OF THE PEOPLE
The Life
The front of the newly renovated Pa‘auilo Store, an establishment that began as a plantation store, was taken over by the Saito family in 1949 and still serves the small Hāmākua coastal community.
Miriam S
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“My father-in-law used to work for the plantation store before the company leased it to him,” said Miriam Saito, wife of the late Earl Saito, Torao’s son. He began work in his father’s business after returning from the Navy. “It was so big aito e Earl S back then, it was more like a The lat department store [of today]. We sold clothing and food; there was a meat market and we had two gas pumps.” The lively 73-year-old great-grandmother has worked in the family business for the past 42 years. (She did “odds-and-ends” jobs beginning in 1959.) She continues, telling how Earl and his father used to drive down to Hilo to pick up the store’s supplies that came in by freight (a tradition that would eventually be part of Earl’s sons’ memories as well) and describing the freshness of the meat market. “The meat came from my father-in-law’s cows. He raised them on Hawaiian Homeland pastures, and every Sunday he would go riding and pick out the cows to slaughter. On Monday he would pick up the slaughtered meat,” she reminisced. “The area was booming back then. People from all the neighboring towns like `Ō`ōkala would come here, but after the plantation closed everything went down.” Earl took over the store from his ailing father and, in the 1970s, he transformed the business to Earl’s Snack Shop, sensing a need in the community to follow a trend and revive the declining market. He sold hamburgers, French fries, milkshakes, sandwiches, hot plates and cold drinks. From there the business began to grow over the years, with the help of Earl’s sons, Mark and Miles, and son-in-law Schoen Maekawa. In 1981 Earl’s also started selling bentos, the typical Japanese home-packed meal, which boxes rice, a chicken or fish option and a pickled or cooked vegetable, and they soon became a lunchtime trademark favorite for locals. Maekawa, who, according to Saito, made delicious sushi plates and rolls for his family at home, invented Earl’s Bento Roll. By taking all the elements of the bento plate, he rolled them all together with nori into a sushi-like roll.
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t might just be that a simple bento roll is what has kept the Saito family of Hāmākua in business all these years, and helped their family store to recently reach its 63rd anniversary. You may have heard about those bento rolls at the Pa`auilo Store. Maybe you read a brief paragraph in a guidebook suggesting you make Pa`auilo Store—a small storefront on highway 19 along the Hāmākua coast—a stop on your way from Waimea to Hilo. Perhaps your friend lives nearby in one of the picturesque towns that dot the cliff-side community and frequently feeds his appetite with the Korean chicken bento. Whatever serendipity brings you there, the homemade roll is worth the drive, and so is the story behind the longtime family-operated store. While any small family business will find it hard to stay competitive these days, it may be that the long-lasting traditions valued by both shop owners and patrons along the East side have been a contributing factor to the sustainability of this mom-and-pop shop. There are many historical general stores like Pa`auilo Store scattered around Hawai`i Island—still run by generations of families who started in business years ago. Grandchildren and great grandchildren of the original Japanese, Chinese, Filipino and Portuguese businessmen now stand behind the counter, stock shelves and make deliveries. Unfortunately these stores—the ones that have been in business for more than 50 years—are the last of their breed. It’s all the more reason to preserve their existence, continue their stories and provide a living example of how the foundations of hard work, dedication and community commitment can help perpetuate the culture and lifestyle of the Hawaiian people, of all ethnic backgrounds. From the early to mid-1900s, when sugar plantations along the Hāmākua coast were at the height of operations— immigration, labor and commerce were thriving up and down the East coast of Hawai`i Island. In the sleepy town of Pa`auilo—situated less than 10 miles south of Honoka`a— packed together along the small roads in the old village, there existed two grocery stores run by two Filipino families, another third store, a vegetable stand, two restaurants and a number of other small businesses. It was during this time, in 1949, when business partners Torao Saito and Pedro Eugenio took over the Pa`auilo Store from the Theo H. Davies Co. sugar plantation, which had operated the small grocery store along the highway.
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