Monday, April 16, 2007

In the last many days I've been busy getting my video editing software fixed up, among other things. I ended up taking off my Roxio Easy Media Creator Version 7, then removing the driver to my video/graphics card, then downloading an updated driver for my video card, and finally loading my Roxio--version 9. Now it seems to work fine, except I get some "jerking" when viewing a couple of the clips in the video for editing timeline. That's to be worked on. I also reformatted my SeaGate 750 gigabyte external hard drive from Fat32 to NTFS which wiped all my backup off, but easy enough to put back. My goal is to store my videos in the external hard drive and bring them to my C-drive to work on.

A great evening on the 12th was at the Bishop Museum where Ben Finney had a presentation on Polynesian Canoes and Navigation. Photo on right. Of course he was one of the founders of the Polynesian Voyaging Society which created the non-instrument navigated "Hokule'a" voyaging canoe for it's epic voyage from Hawaii to Tahiti in 1976. Right now the Hokule'a is sailing on it's voyage from Hawaii to Japan. She has left Yap and the voyagers hope to reach Japan before a typhoon reaches them. I was on one of the voyages from Tahiti to the Marquesas in 1995, a most memorable experience.

Quite a bit of the week was involved in working at CapitolTV and the City Council - televising the meetings. Only three more weeks of the State Legislature session. Today the State Legislature had an impressive ceremony to present the families of all the military who died that were either stationed in Hawaii or were from Hawaii and died in the war, with the Hawaii Medal of Honor. It was a beautiful gesture and had a 21 gun salute in the exterior rotunda. We televised the ceremony with all our crew doing everything in our power to make it professional production. It will be sent to CNN.

When I went out to my car last week I noticed at my townhouse parking lot, that the door key lock on my car had been "punched in" - someone had tried to break into the car using a punch or screwdriver on the door lock during the night. Luckily they didn't get in, so nothing was taken, etc. Today I had it replaced at Saturn for $200 - oh, and they also pulled a nail out of a tire that always seemed to be losing air (since January)... I guess that was the reason!

Our Honolulu County Genealogical Society meeting was Saturday, we meet in a community room in a neighborhood near the University of Hawaii. It is such a fun and interesting group. This month Stan Jones talked about "How to Prepare for your Genealogy Research Trip." He's a very good speaker and he not only brought up considerations for traveling to a research location, but also highlighted ways to sustain and increase membership in the society. I brought the refreshments - one of my favorite parts of the meeting! As usual, after the meeting most of us went to lunch together. This time we went to the Tree Tops buffet way in the back of Manoa Valley - in a tropical rain forest, near Lyon Arboretum.

In my "root-digging" endeavors in the last few days, I've enjoyed getting back into the property deeds or indentures of my Hague family from Iowa. When I was in Des Moines in 2002, with my cousins Dorothy and Don Wilson, we went to the Court House and photo-copied all the Hague deeds we could find in the big old deed books. It was quite a hot, dusty, exhausting activity. Later they transcribed them and Don also drew out the parcels of land as they were described in each deed. James Hague and family immigrated to Rhode Island from England in about 1848. These deeds start from 1855 when James Hague and investment partner Alfred Chatterton, both in Rhode Island at the time, purchased 126 acres in Delaware Township, near Berwick, in Polk Co., Iowa - this is several miles north of Des Moines. I think that John, son of James Hague, and his wife came to Iowa first, with his in-laws, and perhaps started fixing up the land to farm. Later in about 1861 the rest of the Hague family left Rhode Island and arrived in Iowa. They seemed to buying and selling parcels as father, James, died in 1871, then as mother, Eliza Barker Hague, died in 1893. Sons William, John and James Hague inherited the land, and as time went on William and John lived their lives on the land farming. It was tragic that when John died in 1913, William was said to be so distraught at his death, that he hung himself the next day. They are buried next to each other in the Berwick Cemetery. William's sons Arthur and Alfred kept the land, with Arthur and his large family living on the farm and Alfred (my grandfather) living and working in Des Moines as a draftsman and patent attorney. My father, Vincent, spent his most wonderful summers growing up with Uncle Arthur's family, as just another one of the farm kids. I guess that's where I got my love for farm animals, especially horses.