Bailey House Museum Report

The Bailey House Museum stands on the royal Hawaiian ground which was deemed sacred for Ali`i of Maui. The fact that Hawaiian noble chiefs donated this sacred ground to the missionaries to build a mission school adds to the significance of this museum. The building that houses the museum was built on 1833 and functioned as a mission school in its early years. Known as the Wailuku Female Seminary, the school taught many daughters of Maui’s chiefs how to read and write the Hawaiian language, the Christianity and crafts, such as spinning and weaving. Here, two important missionaries in the Hawaiian history, Reverend Jonathan Smith Green and Edward Bailey, lived and taught Hawaiian women. By teaching them how to read and write the Hawaiian language, they contributed greatly to perpetuation of the Hawaiian language and preservation of the Hawaiian culture. By educating Hawaiian women, this mission school significantly improved the social status of Hawaiian women, traditionally treated inferior to Hawaiian men.

The building of the Bailey house is in itself an important exhibit,whose structure showcases the workmanship of both the missionaries and early Hawaiian builders. The middle section of the house was built with large white bricks that illustrate the building style of Hawaiians.

Other important exhibits include many drawings by Bailey, his epic poem Hawaii Nei, many Hawaiian artifacts, such as Koa plates, Kapa cloths, stone tools and fishing lure for catching an Octopus, among many other things.

It was a special experience for me to visit the home of early missionaries and Hawaiian women educated there. I saw and touched old furnitures, beds, a spinning wheel, the oven and other housewares that early missionaries used. During the visit, I gained my understanding of what missionary lives in Hawaii were like. It is marvelous that the house still stands after nearly 2 hundred years. The exhibits well illustrate many aspects of Hawaiian history, including the missionary life and the Hawaiian culture. The exhibits are overall satisfactory, considering the limited space and the surrounding atmosphere. I learned about the Wailuku Female Seminary in my Hawaiian history class which I think played a significant role in improving literacy among Hawaiian women and their social status. The museum is an important heritage to Maui, the island I live in.