The missionaries and Kawaiahaʻo Church (1820s to 1840s)

American Protestant missionaries arrived in 1820 and, with Hawaiian aliʻi, created a written Hawaiian alphabet, schools and printing presses; within a generation Hawaiʻi had one of the highest literacy rates in the world. Their landmark is Kawaiahaʻo Church in downtown Honolulu, built from 1836 to 1842 with about 14,000 coral blocks cut by hand by Hawaiian divers.

• Arrival: the first company arrived aboard the brig Thaddeus at Kailua-Kona in April 1820, just after Kamehameha II ended the old kapu system.
• Literacy: missionaries and Hawaiian scholars developed the Hawaiian alphabet and printed the first Hawaiian-language materials in 1822; Hawaiians embraced reading and writing rapidly.
• Kawaiahaʻo Church: about 14,000 coral slabs were quarried from offshore reefs by Hawaiian divers. Called 'Hawaiʻi's Westminster Abbey,' it hosted royal oaths of office, weddings and funerals; Queen Liliʻuokalani lay in state here in 1917, and King Lunalilo is buried in a tomb on the grounds.
• Visit: 957 Punchbowl Street, Honolulu. Sunday services include Hawaiian language. Next door, the Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site (553 S. King St.) preserves the missionaries' 1821 frame house, the oldest in Hawaiʻi.
• The missionaries' influence was mixed: they promoted literacy and Western law, and some descendants later became powerful in business and in the 1893 overthrow.

Sources: Wikipedia: Kawaiahaʻo Church · Images of Old Hawaiʻi: literacy was sought by the people

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