​Nishiyama Bus Service and Garage in Wailea

Nishiyama Garage on the Old Wailea Road (see map below) circa 1942 or 1943. Standing on the left bus is Kazumi Hamada, about 14 years old. Next to him is Susumu "Dango" Kimura. On the far right are Shigeo ("Ribs") Nishiyama, about 26 years old, with his two children, Dennis and Roy. Shigeo's father, Gosaku Nishiyama, built the vehicle at far left from a 1933 Dodge truck, creating a 20 passenger bus. The building is the 2nd Nishiyama Garage -- the first burnt down in 1939, and four buses were lost. 

Read the Article!

Hawaii Tribune Herald, March 16, 1941, accessed via Newspapers.com

Former Wailea resident, Kazumi Hamada, now living in Florida, remembers the photo above:

My uncle "Ribs" & cousins Dennis next to him & Roy.  Both uncle Ribs & Roy are gone now. And "Dango" we called him big "Dango" and his younger brother was small "Dango".  The handsome guy sitting on the middle bus you may guess is me.  Don't remember when this photo was taken but seems like I was 13--14 years old at that time so could have been 1942-43? long time ago.  Big "Dango" was one of the bus drivers that transported people from Hakalau to Hilo & back. Of course it included people from Hakalau, Wailea, Chin Chuck, Stable Camp, Kamae Mauka & Kamae Camp.

About that time Uncle "Ribs" started a trucking business hauling & distributing store supplies that retail stores like Yamamoto Store & Fujii Bakery Store in Wailea and retail stores in Honomu town had put in their orders with the wholesalers in Hilo.

Why I am in the photo?  A young kid wanting to do something so I volunteered to service and clean the busses after the business day was over & be parked in the garage ready for the next day.  No compensation for the job but I enjoyed doing the work to help my
uncle. Occasionally I would get a bonus by finding a nickel or dime that passengers had dropped.  Finders keepers, I thought.  A big day was when I would find a couple of quarters while sweeping the bus
floors & wiping the seats. The toughest work was in gassing up the empty gas tank of each of the buses.  There was only one gas pump which was manually operated & held only 10 gallons.  Each bus would take in at least 20 gallons so you can imagine how many times I needed to fill the pump 10 gallons at a time with cranking the pump handle manually. One benefit I got from doing this work was that I self taught myself to drive since all the drivers had gone home after leaving their busses at the garage & someone had to park the bus next to the gas pump nozzle to gas up.  So much of my story!!!

The building was the garage for the busses to be kept while not in business and was located at the bottom of small hill entering Wailea business section & was across the home of the Kishimori family. 

That's my story as best I can remember. 

In the mid 40's WWII was intensifying and Uncle "Ribs" had expanded his trucking business with several trucks in his fleet.  U.S. Marines were returning from battles in the Pacific & had built a large Marine Camp "Camp Tarawa?" in Kamuela.  Coca Cola "Coke" drink was popular at that time.  Uncle had a contract with the only Coke company in Hilo to supply the marines in Kamuela with the drinks.  I now became my uncle's helper to load/unload cases of Cokes from the truck. In January 1945 I became a 16 year old teenager.  The very next day of my birthday Uncle took me to Hilo Police Dept. to get my drivers' license.  On several trips he would let me drive the truck and teach me.  Few days later he let me have a truck to have it loaded up with Cokes for delivery to where the order was for that day.  Most of my deliveries were to small retail stores that opened for business because of the large number of marines that filled the camps.  By now I was one of his paid employee among 5 or 6 others,  I was delivering Cokes as far out as Capt.Cook in Kona. We made deliveries to stores in Kohala too.  And later we were hauling bagged sugar cane pallets to Hilo wharfs for loading onto ships waiting for bags of raw sugar cane to fill their holds. Then came the 1946 Tidal wave that hit the Islands & by then the war had ended. 

End of story...for now...about the Nishiyama buses.