No Angel: A Seaside Mystery

Here's a modest but intriguing mystery I encountered recently and one that I hope you can help me solve. In 1996, our son Ned was stationed in Hawaii, and his sister, her husband Steve, and I visited Ned on Oahu for a week. During the trip, we took a flight to the "Big Island," the Island of Hawaii, for a one-day volcano tour. Near the end of the trip, I snapped this photograph on a black sand beach not too far from Hilo. 

The photo shows the top of a low wall at the beach's edge where someone had spelled out, "I'M NO ANGEL," with small shells embedded in the mortar on top of the wall, and signed the message, "Mae."

Like so many others, when I travel, I often photograph scenic views, but I also look for the small traces of individual lives and ephemeral moments––window displays, graffiti, folk art––odd things left behind as time passes. 

These things feel like connections or even messages from someone else who passed that way earlier. 

The note left in shells on this wall was certainly intriguing and worth consideration. "I'm no angel." One could imagine a number of stories hidden in that message–lost love, despair, repentance, renewal–any number of possibilities come to mind.  

The mystery of the message seemed to float into my head whenever the subject of Hawaii came up. A few years later, on a whim, I searched the internet for that message and found that Mae West had made a movie in 1933 titled "I'm No Angel," co-starring with a young Cary Grant.  Mae West was a box office sensation at the time, and this ribald, satirical comedy about a woman from the wrong side of the tracks was a big hit.  West wrote both the story and the screenplay. The movie also included the song "I'm No Angel."

Is it possible that Mae West visited Hawaii and left this message, or did a movie fan write this while the mortar was fresh? Our volcano tour guide that day told me that he had never noticed it.

My friend Charlie Dahlberg grew up in Hawaii near Hilo on the Big Island but lives in Connecticut now, and I see him once a year or so when we take kayak/canoe river trips with other friends. I asked him about this message from "not-an-angel," but he knew nothing of it. On his next trip to Hawaii, he searched for this rock wall using my vague location suggestions without success. 

I can't pinpoint exactly where I took the photograph. No one else was on the beach when we visited, and no boat docks nearby.  It seems like it was a semi-isolated stretch of black-sand beach east of Hilo.

I have searched using Google Earth and by following along the roads we drove that day. My best guess is that the site was near Keaukaha Beach Park, Hawaii, but that's only a guess. I recently sent Charlie a scan of the photo, and he passed it along to his relatives in Hawaii. Their suggestions are Hilo Bay or the old Pu'umaile Hospital site at the end of Kalaniana'ole.

Did Mae West put this inscription on the wall?  It seems unlikely, as I find no reference on the internet of Miss West ever visiting Hawaii. (However, see later notes below.) If Mae didn't write it, who did? We may never know, but it is a fun little puzzle to work with.  I would be quite happy if someone else could identify the spot and take a current photo of it if it still exists.  A number of strong storms struck this area throughout the years, including a tsunami in 2011, so it's possible that the wall no longer stands.

So, if you blog readers find anything, have any ideas, or know the answer – "... come on up and see me sometime" –  at least by email.

7/2/12 Note: As you can see by the second comment below, there is a good chance that Mae visited Hawaii in 1934, the year after the movie. Did she leave us this note?

3/20/2021:  Here's a shot of a small advertising poster for "I'm No Angel" from the Paramount Theater in Austin from 1933 or 1934. Note the suggestion at the bottom that the "kiddies" might be better off next door at the State Theater. (In the 1960s, when I was a student at the University of Texas, one could catch the outgoing movie at the Paramount and a "sneak preview" of next week's film at the State Theater for one ticket. Heck of a deal for a student!)

"It's better to be looked over, than overlooked." – Mae West