Gaughen's Emporium
In 1979, I returned to Hawaii with a small bankroll, some new skills, and 5 disassembled hot tubs, which I took straight out to Keaau to enlist Tim Gaughen in selling them out of his now burgeoning "Gaughen's Emporium".
Over the next 8 years I worked in Puna on all sorts of projects, mostly small houses, some elaborate ones, Greenhouses, water tanks and a water tank tower, one complete house for Tim Gaughen in Volcano, and I nearly doubled the size of the house he lived in, also in Volcano. Like many of my friends who made a similar living in Puna, if I didn't have anything else to do, was passing through Keaau, or got off work early, I would stop in to the Emporium.
There was always a Gaughen style sit-com going on around whatever scheme, or proposition, used goods of all kinds bought and sold that day, it was predictably hilarious. There are endless stories about what happened I encourage all the storytellers to hurry up and get them written down before any more is lost.
The store always had some repairs to be done, roofs leaks to fix, old termite eaten buildings to be shored up. These buildings were very old having been built for the simple needs of a Sugar mill town in the 1930's. Tim and his friends who had worked underneath the adjoining Emporium, Akiyama Store and my former store from 1976, had found old artifacts, including old opium bottles in the soft silt down there. So when I had the time, I would do the jobs and take credit in the store for my pay, and when I did anything under there, I kept an eye out for anything poking out of the dirt. Sure enough I found this broken cast iron gizmo, I didn't find out what it was until a long time later. It had a thick, once razor sharp but long since broken blade that the iron mechanism levered down to chop something I didn't know what. The cast iron base is partly broken.
The casting on the handle has a character that's riding it. He has a funny little hat, a flask sticking out of his coat pocket, and with one hand, he's thumbing his nose. I called it "Nuts to You" until with the advent of Google, when it wasn't hard figure out what it was and to find one just like it.
In the days of old, tobacco came to a merchant as a bundle of dry leaves, so a proprietor that sold tobacco would have one of these things to chop off whatever portion his customer might desire. It's a tobacco chopper! So that's one artifact from old Keaau.
When Johnny expressed interest in learning how to surf, we went down to the Emporium and loaded up every used surfboard he had in the place, about six of them. The bill came to $95. We took them home patched up their dings, cut one broken board down into a belly board and tried them out. We each came up with one we could ride.
So I had revolving credit in the store and all kinds of interesting things passed through, like the piece of furniture that I found the Deli sign in. Whatever Tim might have in the store, I could afford it. It came with the means to pay for it. And I enjoyed working on the Emporium and hanging out with Tim and Kathy and the whole Keaau crowd.
One of those purchases was this very understated reclining nude on a tropical beach. It is signed "Likeke" but I have never been able to find anything about the artist. I just refer to it as Likeke. It hung over my bed in Ainaloa for years and in everyplace I lived since. She clasps her fingers over her head in a subtle mudra.
The other treasured work of art I traded my labor for is "Moon Goddess Shooting Stars Over the Horizon of the Universe"...Kind of a long name but when you see the painting, that's exactly what it is. It was painted by Robert Orlin Woodward, known on the Big Island as Woody. Google that name, you'll find 100 of his popular paintings, many of local island scenes: an oceanside shack, with a outrigger canoe and an old beat-up pickup truck in the yard, coconut palms, surf in the background, etc., in a kind of cartoon style. You can recognize it in this painting on my wall, but the subject matter is quite different than the rest.
I do believe The Moon Goddess is his masterpiece. It's in his familiar style but describes an extended fantasy. It's got a lot going on. There are two types of tree that he had invented, and a key plant that he imagined, depicted in three stages of growth; first a low spread of purple leaves, then with a small blossom that matures on a long stem to where the round white spiked ball of a shooting star flower is presumably plucked by the Moon Goddess and launched from her bow over the horizon of the universe.
There are several black cats, I'm not sure I've found them all. There is a giant below the bluff she's standing on, holding the golden sword at the center of the scene. The water flows over his shoulder on to his upturned hand to cascade through his fingers to the beach below.
There are constellations in the dark sky with outlines, centrally a dragon. On the left is the outline of the same upturned hand as the giant's, on the right perhaps the carapace of a sea turtle.
The smoke of the volcano contains two facial profiles, shot through by the trail of the shooting star. And of course there is more. There is the suggested springing of her bow, the trail of the meteor's pathway, her boots, her costume, her headdress and there is her.
For this I paid my design and labor to solve a troublesome problem with the Emporium's roof. There was a triangular space between two of the buildings. And a floor had been built for walking between the two structures. The problem was when it rained (it rains long and hard in East Hawaii), and the roofs dumped a lot of water down into that area. Several attempts were made to install gutters and downspouts, but each time the configuration was overwhelmed by the deluge.
I designed a big sheet metal triangle that spanned the whole space, with 8 inch high walls that channeled the rainwater into a single large downspout. We had a local sheet metal shop build it, I installed it and went home with the Moon Goddess. The fix never leaked a drop in the heaviest downpours.
To pay tribute to Gaughen's Emporium and to sell a few t-shirts, I created a drawing that was pretty much a simplified but accurate rendition of the storefront, with Tim holding a broom out front. Now here's something that is for sale at Uncle John's Garage Sale. I've got a few left over, and I have the original screen so I can always print more.
Not for sale. Uncle John's Garage Sale is just the name of the book.
© 2022 John Oliver
All Rights Reserved
mail@unclejohnsweb.com
In 1979, I returned to Hawaii with a small bankroll, some new skills, and 5 disassembled hot tubs, which I took straight out to Keaau to enlist Tim Gaughen in selling them out of his now burgeoning "Gaughen's Emporium".
There was always a Gaughen style sit-com going on around whatever scheme, or proposition, used goods of all kinds bought and sold that day, it was predictably hilarious. There are endless stories about what happened I encourage all the storytellers to hurry up and get them written down before any more is lost.
The store always had some repairs to be done, roofs leaks to fix, old termite eaten buildings to be shored up. These buildings were very old having been built for the simple needs of a Sugar mill town in the 1930's. Tim and his friends who had worked underneath the adjoining Emporium, Akiyama Store and my former store from 1976, had found old artifacts, including old opium bottles in the soft silt down there. So when I had the time, I would do the jobs and take credit in the store for my pay, and when I did anything under there, I kept an eye out for anything poking out of the dirt. Sure enough I found this broken cast iron gizmo, I didn't find out what it was until a long time later. It had a thick, once razor sharp but long since broken blade that the iron mechanism levered down to chop something I didn't know what. The cast iron base is partly broken.
The casting on the handle has a character that's riding it. He has a funny little hat, a flask sticking out of his coat pocket, and with one hand, he's thumbing his nose. I called it "Nuts to You" until with the advent of Google, when it wasn't hard figure out what it was and to find one just like it.
When Johnny expressed interest in learning how to surf, we went down to the Emporium and loaded up every used surfboard he had in the place, about six of them. The bill came to $95. We took them home patched up their dings, cut one broken board down into a belly board and tried them out. We each came up with one we could ride.
So I had revolving credit in the store and all kinds of interesting things passed through, like the piece of furniture that I found the Deli sign in. Whatever Tim might have in the store, I could afford it. It came with the means to pay for it. And I enjoyed working on the Emporium and hanging out with Tim and Kathy and the whole Keaau crowd.
One of those purchases was this very understated reclining nude on a tropical beach. It is signed "Likeke" but I have never been able to find anything about the artist. I just refer to it as Likeke. It hung over my bed in Ainaloa for years and in everyplace I lived since. She clasps her fingers over her head in a subtle mudra.
I do believe The Moon Goddess is his masterpiece. It's in his familiar style but describes an extended fantasy. It's got a lot going on. There are two types of tree that he had invented, and a key plant that he imagined, depicted in three stages of growth; first a low spread of purple leaves, then with a small blossom that matures on a long stem to where the round white spiked ball of a shooting star flower is presumably plucked by the Moon Goddess and launched from her bow over the horizon of the universe.
There are constellations in the dark sky with outlines, centrally a dragon. On the left is the outline of the same upturned hand as the giant's, on the right perhaps the carapace of a sea turtle.
The smoke of the volcano contains two facial profiles, shot through by the trail of the shooting star. And of course there is more. There is the suggested springing of her bow, the trail of the meteor's pathway, her boots, her costume, her headdress and there is her.
For this I paid my design and labor to solve a troublesome problem with the Emporium's roof. There was a triangular space between two of the buildings. And a floor had been built for walking between the two structures. The problem was when it rained (it rains long and hard in East Hawaii), and the roofs dumped a lot of water down into that area. Several attempts were made to install gutters and downspouts, but each time the configuration was overwhelmed by the deluge.
I designed a big sheet metal triangle that spanned the whole space, with 8 inch high walls that channeled the rainwater into a single large downspout. We had a local sheet metal shop build it, I installed it and went home with the Moon Goddess. The fix never leaked a drop in the heaviest downpours.
To pay tribute to Gaughen's Emporium and to sell a few t-shirts, I created a drawing that was pretty much a simplified but accurate rendition of the storefront, with Tim holding a broom out front. Now here's something that is for sale at Uncle John's Garage Sale. I've got a few left over, and I have the original screen so I can always print more.