Born and raised on Kaua‘i, Frank Hiroshi Kurihara (b. 1916) hired on about 1934 with his cousins as paniolos to the Robinson brothers — Sinclair, Aylmer, Selwyn and Lester — the owners of Ni‘ihau, who at that time ran ranches
Born and raised on Kaua‘i, Frank Hiroshi Kurihara (b. 1916) hired on about 1934 with his cousins as paniolos to the Robinson brothers — Sinclair, Aylmer, Selwyn and Lester — the owners of Ni‘ihau, who at that time ran ranches from Moloa‘a to Ha‘ena.
They paid Frank and his cousins $40 a month for putting up fences, planting grass, clearing brush, breeding mares, castrating and branding young bulls and rounding up cattle.
Lean, tough, and inured to physical hardship, the Robinsons were stern taskmasters who spoke Hawaiian fluently.
One day, while Lester was roping a bull, his horse slipped and fell, and Lester found himself stuck in the saddle on the ground unable to move with one leg pinned under the horse.
Frank and other paniolos jumped off their horses to assist him, but Lester’s three brothers stopped them. Insisting on seeing their brother free himself, they just sat in their saddles and told him to “Get off your horse, Lester!” And he did.
At roundup time, most of the cattle would hide up in the mountains and the paniolos would flush them out with the aid of dogs. The best of them was Frank’s cousin Alan’s dog, Tiger, who Lester took an interest in. On roundup mornings, the first thing Lester would ask was “Ai hea ka Tora?” (“Where’s Tiger?”). He even offered Alan $300 for the dog, but Alan would not part with him.
Another of Frank’s duties was breeding Jackson, the jackass, with mares in estrus to produce mules, which are valued as sure-footed pack animals, but being hybrid are sterile and cannot reproduce.
Frank would back the mares into a special sloping pit, so that their hindquarters were just high enough for the smaller Jackson to perform his sole function on the ranch.
