Sportsmania reigns on Kaua‘i over Labor Day weekend

LIHU‘E — Kaua‘i kept in the tradition of Labor Day over the weekend with football games being offered by the Kaua‘i Interscholastic Federation, the Kaua‘i Pop Warner Football League and the Kaua‘i Youth Football.

Labor Day was celebrated Monday in the United States, with families celebrating with picnics, barbecues, road trips and sports events, states Shelly Palmer of the digital leadership website.

Referring to Forbes magazine’s “10 Labor Day Facts” by Steve Odland, the football season starts on, or around, Labor Day and many teams play its first game of the year during the Labor Day weekend.

Kaua‘i High School opened the football weekend, surviving a 24-7 win over Waimea in the first regular season KIF football game, preceded by a 26-25 nail-biter where the Kaua‘i Junior Varsity held off a tenacious Kapa‘a JV in the waning seconds of the game. Waimea High School did not field a JV team for the 2012–13 KIF football season.

Pigskin mania continued Saturday when officials of the KPWFL celebrated its 50th anniversary with a special parade featuring the five associations, which make up the league and its Jamboree ceremony paying tribute to the contributions made by longtime supporters of Pop Warner football on Kaua‘i.

“It was really nice to see all the old timers, like Stupe Shimogawa, Maxie Moreno, Marilyn Yamaguchi, Dick Ueoka and others, come together and be back on the football field,” said Lenny Rapozo, director of the county’s Department of Parks and Recreation and son of longtime football official Leo Rapozo.

“We lost Harold Naumu before the Jamboree, but when I saw him, he cried when he found out the Pop Warner program wanted to recognize him.”

While football games between the Mitey Mite, Junior Pee Wee and Junior Midget teams unfolded in the day-long festivities, the Kaua‘i Youth Football program hosted a Saturday evening game between the Intermediate division Kapa‘a Junior Warriors and the Kaua‘i Bulldogs at Hanapepe Stadium, the Bulldogs prevailing, 27-14 despite Kapa‘a coming back with two second-half touchdowns.

Brad Hiranaka, commissioner for KYF, said the boys will be involved in a host of games featuring teams from O‘ahu and the season ending with a weekend of football on O‘ahu.

“We will take in the Hawai‘i High School Athletic Association football championships Friday, play a game on Saturday before taking in the University of Hawai‘i game against the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, play a game on Sunday and potluck before coming home,” Hiranaka said. “That’s a lot of football.”

Odland, on the Forbes website, states Labor Day is the last blast of the summer vacation season, now a federal holiday with most government offices, schools and businesses closed.

Labor Day started in 1872 in Toronto, Canada and quickly made its way to the United States as a significant demonstration demanding rights for workers.

During the late 1800s, the average American worked 12-hour days and seven-day weeks to eke out a basic living, the Forbes website states. Children as young as 5 and 6 years old worked in factories and mines.

The eight-hour day was firmly established in 1916 with the passage of the Adamson Act, the first federal law regulating hours of workers in private companies.

The first U.S. Labor Day was celebrated on Tuesday, Sept. 5, 1882 in New York City, coordinated by the Central Labor Union, which hosted a parade of about 10,000 workers who took unpaid leave to march and enjoy a concert, speeches and a picnic.

Oregon was the first state to make Labor Day a holiday in 1887, states the Forbes website, and on June 28, 1894, Congress passed an act marking the first Monday in September of each year a legal holiday in the District of Columbia and the territories.

Labor Day celebrates the contributions and achievements of the 155 million men and women who are in the U.S. workforce.

Visit www.forbes.com for more information.