{"id":15844,"date":"2015-04-01T18:33:31","date_gmt":"2015-04-01T23:33:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/?p=15844"},"modified":"2021-12-21T18:26:43","modified_gmt":"2021-12-21T23:26:43","slug":"mainland-hawaii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.howderfamily.com\/blog\/mainland-hawaii\/","title":{"rendered":"Hawaii on the Mainland"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Reader Joel expressed mild surprise at a Hawaiian-inspired spot in Utah that I’d referenced. I’m mentioned the town of Loa named by a former resident of Hawaii honoring the towering mountain Mauna Loa. He wondered about “names out of place<\/a>” in general while I continued to fixate on Hawaii. I complemented his comment with Diamondhead, Mississippi. It’s a locale that crept into articles like Just Keep Turning<\/a> and Residential Airparks<\/a> because I have family there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Diamondhead, Mississippi<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Early Morning in Diamondhead, Mississippi<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Nobody would ever confuse the bayous and tidal estuaries of the Mississippi Gulf Coast with any part in Hawaii. Diamondhead<\/a> (the Mississippi city) certainly looked nothing like Diamond Head<\/a> (the iconic volcanic cone in Honolulu spelled with a space between Diamond and Head). First of all Mississippi had a flat shoreline giving way to gentle rolling hills farther inland at Diamondhead. That’s why Hurricane Katrine gave it such a wallop during its epic storm surge (my family remembers<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One needed to understand that Diamondhead arose recently from the minds of developers. They wanted to attract retirees to the Gulf Coast and make a lot of money. The theme served as a marketing gimmick by a company with the same name. They weren’t going to call it Mudbug or Mosquito even though the coast had both in abundance. No, they wanted it to sound like a tropical resort. As the Hancock County Historical Society<\/a> explained,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The Federal Highway Act of 1956 created the interstate highway system, and construction began on I-10 through the Mississippi Gulf Coast making Hancock County accessible to people from a wide area… It was in this environment that the Diamondhead Corporation, a large corporation with resort developments in several states, began development operations in coastal Mississippi. It purchased six thousand acres of property adjacent to I-10… The first land sales [in Diamondhead] were recorded in 1970.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Diamondhead has been an incorporated city only since 2012.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Aloha, Oregon<\/h2>\n\n\n\n