's core. The restored Hawaii Theatre reopened in 1996, anchoring what became known as the Ar...

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Image: Kahskydream | CC BY-SA 4.0