KALAHEO — Playing barefoot football seems like a distant memory for the individuals who took part in the Kaua‘i Barefoot Football League from the late 1930s to the late 1950s, but yesterday was a “blast to talk about the past”
KALAHEO — Playing barefoot football seems like a distant memory for the individuals who took part in the Kaua‘i Barefoot Football League from the late 1930s to the late 1950s, but yesterday was a “blast to talk about the past” at the Kalaheo Neighborhood Center, where the old-timers and their wives gathered for some fellowship and great food.
There’s a lot to be said about these players, who are walking history books. Kalawai Packers head coach Stanley Kawakami and his assistant Bob Yamakawa had a lot to say about their players, who played with not only the absence of shoes, but with little or no padding or the use of a plastic helmet. In the place of a helmet, the players utilized a leather hat, which was so light and comfortable, that it would fit in their back pocket when the game was over.
But the bare feet would be the trademark of the league, which lasted about 20 years. The plantation sponsored teams came from Kekaha, Waimea, Kalawai, Lihu‘e, McBryde, Koloa, and Pono (Kapa‘a).
With the weight limit at a strict 135 lbs., the players would go to all costs to make the weight.
“We would try everything to make the weight, we’d even wear lots of clothing during hot days, so we’d sweat it out and we would take hot baths with certain chemicals in it to try and open up our pours so we would sweat more,” one of the players said.
The individuals who gathered at Kalaheo included Kachi Hiraoka, Hiromo Murabayashi, Toki Koga, Stupe Shimogawa, Mitsu Wakamoto, Shoichi Igarashi, Yasuo Taba, and coaches Kawakami and Yamakawa.
Their wives also made it to the event with lots of stories about their husbands, who seem to bask in their glory days every once in awhile.
“Oh yeah, my husband always tells me how good he was back then and how he was a good player,” one of the wives said.
The young at heart women included, Mary Shimogawa, Itsuko Murabayashi, Nancy Koga, Nobue Igarashi, and Betty Ihara. Ihara, whose husband Eddie participated in the barefoot league towards its end, said that the funniest thing she heard about the league was that some players would use jabong (melon) skins as shoulder pads.
Considering how thin their pads were, a jobong’s skin would make a lot of sense, plus it probably kept the players from the smelling not so good!
The longevity of the league can be attributed to the support of each community around the island and the strong brother-hood the players attained while playing in the league.
“In 1939, we (Kalawai) won the championship and that team was just great, they played together and we had really good players too,” coach Kawakami said. The Packers were also co-champions in 1945 and just a year before that, Kalawai’s Kenichi Shimogawa unanimously won the most outstanding player award. “We all just loved the game of football and we had really good fun in those days, we’d go to games in a Model A and just cruise around after and I really enjoyed that,” one of the players said. Back in those days, the only way the players would travel off-island was by ship.
“That was fun too, we would go interisland on the ship, some of us got sea sick and we’d even just sleep on the deck,” a player said. No league would survive that long today and the staying power of the barefoot football league can be credited to many things, but the big crowds who witnessed the “tough as nails” players had the pleasure of watching history unfold, right before their eyes.
“I dunno, I really think that it was the fact that there were not many things to do, and of course, we had no TV back then, so watching the league seemed like the best thing to do,” a player’s wife said.
TV or not, the barefoot football league and its players not only survived two decades, but they also paved the way for our football players today, who carry on the gridiron tradition — with shoes!
