Bishop Museum Honors Navigator, Kamehameha Schools CEO
The 10th ANNUAL BERNICE PAUAHI BISHOP AWARDS DINNER will be heldJuly 12, 2008 on the Great Lawn at Bishop Museum. Reservations are $300 and up per person and may be made by calling (808) 848-4170; or emailing angela.britten@bishopmuseum.org.
Download a table reservation form to printout here.
Nearly 1000 people attend the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Awards Dinner each year making this the largest and most lavish event in Honolulu. The event honors selected individuals who have made life-long commitments to Hawai‘i and its people. Under the starry night, there’s live entertainment, gourmet cuisine, and behind-the-scenes tours—including a peek inside Hawaiian Hall while it undergoes a $21 million restoration, and a celebration of excellence in philanthropy and leadership.
Bishop Museum’s major fundraising event honors two long-standing community members for their devotion and outstanding civic leadership and who exemplify the spirit and purpose of the Museum’s founder Charles Reed Bishop. This year’s honorees are famed Polynesian navigator Pius Mau Piailug and Kamehameha Schools Chief Executive Officer Dee Jay Mailer.
Piailug is from the Micronesian island of Satawal in the state of Yap. He was the navigator on the first voyage of the Hawaiian voyaging canoe Hokulea. It was the first voyage in over 600 years navigated without instruments on an ancestral Polynesian sea route that crossed over 2,300 miles to Tahiti. The success of Mau’s navigation sparked pride in the Hawaiian and Polynesian culture and brought about the renaissance of voyaging, canoe building, and non-instrument navigation that has continued to grow and spread across Polynesia, reaching to the far corners of Rapanui and Aotearoa.
Piailug, a master navigator, trained the next generation of navigators including Nainoa Thompson. His teaching is a legacy that will not soon be forgotten. Born in 1932, Piailug is one of the last navigators left in Micronesia. He was taught at the knee of his grandfather and at 18 was initiated as a master navigator in the Weriyeng School of Navigation through a sacred ceremony called Pwo. This school, one of only two schools of navigation left in Micronesia, began on Pollap Island.
Piailug will be this year’s Robert J. Pfeiffer medalist. The medal is conferred each year on an individual who has demonstrated exceptional dedication to the advancement of maritime affairs and the perpetuation of maritime heritage in Hawaii and the Pacific. The medal commemorates the life and deeds of Robert J. Pfeiffer who was honored as a symbol of community devotion and civic leadership. Past awardees have included Senator Daniel Akaka, Michael Chun, Patience Bacon, Dr. Yoshiko Sinoto, Ph.D., J. W. “Doc” Buyers, Robert Krauss, Myron “Pinky” Thompson, Thomas Henry Gentry, and Walter A. Dods, Jr.
Kamehameha Schools Chief Executive Officer since 2004, Dee Jay Mailer will be this year’s Charles Reed Bishop Medalist. Mailer served as Chief Operating Officer of the United Nations and supported the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. During her one-year tenure, the foundation raised more than $3.4 billion and committed more than $1.5 billion to 92 developing countries. She also served as Chief Administrative and Operating Officer and Senior Vice President of National Contracting and Claims Best Practices for Health Net of California, a health insurance program serving more than 2.2 million California residents.
In 1995, Mailer was named chief executive officer for Kaiser Permanente. Under her leadership, the program instituted an organizational culture that built and sustained employee, physician, and health plan member satisfaction rates higher than any other Kaiser program in the United States. Her program was named one of the top ten HMOs in the nation by U.S. Business News and World Report and Newsweek.
The Charles Reed Bishop Medal is conferred upon individuals who best exemplify the spirit and purpose of Charles Reed Bishop, founder of Bishop Museum. Former recipients have included W. Allen Doane, Richard T. Mamiya, Walter A. Dods, Jr., Bert A. Kobayashi, James C. Mcintosh, The Honorable George R. Ariyoshi, Edwin L. Carter, Governor Benjamin J. Cayetano, C. Nainoa Thompson, Edison Hiroyuki Miyawaki, M.D., Alexander Cooke Waterhouse, Sr., Herb Kawainui Kane, Senator Daniel Akaka, Alexander Atherton, Edward L. Kamae, Robert J. Pfeiffer, Albert C. Smith, Gladys K.A. Brandt, Abraham St. Chad Piianaia, Isabella Abbott, Ph.D., Kenneth F. Brown, Hampton L. Carson, David Twigg-Smith, Alexander Spoehr, John Dominis Holt, S. Dillon Ripley, John D. Waihee, III, and Senator Dan K. Inouye.
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