Hilo Hattie

When you mention Hilo Hattie to “old timers,” many will smile and recall her signature comic hula, “The Cockeyed Mayor of Kaunakakai.” There is little connection to Clara Inter, the Waipahu Elementary School teacher. But she was both.

The dry facts are these: Hilo Hattie was born Clarissa "Clara" Haili on October 28, 1901. She married Theodore Inter in 1930; they were divorced in 1946. In 1950, she married bandleader Carlyle Nelson.

In the midst of her life, Clara legally became “Hilo Hattie” in 1941, danced her comic hula to sold out audiences all over the mainland, and her radio show performances were heard in most of the English-speaking world.

So, what did she do during the war? Let’s backtrack a bit.
In 1936 Clara performed with the Royal Hawaiian Girls Glee Club at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, the Waialae Country Club, and on occasion she danced at the then-new Kodak Hula Show. She continued teaching during the day and entertaining at night. In the mid-1930’s she went to a teacher’s convention in Portland, Oregon. On the ship home, Clara first performed a new song by Don McDiarmid’s called, “When Hilo Hattie Does the Hilo Hop.”

The story goes that McDiarmid wrote the song for a sultry young dancer, and that two years later, when he took over at the Royal, that dancer was slated to perform, but feel ill right before show time. That night Clara was performing with the Girls’ Glee Club, and McDiarmid reluctantly asked her to step in. She did ---and was called back for five encores. With that, Clara became “Hilo Hattie” and her signature over-sized muumuu, lauhala hat and her rascal comic hula.
Her next mainland trip was in 1939 where she performed at the St. Regis Hotel in New York to a sold out engagement. Life was good for Clara; then she came home to the news that the Territory’s Board of Education was giving her an ultimatum. S he had to choose between teaching and performing. She opted for teaching, and went back to school to complete her teaching degree—those were here intentions.

But the war was brewing. In 1940, Harry Owens, hired Clara to perform with his orchestra and took her to Los Angeles, where he got her in the movies. In fact, it was when she was signed to perform in Song of the Islands, that Harry Owens insisted she legally change her name and officially become Hilo Hattie.

Owens and Clara were headed home when war broke out. The two were asked to stay in San Francisco to entertain at the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco, where many sailors were departing for the Pacific. And for the duration of the war, they had a 26-week contract at the hotel and their show was broadcast to over 600 radio stations and Armed Forces Radio. Owens and Hattie spent all their “spare time” on the road doing benefit shows for the Red Cross, USO, hospitals and military bases.
And what about that Hilo Hattie clothing line? Well, in 1971, while she was at the, the Merry Monarch Festival, Evelyn and Richard Margolis of Kaluna Hawaii Sportswear approached her for permission to design a line of 'Hilo Hattie' clothing. Kaluna, already a million dollar business, purchased a manufacturing plant in Hilo, bought the rights to Hilo Hattie’s name, and, as they say, “The rest is history.”

Clara H. Nelson, “Hilo Hattie,” and her husband spent their last years in their home in Kaaawa. In 1978 she was presented with the first Sidney Grayson Award, for lifetime achievement at the Na Hoku Hanohano Awards. The next year, at age 77, Hilo Hattie died She is buried in the Punchbowl Cemetery (Clara H. Nelson, Section U, Grave 653-A, interred on Dec. 17, 1979).

Hilo Hattie, the well-loved aunty with a lauhala hat tied on her head.