Watumull: The Indian family that built a business empire in Hawaii from scratch

In 1915, 29-year-old Indian businessman Jamandas Vatumul arrived on the Hawaiian island of Honolulu with his partner Dharmadas to set up a retail outlet for his import business.

The two registered Vatumole and Dharmadas as a business on Honolulu’s Hotel Street, selling exotic goods such as silk, ivory handicrafts, brassware and other items from the East.

Dharmadas died of cholera in 1916, prompting Jamandas Vatumal to send his brother Gobindram to manage the Honolulu store while he took care of his business in Manila. Over the next several years, the brothers would travel between India and Hawaii while consolidating their business.

Today, the Watumole name is ubiquitous on the islands – from textile manufacturing and real estate to philanthropy in education and the arts, the family is tied to Hawaii’s rich history.

The first South Asians to move to the island from India, they are now one of its wealthiest families.

“Slowly, we did just that,” Jamandas told A local Hawaiian publication in 1973.

Born in pre-independent India, Jhamandas was the son of a brick contractor in Hyderabad, Sindh province (now in Pakistan). The family was educated but not rich. After an accident left his father paralyzed, Jamandas’ mother bought his way to the Philippines where he began working in textile mills. In 1909, he It started His mercantile business with his partner Dharmadas in Manila.

According to their grandson JD Vatumal, Jhamandas and Dharmadas moved to Hawaii after their Manila business declined when the United States occupied the Philippines and cut ties with foreign businesses.

Their air business was renamed East India Store when Jamandas’ brother Gobindram took over. In the following years, the business expanded into a large department store with branches in several parts of Asia as well as Hawaii, says SAADA, a digital archive of South Asian American history.

In 1937, Gobindram built the Watumule Building in Honolulu’s Waikiki neighborhood for the company’s headquarters. According to SAADA, the multi-million dollar business had expanded to 10 stores, an apartment house and various commercial developments by 1957.

The Star-Bulletin newspaper describes the store’s products – clothes, lingerie, brass and teak curios – as imbued with “romance and mystery” that transport one to “distant lands and enchanting scenes”. are

As Hawaii emerged as a popular destination for wealthy tourists in the 1930s, brightly colored shirts with island motifs called ‘aloha shirts’ became a souvenir.

According to Hawaiian textile and pattern expert Dale Hope, Watumull’s East India Store was one of the first stores on the island to carry designs with Hawaiian patterns.

The designs were first acquired by Gobindram in 1936 from his artist sister Elsie Jensen.

“Instead of Mount Fuji, he would have had Diamond Head instead of Koi [she’d] Instead of cherry blossoms, there are tropical fish. [she’d] Gardens and hibiscus and all the things we know here,” Hope. said.

Nancy Shafer writes in the book Hawaiian Shirt Designs that these designs were sent to Japan where they were handblocked onto raw silk.

“These subtle floral patterns, modern and dynamic in concept, were the first Hawaiian designs to be produced commercially,” Schaeffer notes.

“They were sold by the boatload and exhibited as far as London,” says William Davenport in the book Paradise of the Pacific.

Gobindram’s daughter Leela told Hope that Watumull’s Waikiki store was visited by American movie stars Loretta Young, Jack Benny, Lana Turner and Eddie “Rochester” Anderson.

“More and more we’re finding that Whatmole has become synonymous with Hawaiian fashion,” Rose Whatmole. said In a 1966 interview in the Honolulu Star Bulletin.

The Watumulls soon bought the Royal Hawaiian Manufacturing Company, where the first matching family wore aloha. created.

Despite their success, it would take decades for the Vatumole brothers – Jamandas and Gobindram – to receive US citizenship. Hawaii Business Magazine, his early years in the country were marred by discrimination and difficult immigration laws wrote.

In 1922, Gobindram married Ellen Jensen, an American, whose citizenship was revoked under the Cabal Act for marrying an immigrant who was ineligible for US citizenship. Jensen would work with the League of Women Voters to reform the law and regain citizenship in 1931.

Gobindram would become a citizen in 1946 when a law allowing Indians to acquire citizenship through naturalization was enacted.

Meanwhile his brother Jamandas spent most of his time between India and Hawaii.

SAADA says that during the 1947 partition of India, the Watmul family moved from Sindh to Bombay (now Mumbai), leaving most of their property behind.

Jamandas son Gulab eventually arrived in Hawaii to work in the family business and become its head.

In 1955, the brothers demerged the business with Jhamandas and Gulab keeping its retail arm while Gobindram’s family took over its real estate section.

Jamandas moved to Hawaii permanently in 1956, a few years after the death of his wife and one of their sons, and became an American citizen in 1961.

Over the years, the family has invested in the welfare of India and its people. Eliot Robert Barkin writes in Making It in America that Gobindram was an active member of the Committee for Indian Independence and frequently visited Washington to support the country’s cause for independence.

Gobindram’s home in Los Angeles was “a Mecca for people concerned with Indian independence”, notes Sachandra Nath Pradhan in his book India in the United States.

The Vatumole Foundation sponsored a series of lectures at American universities in 1946 by Dr. S. Radhakrishnan – who later served as President of India.

Gobindram’s wife was Ellen. Instrumental In bringing an International Parenthood Conference to Delhi in 1959, which resulted in the establishment of the country’s first birth control clinic.

The family’s philanthropy has included and continues to fund educational institutions in Hawaii and India, endow Honolulu-based art programs, and promote Indian-Hawaiian exchanges.

Many of the Watumull brothers’ grandchildren now work in and around Hawaii.

Over the past few years, as the family business focused on real estate, the last Vatumul retail store closed in 2020. Company Thank you Its customers “for years of good business and good memories”.

Watumull Properties bought a 19,045 square meter (205,000 square foot) market in Hawaii last year. JD Watumull, Company President; said“The Hawaiian Islands continue to be our family’s focus today and into the future.”

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