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The facts, checked
Everything on this page traces to a documented source. If a figure you have seen elsewhere is not here, that is usually deliberate.
Boilerplate
One paragraph, safe to print
Duke Paoa Kahanamoku, 1890 to 1968, was a Native Hawaiian swimmer who won five Olympic medals, three gold and two silver, across Stockholm 1912, Antwerp 1920 and Paris 1924. Surfing, heʻe nalu, is Native Hawaiian and centuries older than him; he carried it from Waikīkī to the world, and Australia dates its surfing to his afternoon at Freshwater Beach in December 1914. Elected Sheriff of the City and County of Honolulu in 1934, he served thirteen consecutive terms until the office was abolished in 1961. He is remembered as Hawaiʻi’s Ambassador of Aloha.
Fact sheet
The record
- Full name
- Duke Paoa Kahinu Mokoe Hulikohola Kahanamoku
- Born
- 24 August 1890, at Haleʻākala in Honolulu, Kingdom of Hawaiʻi
- Died
- 22 January 1968, Honolulu, aged 77
- Olympic medals
- Five. Three gold and two silver, across Stockholm 1912, Antwerp 1920 and Paris 1924
- Australia
- Surfed Freshwater Beach, Sydney, on 24 December 1914, on a board he shaped from local sugar pine. Australia dates its surfing to that afternoon
- Newport Beach rescue
- 14 June 1925. Brought eight men alive off a capsized fishing boat on his surfboard
- Civic office
- Sheriff of the City and County of Honolulu. Elected 1934, thirteen consecutive terms, office abolished 1961
- Title
- Hawaiʻi’s Ambassador of Aloha
- Statue
- Jan Gordon Fisher’s nine-foot bronze, dedicated at Kūhiō Beach on 24 August 1990, his hundredth birthday
- Rights
- Name and likeness held by Mālama Pono, Inc.
For the record
Figures we do not print
Some widely repeated claims about Duke are not printed here because they fail verification. He was elected Sheriff in 1934; the earlier election year that often circulates is contamination from the Los Angeles Games, where he was an alternate. He won five Olympic medals, not six. He carried surfing to the world; he did not invent it, and Australia has documented rides earlier than his. Quotations attributed to him circulate widely without sources, and we do not print them.