President Mike Latham ’86
In the Oahuan of 1926, the year in which this Punahou Bulletin was first published, the School’s graduating seniors reflected with pride on their many achievements. They excelled in the Damon Speech Contest, in theatre, choir, and songwriting. They vanquished rivals in track, football, tennis, and basketball. They thrived academically, joining what was then a trend in which over ninety percent of Punahou’s graduates went off to college at schools that would be familiar to today’s students as well, including the University of California at Berkeley, Pomona, Stanford, UCLA, Oberlin, Amherst, Wellesley, Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Yale, Wesleyan, the U.S. Military Academy and the U.S. Naval Academy. They also displayed a deep attachment to the lands of Ka Punahou and contemplated the future of their beloved school. “When this illustrious Class of 1926 shall have graduated,” they asked, “and the arches and roofs of Pauahi and Bingham Halls will no longer echo and re-echo to their joyous shouts and studious sighs, and when the school will cease trembling from the rumblings of their mighty minds, just what will become of Punahou?”
Reading those words a century after they were written, I find myself wondering what those seniors would think if, through some miracle of time travel, they were to walk across our campus today and encounter the Class of 2026. In some respects, they would find a dramatically altered world. One hundred years ago, in the pages of Ka Punahou, Liberty House advertised “Punahou Sweaters” available in V-neck or circle-neck, “in Punahou blue with gold stripes across the chest. Get one now and have it for the first football game.” While the school colors remain the same, fashions have clearly changed. In 1926, Punahou enrolled 1142 students and the school offered 70 full or partial scholarships to support them. In 2026, Punahou is the largest independent K – 12 school on a single campus in the United States, with an enrollment of 3,770 students, nearly one fourth of whom receive financial assistance. While the Class of 1926 included Hawaiian, Chinese, and Japanese students alongside the children of American and European missionaries, planters, and bankers, we are proud of the fact that today’s student body much more closely reflects the wide cultural and ethnic diversity of the surrounding community to which Punahou belongs.
The curriculum was quite different as well. A century ago, boys could pursue courses in agriculture and board at Punahou’s “farm school” on the grounds of the former Honolulu Military Academy campus in Kaimukī. In 1926, the only foreign languages offered for study were French and Latin, with the latter required for students pursuing the “Eastern College Preparatory” course of study. Today, our students choose among Chinese, French, Hawaiian, Japanese, and Spanish. One hundred years ago students might include mechanical drawing or machine shop in their curriculum, and today we harness the power of artificial intelligence in our design technology and engineering courses. Like the graduates of a century ago, we still may choose to build and fabricate by hand, but we can also do so with analytic and computing power that our predecessors could never imagine.
In other respects, however, I am struck by strong elements of continuity. In addition to the clear commitment to a deep tradition of academic excellence, our school’s distinctive sense of place and history shines through. Alongside our chapel services and programs, a century-old issue of Ka Punahou recounts an Academy assembly devoted to Hawaiian music and hula, closing with the singing of Hawai‘i Pono‘ī “in which the whole school joined enthusiastically.” In a similar vein, Punahou’s Handbook for the 1925 – 26 academic year marvels that “through some kindly influence, intangible yet potent and persistent, Punahou has always been and is now distinguished for the happiness of its student body. Perhaps it is the locality, the lovely surroundings and buildings, the spirit of democracy among students and faculty or, not improbably, the guardian spirits of those who in the past gave their best to this fine school and so earnestly prayed that it might endure as a power for good in the land.”
As I reflect on our school’s history, that central theme of our distinctive Hawaiian and Christian heritage and our commitment to the wider community becomes a constant refrain. One hundred years ago, Punahou’s Handbook discussed the hala tree as emblematic of our students: “storms may lash it unmercifully, yet in vain … as the tree grows older and its responsibilities increase, more braces are put forth at exactly the right angle …” Mary Kawena Pukui, the former Punahou teacher and foremost scholar of Hawaiian history and culture, went on to define Punahou as “a Spring of Wisdom.” “As the hala tree stands firm through wind or storm,” she wrote, “so shall the children of this school stand strong and brave, through joy and sorrow. And just as the hala tree has many uses, so shall these children be useful to Hawai‘i.” In the words of our current mission statement, Punahou remains “our home to dream and discover our purpose and kuleana to Hawai‘i and the world.”
Today, as children of Ka Punahou, we are the beneficiaries of people who came to Hawai‘i from all over the world and found a home and community in service to this school, its students, and its ideals. This central feature of our school is both our inheritance and our responsibility. Among all the institutions I have ever been a part of, this is the one that had the most profound impact in shaping me as a person, enabling me to become who I am today. As a graduate of the Class of 1986, approaching my own 40th reunion, I feel that very strongly and I expect that many of you do as well. At the most profound level, all of us want to be part of a legacy, something that will endure long after our brief time here has run. How fortunate we are to support the education of future generations of students who will, like their forebears, continue to lead lives of compassion, conscience, and commitment, in service to the wider community of which they are a part.
I hope that you enjoy this special celebratory issue, marking the Punahou Bulletin’s century of storytelling. I also invite you to reflect on the deeper meaning of your own Punahou story, and the way that you might help those who follow us go forward to write their own. As Punahou’s president, I am honored to join you in that transformative work. With your help, I know that the best is yet to come.