National Register Listing

Bond District

a.k.a. Father Elias Bond District

SE of Kapaau off HI 27, Kapaau, HI

The Bond District in Kohala, Hawaii includes a well-preserved homestead established in 1841 by Boston missionary Reverend Elias Bond, a church with outer structures completed in 1855, and a school complex founded in 1872 by the Reverend Bond. The forms of these buildings come directly out of the rural New England building tradition, which has been adapted to the local climate and building materials. The buildings display a variety of construction techniques ranging from field stone and burned coral masonry, to heavy timber construction with mortise and tenon joints, to double and single wall frame construction.

Bond was born in Hollowell, Maine on August 19. 1813. He graduated from Bowdoin College, Maine in 1837, and from Bangor Theological Seminary, Maine in 1840. He was ordained in Hollowell, Maine on September 30, 1840, and married Ellen Mariner Howell in the same year. The Bonds had 10 children, all of them born in Hawaii. Reverend Bond died in 1896 and his wife in 1881.

The Reverend and Mrs. Bond sailed with the Ninth Company of Missionaries from Bos- ton and settled at Kohala, Hawaii. Bond arrived in Honolulu in May 1841. He observed the construction of Kawaiahao, a coral block church. Reverend Isaac Bliss, an elderly missionary to Kohala, had already completed the main house (Building #1) of what is now known as the Bond House compound when Bond arrived in Kohala in June 1841.
The impression of Kawaiahao Church was perhaps still fresh in Bond's memory, since his immediate addition to his home employed stonework. Fieldstone and burned coral mortar were used in the construction of the wash house, archway and walls, and foundations of the woodshed and carpenter sheds. Kalahikiola Church, dedicated on October 11, 1855, was also a stone-and-mortar structure.

Rev. Bond built a doctor's office after the return of his son, Dr. Benjamin Bond from medical school in the later part of the 19th century, and a cottage was added in 1889 at the east end of the main house for Dr. Bond and his wife. In addition, a small shed that had been erected some years before to shelter a carriage and single-horse stall was utilized by Dr. Bond for his horse and carriage for emergency calls.

Toward the turn of the century, the Bond family's affluence was mirrored in the construction of servant's quarters, a kitchen, and a bathhouse. During the early 1900s, the Bonds built larger stables and a blacksmith shop, a power plant for electricity, and a rock-crushing facility, Dr. Bond used the rock-crusher to provide material to pave the road to the Kohala Girl's School.

After the death of Dr. Bond in 1930, the buildings were maintained by a special trust fund which terminated in 1968. Since that time a family corporation has helped finance the care of the estate. Kenneth Lyman Bond, great-grandson of Reverend Elias Bond, resides in Hawi, not far from the compound, and attends to the upkeep of the compound.

The state of preservation of the building and the completeness of the furniture, housewares, books, tools, and general furnishings of the Bond Houses makes the total compound unique and of priority importance for preservation.

Kalahikiola Church is one of the few large stone churches still in use today. For almost a century, Kalahikiola Church was known as a special house of worship for those of Hawaiian ancestry. Although almost all ethnic groups have been represented in its congregation for the past 23 years, many people still call the church the "Hawaiian" Church.

Two church structures preceded the present Kalahikiola (literally translated as "life-giving sun"*) church in North Kohala. The first Congregational "church building", a thatched structure erected in Nunulu in 1837, was destroyed by a storm in 1844. The second thatched structure built on the present Kalahikiola site, also was demolished by high winds in 1849.

The destruction of Bond's second thatched church in 1849 moved him to model his new church after the impressive Kawaiahao church which he had seen earlier in Honolulu. For the next six years there unfolded one of the great sagas of the Hawaiian Protestant mission. Bond would not permit construction to begin until all building materials had been accumulated. Special wood, ohia, was cut from Kalahikiola mountain, from which the church acquired its name. Timbers and stones were dragged or carried over ravines and streams. In his journal, Bond wrote that sand for mortar was carried from the beach at Kawaihae, a distance of more than 23 miles.

The church, completed in 1855, became the most impressive structure in North Kohala at that time. For the next 95 years, its services were in Hawaiian and, during that period, the congregation was almost entirely Hawaiian or part- Hawaiian. In 1950, Japanese, Caucasian, and Chinese, who had long maintained native language churches, joined the predominately Hawaiian congregation at Kalahikiola.

The church is a distinctive structure that has been in continuous use for 122 years and still serves an active congregation. The building suffered damage during the May 1973 earthquake on the Island of Hawaii and the parishioners diligently are seeking funds for repair work. There is concern about the repair and maintenance of the church to preserve its historic integrity.

Although Bond's primary concern was spiritual, he also assisted his parishioners with more secular pursuits. He started the Kohala Sugar Company as a means of providing employment so as to keep the urban migration down to a minimum and thus keep the people on the land. When the sugar company later began to prosper, Bond received annual profits as large as $48,000, all of which he gave away, including large anonymous gifts to the American Board. Many of the gifts were for mission work among both Hawaiians and Chinese in Hawaii.

The Kohala Girl's School was Reverend Bond's last major undertaking. For 30 years prior to the 1874 founding of the Kohala Girl's School, Reverend Bond ran a boarding school for boys. His decision to build a separate facility to educate native women in Christian living and housekeeping was made in 1872. He hired a white carpenter, D. F. Sanford from nearby Waimea, and assisted by his boarding school boys cleared the grounds and built the stone foundations for the first building. The school formally opened on December 3, 1874, with an enrollment of 28 women with Miss Lizzie Lyons of Waimea as principal. There were only two buildings on the grounds, the Main Building (#29) which housed dining, sleeping, and all educational facilities, and a washroom and bathroom building which stood apart from this Main Building. The washroom was later destroyed and the lumber was used to build stables.

In 1878, due to over-enrollment, the School Hall was built. This building was later converted into a chapel. In 1884, the Carriage Building was erected for laundry purposes as well as for carriage storage. In 1891, additions on the second floor of the Main Building were built. In the School Hall, two new classrooms for teachers and three rooms on the ground floor were added to the south side of the building.

In 1916, the Auxiliary Dormitory was constructed to house twelve students and one teacher. An Industrial Building was completed in 1921. This building was used for home economics as well as for a dining hall in later years. In 1955, the school stopped functioning. During the summer of 1958, its large classroom was converted to a chapel. For a period of time, the area was used for conferences, retreats, and camping grounds. The buildings are now unoccupied and are in poor condition. They are maintained by the present owner, the Hawaii Conference of the United Church of Christ, who obtained this property in trust from the Reverend Elías Bond.

Local significance of the district:
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1978.