She’s a Survivor: Virginia Isbell of West Hawai‘i

By Karen Valentine

I’ve been dead three times,” said former Hawai‘i State Legislator and Hawai‘i County Councilwoman Virginia Isbell. “I survived because I’m a rotten kid—a stubborn Italian. I learned if you don’t fight, you don’t get. After that I’m not afraid of anything. You’ve got to be yourself, be true to who you are. I just tell the truth about things. A lot of people can’t handle that. If there’s something wrong, tell it like it is.”

These statements perhaps encapsulate Virginia’s approach to a lifetime of service to the community, fearlessly tackling contentious personalities and difficult issues while tenaciously holding onto goals throughout years of stalling bureaucracy to accomplish community benefits.

One of many such community benefits is the new campus in West Hawai‘i, the Hawai‘i Community College Pālamanui, University of Hawai‘i. Allocation of land for this project was begun by Virginia and colleagues in the Hawai‘i State Legislature during her second term as Representative for West Hawai‘i from 1988 to 1996; classes finally began this fall after a 25-year odyssey.

“I started the ball rolling for the Pālamanui campus,” she says. “We took 1,000 acres when I was in the legislature. I said ‘That’s going to be a university.’ It took awhile.”

In addition to the University campus, the Pālamanui development plan includes a residential community with recreational spaces and a town center.

Over three decades of major development in West Hawai‘i, there was hardly anything Virginia didn’t have her hand in.

“I wanted to equalize the benefits to this side of the island. I spent 16 years in the Legislature. Almost everything that’s around here I had my fingers in.”

During that time, she laments, “We couldn’t get anywhere because of Hilo,” meaning the entrenched voting block of the island’s larger populated area. The population has been steadily growing on the west side since then. She has been an advocate for affordable housing in conjunction with real estate developments.

Virginia was born in 1932 in Montana to an Italian immigrant father and an American wife, the 11th of 12 children. There were harsh conditions there, and families often lost children to diseases.

“When I was five years old, I had scarlet fever, which in those days was fatal,” she said. “Children all around us were dying. I can remember going out of my body. I died in my bed and the doctor said to my mother, ‘Bessie, prepare for a funeral.’ After he left, I was lying there and started moving. I remember my Mom screamed. I said I’m not going. I wanted to tell people what happened to me but I couldn’t get them to believe me. I was angry because I couldn’t talk about it. I think I’ve been angry ever since.”

The second time Virginia “died” was from bulbar polio, a paralytic form of polio that affects the brainstem and spinal cord, attacking the muscles that control breathing, often resulting in asphyxiation. Again, she said, smiling, “They didn’t know what to do with me, because I was supposed to be dead. My back collapsed. I survived. I guess I was a reject.”

The condition has left her with a stooped posture and breathing strictly from her diaphragm. This practice probably enhances her ability to blow the pū (conch shell), which she often does for public ceremonies.

“I blow a lot of hot air.”

Yet again, when a teenager, Virginia says she died from bacterial spinal meningitis.

No one can say that she isn’t a survivor! At the age of 83, she still swims and participates in Hawaiian outrigger canoe paddling. She has survived 12 campaigns for public office: nine for the State Legislature, one for mayor and two for County Council. She lost five times out of the 12.

In 1953, Virginia married her husband of 62 years, Donald Isbell. They had two sons in Montana prior to moving to Hawai‘i in 1960.

“We were determined to leave Montana because of the snow. We had two little boys, and we almost lost a little kid in the snow. He was just learning to walk. I took the boys out for a sled ride where my husband had just shoveled the walk. There were big piles of snow on each side. I turned briefly to help the older one, David. When I turned back around, I couldn’t see the younger boy, Daniel. I didn’t panic and told myself, I know he has to be here. Soon I saw a bit of his little boot wiggling in the snow. I dug around it and there he was, face flat in the snow and struggling. He could have died. That is what made us move. I said I’d had it.”

Don Isbell was a schoolteacher, and they learned that Hawai‘i was offering living quarters in cottages to entice teachers to move here. They landed in Pāhoa and moved into a cottage that rented for $8 per month. Two daughters, Mahealani and Iwalani, were born there, and after four years, the couple moved to South Kona and a job for Don at Konawaena High School. One more son, Richard, was born on the Kona side.

With the low rent for the cottages, she says, “We could save money to buy a house nearby after eight years.” The Isbells still live in that house today.

It was only five years ago that Don retired at age 80 after a marathon 56-year career of public school teaching. He taught social studies and began band programs at Pāhoa and at Konawaena and Kealakehe Intermediate schools. He was also instrumental (literally!) in starting the Hulihe‘e Palace Band and Hawai‘i County Band.

Virginia had completed college degrees in library science and medical secretary training in Montana. She chose to primarily be a stay-at-home mother until the children were grown.

Her earliest experience in community service, she says, came with her daughters in Girl Scouts. She worked to improve the Girl Scout Camp Kilohana on Saddle Road.

“My first bid for the Legislature was when the kids left.” Virginia won eight straight House terms from 1980 to 1996, the last four as a Democrat.

“I was eight years a Republican and eight years a Democrat. I couldn’t get anything done as a Republican so I changed parties. I was good at working with the other legislators and saying that we could benefit by doing these things together. I would give my reasons so it would make sense. What we do is what we do together,” she said.

“In 1996 I decided to leave the legislature and run for mayor. I lost by three points to [Stephen K.] Yamashiro. There’s so much going on in the other side of the island. There’s still never been a mayor from this side.”

In 1998, 2000, and 2002 she tried again for state office and lost: so then she ran for County Council, winning in 2004. In 2006, she lost by only nine votes in the primary for Council, amidst political controversy and infighting. In 2008, Virginia ran against Josh Green for State Senate and lost in the primary.

Even today Virginia is ready to pick up the banner and fight for what she feels is right. In 2011, she wrote a letter to the editor at West Hawai‘i Today, defending the proposal to build a new county building for West Hawai‘i. This letter included a good description of her district’s progress throughout the years. For newcomers to the island, she told it like it was in a letter entitled, “Taking responsibility:”

“I could tell [that] the people of West Hawai‘i desperately needed a facility for county government, and now, 50 years later, we have it.” Speaking about a detractor, she says, “He should have lived here when all county department heads and offices were located in Hilo. If you wanted to get a permit for any building, pay your taxes at the tax department, get a license for your car, etc., you had to go to Hilo.”

The Civic Center is now a reality.

“All Kona had was a small police station and fire station in Captain Cook.”

“And oh, yes, there was a only a secondary road from Waimea to Kona and a one-lane road south of Captain Cook to Nā‘ālehu. There was no Queen Ka‘ahumanu Highway, just a simple road to Honokōhau Harbor, a one-lane road from Kailua Village to Keauhou, and only one road in and out of Kailua Village—Palani Road,” Virginia said.

Reports Virginia, ”Over the years, we have constantly struggled with the need to have county services in West Hawai‘i.”

There is another side to Virginia Isbell, one that loves music and gives of herself.

In 1999, Virginia was honored as an “Ageless Hero” in the category of “Creative Expressions” by Soroptimist International of Kona, a group that was formed in 1971, where she is a past president. In the organization’s newsletter it was explained, “While her legislative contributions to the community are many, Virginia was honored for her creative talents, specifically, her love of music and performing. Her musical abilities were recognized and cultivated at a very early age. She began studying classical piano at age five. Today she is quick to share her talents in the community she loves so much by volunteering to perform… at special events and more. Besides being a pianist, Virginia Isbell also plays the [baritone] horn and sings. In 1976, she helped start the all-volunteer Hulihe‘e Palace Band, and she has performed in the Hawai‘i County Band as well as a barbershop quartet…. Those of us who know Virginia know that she is an ‘Ageless Heroʻ in all areas of her life.”

These days her calendar is full from giving piano lessons and playing at a weekly performance at Life Care Center in Keauhou.

“I give free piano lessons. That’s the thing I enjoy the most, because I see people, children especially, who would never have a chance to take piano lessons. I teach four adults plus children, including four in one home. I used to do it for money when the kids were little. Now I said it’s time to give back.”

Virginia asks for payment in the form of handmade gifts, and she saves them all.

“They have to make it themselves,” she says. “I’ve been doing this over 30 years and I have plastic boxes full of them.”

She has had many other volunteer positions over the years, including serving on the Kona Crime Prevention Committee. She still takes photos for police department events, in addition to blowing the pū for community blessings, grand openings, and groundbreakings. She served on the boards of directors of the Kona Family YMCA and the Kona Soil and Water Conservation District, helped found the West Hawai‘i Fund and served as an officer, director and volunteer of Kai ‘Opua Canoe Club.

The Isbells’ two daughters, Mahealani and Iwalani, live on O‘ahu. Iwalani is a designer of swimwear. Son Richard “Rick” manages Tavarua Island Resort in Fiji, to which he commutes from Huntington Beach, CA.

Son David lives and works in Ocean View and Daniel was tragically killed in a car accident. The Isbells’ have five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Virginia enjoys swimming and paddling with Kai ‘Opua and Keauhou Canoe Clubs. In a news clipping from 2012, Virginia Isbell’s name was listed as part of the Team Kupuna in the Lavaman Waikoloa Relay triathlon race. She swam the 0.9 mile swim leg in ‘Anaeho‘omalu Bay in just under an hour.

Virginia’s favorite poem, which she has memorized, is entitled “It’s All in the State of Mind” by Walter D. Wintle:

If you think you’re beaten….. you are
If you think you dare not….. you don’t
If you’d like to win, but think you can’t,
It’s almost sure you won’t!

If you think you’ll lose, you’ve lost,
For out in the world we find,

Success begins with a fellow’s “will” ….
It’s all in the state of mind.

Life’s battles don’t always go
To the strongest or swiftest man,
But soon or late, the one who wins,
Is the one who thinks he can!!! ❖

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