Gladys LAUGHLIN

Gladys LAUGHLIN & Medford Ross KELLUM junior

Marriage (1925) between Medford Ross KELLUM junior (d. 1992) and Gladys LAUGHLIN (d. 1990)

HONOLULU STAR BULLETIN, SATURDAY, MAY 30, 1925

Miss Gladys L. Laughlin bride of M. R. Kellum

“Gladys Laughlin and Medford Ross Kellum, Jr., were married Tuesday May 26, 1925, as the culmination of a romance which began on a trip to the South Seas last year. The marriage ceremony was performed at St. Clement’s church by the Rev. Maitland Woods in the presence of a few close friends and members of both families, and took place a few hours before the steamer Sonoma sailed for San Francisco.

For the ceremony the bride was dressed in a white crepe gown, a white hat, and carried a shower bouquet of gardenias

The young couple will return to the South Seas on June 20,/1925/ and there on the island of Moorea, 18 miles from Tahiti, build a home. Young Kellum is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Medford Ross Kellum, Sr., owner of the Kaimiloa, a palatial yacht in which they spend a large part of their time. The wedding was first set for September but was changed to May so that the bride could supervise the erection of her island home”.

SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE , JUNE 2, 1925

Honeymoon to S. F. Culminates Romance Begun on Yacht Trip Through Tropics

“Gliding leisurely through the tropics for seven months, the snow white yacht “Kaimiloa for one happy couple aboard, lived up to its name of “enchanted bird.” The host to the 17 guests was M. R. Kellum, Jr., son of a Hawaiian sugar magnet. Likewise he was the Romeo of the sea romance, and the Juliet was Miss Gladys Laughlin. They arrived in San Francisco yesterday on the Oceanic steamer “Sonoma,” for the honeymoon is just over and they are purchasing furniture for their new home.

“It’s on the island of Moorea, and is very hard to find on the maps,” said young Mrs. Kellum. “There’s no place like Moorea,” explained her husband, “for it spells home to us. It is 18 miles from Papeete in the Society Islands.”

Young Kellum picked out his home while in the South Seas—3000 acres of virgin land in Moorea. His father will stock the plantation with blooded cattle. When the Kaimiloa goes down again she will resemble the “Mayflower” and “Noah’s Ark” combined, for she will convey both the household goods and the animals to the island “of hearts desire.”

PUBLICATION DE LA SOCIETE DES OCEANISTES, p.241

“Tahitiens – Répertoire bio-bibliographique de la Polynésie française”,

« KELLUM Medford. - Colonist. His father arrived in French Polynesia on the Yacht Kaimiloa, which he owned and which brought to Tahiti the scientists of the Bishop Museum, among them, Kenneth Emory who brought to light the maraes of Tahiti.

Bought in 1924, at Opunohu, in the bay of Papetoai, Moorea, the land comprising his ranch, previously belonged to the Societe Commerciale de l’Oceanie, taken over by the French government during the First World War. It consists of a vast agricultural domaine, formed of an ensemble of parcels of land, hills of low altitude, of valleys, all having an area approximately 1300 hectares. The domaine is thus described in its announcement of sale:

“A third of the property cultivable is planted in coconut trees, numbering approximately 11,600. The actual amout of copra is around 25 tons. It could easily be doubled with more laborers. A copra dryer with furnace is built in the middle of the coconut plantation. It is capable of drying 280 kilos per day. The property is consists of a vast pasturage. The part that is enclosed in fencing, about 100 hectares, is divided into eight paddocks well defined, and watered by running streams. The fences of barbed wire are in good condition. Fifty three hives of honey thoughout the property furnish 1400 liters of honey and 130 kilos of wax annually. The domain is planted in fruit trees, oranges, etc. a good anchorage that can harbour large ships is in the face of the domaine.”

The Kellums have maintained with spirit and competence this magnificient domaine, the only property in all of French Polynesia maintained in good condition during the depression years. They brought with them a house pre-cut in Honolulu.”

The hospitality received by visitors to Opunohu is legendary: “the Kellum’s guest book was worthy of a few hours of study, for every individual of any importance who had ever been in French Oceania had signed it”.