In 1882, King Kalākaua was still on the throne when 10 of the most prominent men in Honolulu gathered at the Rev. Dr. C.M. Hyde’s house at 122 Beretania St. That night, they formed the Honolulu Social Science Association, a civic discussion group made up of dozens of highly influential community members that has continued to meet regularly for more than 140 years.
The 10 who had been “hand picked as leaders of opinion,” as a history of the organization puts it, got together with the aim of “promoting each other’s advancement intellectually and socially,” as well as “the higher interests of the Community generally.” The constitution they adopted that night remains the foundational document that still guides the Social Science Association today.
With the exception of two years during World War II, the group has met once a month every year from October through June — “the season,” as they’ve called it since the beginning — to learn about and debate the most important events of the day. Members have included governors, mayors, elected officials, businessmen and merchants, doctors, lawyers, judges, clergymen, academics and newspaper publishers. Most of them are names we all recognize as shaping the history of these islands…