By Reginald Leuma Schwenke

[Editor's Note: Former Laie resident Reg Schwenke is currently living in Auckland, New Zealand. Right photo: Schwenke, far right, on the front cover of Newsweek Magazine depicting a story about Hawaii's Asian-Pacific cultural diversity.]

The year was 1985. I was home alone, but that moment of relative solitude was irrevocably shattered by a random TV commercial that caught my eye.

The public service spot depicted a montage of captivating but depressing video images of a rusting Statue of Liberty with a weary sounding female voice-over declaring how tired, worn and downtrodden she was. That 30-second commercial touched my heart and soul.

The voice pleaded for public support to raise millions of dollars to repair and restore it to her former glory of a 100 years earlier on Liberty Island in New York harbor. In the intervening century, she had become America's most significant symbol and icon for all immigrants to these United States.

There I sat, a Kiwi-born Samoan who did not complete high school, unexpectedly transfixed and emotionally transformed. I was then Director of Public Relations & Promotions at the Polynesian Cultural Center, Hawaii's most successful visitor attraction. I later left and returned some years later to become a Senior Vice President at the Cultural Center for another five years.

After watching that commercial, I was deeply moved and silently vowed I would do something… anything I could to demonstrate my support to this worthy cause.

I learned that U.S. President Ronald Reagan had enlisted the aid of Chrysler Corporation chairman Lee Iacocca to serve as volunteer chairman of the national fundraising effort to raise $250 million to cover all costs associated with the restoration of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island monuments.

I was not a U.S. citizen at the time, but simply a "Green Card"-carrying immigrant and a grateful beneficiary living the so-called "American dream." I had been blessed with numerous opportunities I would NOT have received in my birth country of New Zealand. I know… because I tried.

Days later, I approached my top boss, [the late] Ralph Rodgers, president of the Polynesian Cultural Center, with a concept I had created seeking his blessing and support to start a nonprofit foundation to raise funds from Hawaii, the U.S port of entry for all Pacific Islanders and Asian immigrants. He agreed as long as I continued to perform my responsibilities for the Center.

To make a long story short, I became president and founder of the Aloha Liberty Foundation, enlisting an impressive board of 40-plus dignitaries that included Hawaii's entire Congressional delegation of two U.S. senators and two Congressmen; Governor George Ariyoshi, Honolulu Mayor Frank Fasi, current Mayor Mufi Hannemann, and top business and community leaders. The Honolulu Advertiser, Hawaii's largest daily newspaper (where I previously worked as a reporter), became our major news media sponsor.

Our foundation raised more than $250,000 — with every cent going directly to the New York-based Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation. Unusually, nothing was kept to cover operating costs or expenses. It was later hailed by Lee Iacocca "as the most comprehensive grassroots fundraising campaign in America."

Though it wasn't planned that way, the most notable of our Foundation events was an elementary through high school essay competition for Hawaii students with the topic, "What the Statue of Liberty Means to Me" in 250 words or less. The winner, selected by Department of Education judges, was Hue Cao, an 11-year-old Vietnamese refugee, who received the grand prize of a brand new Nissan Sentra car arranged through some friends of mine.

Because Hue's family was receiving welfare benefits as her solo mother was raising her children by herself, their federal benefits were jeopardized by her prize and I made sure her story immediately became a national media sensation. How could it not? Federal government threatens to discontinue welfare benefits for refugee solo mother and young children because her 11-year-old daughter wins statewide essay competition detailing what the Statue of Liberty and freedom meant to her and the family.

I contacted the White House and the national media and the matter was eventually resolved with her car sold at auction to the Polynesian Cultural Center above list price and the proceeds set aside in an educational scholarship for Hue. President Reagan even called Hue during our press conference I set up in Honolulu. That required quite a bit of effort and coordination, but it turned out perfectly since it was a surprise to Hue and the assembled media.

Furthermore, I arranged to also have Hue read her winning essay during the global TV broadcast in New York, where we were personally hosted by Donald Trump. In typical Trump fashion, "The Donald" held a press conference at Trump Tower with us to broadcast his involvement as our New York sponsor.

Two other close friends, world renowned environmental artist WYLAND, and Hawaii's foremost fine art photographer [and Hauula resident] Kim Taylor Reece, both agreed to donate an exclusive oil painting and a photographic image they created specifically for our Foundation. We printed them as numbered, hand-signed limited edition lithographs given for donations of up to $1,000.00. The original 6×4-foot oil painting and 4×3-foot photograph were donated for display at the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island foundation museum in New York.

The "Liberty Weekend" grand unveiling of the completely refurbished New York monuments was scheduled for July 3, 1986, as a worldwide television broadcast on ABC TV with an estimated viewer ship of more than a BILLION people.

For the first and only time in history, a special U.S. citizenship swearing-in ceremony was planned as part of the live TV broadcast. Specifically, the governors of all 50 states selected only two eligible persons each to become U.S. citizens in an unprecedented swearing-in ceremony on Ellis Island by the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Warren Burger.

Hawaii's governor selected me and Hue's mother as the Aloha state's two citizenship recipients in New York city. It was a time and series of events I will never forget.

But the most memorable encounter of my Aloha Liberty Foundation activities was an unexpected invitation I received to be part of a VIP airport red carpet receiving line of about 20 people to personally meet and greet President Ronald Reagan and his wife Nancy during a visit to Hawaii.

 

My meeting with U.S. President Ronald Reagan and wife,
Nancy Reagan, with the White House press corps in the background

A White House photographer took photos of each of us, which I later received with a salutation to me by name and signed by President Reagan.

At about the same time, I was contacted to be photographed with others for a front cover photo for a Newsweek Magazine story about Hawaii's Asian and Pacific Island cultural diversity.

"The world needs dreamers and the world needs doers. But above all, the world needs dreamers who do." — Sarah Ban Breathnach

[NOTE: Reg's photos were also included in the book The Samoans, by Frederic Koehler Sutter]