Events
Spanish Hawaiian Heritage Association Conference 2025
The conference, held September 6–7 at UC Davis, was a tremendous success. Hundreds of attendees —including scholars, community members, and descendants — came together to reflect on the journey from Spain to Hawai‘i to California. The program included a range of keynote and featured speakers, among them California State Assembly Majority Leader Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, Professor Lucía Aranda of the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, and the newly appointed Consul General of Spain in San Francisco, Carlos Medina Drescher, alongside several other distinguished voices from academia, public service, and the community. Attendees also enjoyed an archival gallery of family keepsakes, film screenings, lectures, workshops, and cultural performances of music and dance, which filled the days with learning and celebration.
Your attendance helped elevate the gathering, highlighting the enduring contributions of Hawaiian Spaniards to our communities, from labor in the fields and canneries to service as educators, leaders, and public servants today. The energy from the conference will remain a lasting part of our collective memory.
Your participation in the conference made it a huge family gathering, we say together: Hola, Aloha, and Hello — three words, three cultures, one legacy carried forward.
With deep appreciation,
Beverly Baker, President
Kristen La Follette, Conference Organizer
Hawaiian Spaniard International Conference 2022
The Spanish Hawaiian Heritage Association was formed in 2023, after the inaugural International Congress of Spanish Emigrants to Hawaii and California (1880-1930).
57 Spanish Hawaiian descendants from Arizona, California, Oregon, and Pennsylvania attended the conference. This initial congress was held by Club Universo Extremeño in Jarandilla de la Vera, Coria and Cáceres and Malaga from 10- 26-2022 to 11- 4-2022.
It recognized the 8,000 Spanish emigrants who embarked from the port of Malaga and Gibraltar between 1907 and 1913 bound for the sugar cane plantations of the Hawaiian Islands on the ships; SS Heliopolis SS Orteric SS Willesden, SS Ascot and SS Willesden. Due to difficult conditions on plantations, many families later left for California. Their descendants still live in the state, and across the US.
Primary researchers, and conference organizers were Manuel Trinidad of the University of Extremadura, and Miguel Alba Trujillo, of the University of Malaga.