Readers will discover unanticipated uses as they explore the treasures in this book. Some people will use it to gain an acquaintance with the Hawaiian culture in all its aspects; others will use it to enhance their familiarity with the language. It will be an aid to oratory and poetry, prayer and preaching, writing and teaching.

Colonel Harold Winfield Kent accepted the presidency of the Kamehameha Schools in Honolulu at the end of World War II, following service as Chief of the Universal Military Training Section of the War Department Special Staff. During his 16-year term as president he initiated the schools' formal sequence of courses in the Hawaiian language. In recognition of his outstanding administrative service to the Kamehameha Schools and to the Hawaiian people, he earned election as president emeritus, was honored with the Ke Alii Pauahi Award, and was named consultant to the trustees of the Bishop Estate. In 1981 he was granted an honorary degree by William Penn College in Oskaloosa, Iowa, the town where he was born. Colonel Kent passed away in 1990.

"This Treasury offers a wealth of information for everybody.... [It] proves that a surprising number of Hawaiian words from our receding past still help us to express ourselves in the maddening present." --from the Foreword by O. A. Bushnell