The Ethnic Studies Oral History Project of the University of Hawaii recorded and preserved interviews with 250 older Hawaiian working people and selected the 12 most representative life narratives to make up this book. According to an introduction, the 12 were chosen for their portrayal of everyday life and work, their articulation of attitudes and feelings, and the documentation of major historical events as experienced and perceived by them. Representing the values and lifestyles of different communities, the personal narratives comprise four chapters. The oral histories of Ida Kanekoa Milles, with an Hawaiian upbringing in isolated Nahiku, Maui, and Nelson Ah Hoy Chun, a rice and taro farmer in the Big Island's Waipio Valley, are contained in Chapter 1, "In the Country." Eleanor Heavey, from Honolulu's working-class district, Kakaako, and Usaburo Katamoto, who built boats on the waterfront, follow in Chapter 2, "In the City." Chapter 3, "On the Plantation," features Lucy and Seraphine "Slim" Robello, a second-generation sugar plantation family; Adam Holmberg, a locomotive brakeman; Cresencia and Pedro Ponce, participants in the 1924 Filipino Strike; and Emigdio Cabico, a plantation store clerk. Violet New Zane, a storekeeper in Lower Paia, Maui, and Osame Manago, the owner of a hotel in Captain Cook, Kona, Hawaii, are featured in the concluding chapter, "In the Small Town." A glossary of non-English words used by the interviewees is appended. (KH)