Statewide County HI Archives Biographies.....Iaukea, Curtis Piehu December 13, 1855 - 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
J. Orr jessicanorr@gmail.com September 14, 2011, 1:44 pm

Source: The Story of Hawaii and Its Builders, published by the Honolulu Star Bulletin, Territory of Hawaii, 1925
Author: Edited by George F. Nellist

CURTIS PIEHU IAUKEA, Financial Trustee. A descendant of Hawaiian chiefs, for 
years chamberlain of the royal Hawaiian household and special crown 
representative for the rulers of Hawaii, Curtis P. Iaukea, distinguished 
Hawaiian, has had one of the most eventful, colorful careers of his generation.
  His services to his mother country began when but a youth, when he attracted 
the favorable notice of King Kalakaua, and continued throughout the monarchy, 
through the period of the Revolution and ended only in 1921 when Mr. Iaukea 
retired from the office of secretary of the Territory of Hawaii.
  Perhaps no man in recent Hawaiian history was close to the monarchy as Mr. 
Iaukea. For twenty-one years he had the entrée to the royal palace, remaining 
there in one capacity or another from 1872 until the overthrow of the reigning 
house in 1893.
  Mr. Iaukea was born at Waimea, Hawaii, Dec. 13, 1855, the son of J. W. and 
Lahapa (Nalanipo) Iaukea. His father was district magistrate of Hamakua, 
Hawaii, for many years, and the family was well known on the big island. Mr. 
Iaukea was reared in Honolulu under the direction of his uncle, Kaihupaa, an 
old-time retainer of the chiefs and a personal attendant upon King Kamehameha 
III. As a ward of the government, he was educated under Archdeacon Mason of 
the Anglican Church in Hawaii at Iolani College, then directed by the Church 
of England.
  In 1872, upon the death of King Kamehameha V, who had sent Mr. Iaukea to 
Lahaina to learn sugar boiling, he went to Hilo to live with his sister. It 
was there that King Kalakaua, on royal tour of the islands, saw the young man 
and commanded him to resume his place at the royal palace.
  In 1880 Mr. Iaukea was chief secretary of the department of foreign affairs, 
and in 1883 he was sent as special envoy to the coronation of the Czar of 
Russia. He visited all the royal courts of Europe as Hawaiian envoy, and then 
went to India and Japan to study the immigration question and to open 
negotiations for a labor convention between Hawaii and those countries. In 
Japan his mission was most successful, resulting in the admission of Japanese 
laborers to the sugar plantations of Hawaii. He was collector-general of 
customs in 1884 and chamberlain of the king’s household, and in 1889 was crown 
land agent and commissioner.
  As chamberlain, he had the distinction of taking charge of the royal party 
attending the jubilee of Queen Victoria of England in 1887, the party 
including Queen Kapiolani, Princess Liliuokalani, Governor Dominis and several 
suites, and en route the party visited President and Mrs. Cleveland at the 
White House. Ten years later Mr. Iaukea went to London with the embassy from 
the Republic of Hawaii to the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria, and in 1898 
he accompanied President and Mrs. Dole to Washington, D.C., as secretary and 
military attaché.
  Mr. Iaukea was county sheriff from 1906 to 1908, and served one term as 
territorial Senator in 1912. Since 1909 he has been managing trustee and 
treasurer of the Liliuokalani Trust and business representative for her late 
majesty.
  Among the many orders and foreign distinctions that have been conferred upon 
him are the grand cross and cordon of St. Stanislaus, conferred by the Emperor 
of Russia at his coronation in 1883; officer of the French Legion of Honor, 
conferred by President Grevy of France; grad officer’s cross of the crown of 
Italy; grand cross and ribbon of the Order of Takovo, Servia; jubilee and 
diamond jubilee medals of Queen Victoria; grand officer of the Order of Rising 
Sun of Japan; knight commander of the Swedish Order of St. Olaf, and all of 
the Hawaiian orders and decorations instituted by King Kalakaua during his 
reign.
  Mr. Iaukea is a member of the Chamber of Commerce, Pacific, Oahu Country and 
Honolulu Golf Clubs. In 1877 he married Charlotte K. Hanks of Honolulu and 
they have two children, Mrs. Edward B. Watson of Milton, Mass., and Fred Hanks 
Iaukea, foreman of the Libby, McNeill & Libby pineapple cannery at Kalihi.


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