Kent Bowman "Pioneer of Local Comedy"

Kent William Bowman (1923-2007), Hilo, Hawaii, (French, Hawaiian, Scottish, and English). He is considered a pioneer in his work on the road for his unique style and the “Pioneer of Local Hawaiian comedy“. He is serious as he is aware of the local-climate and takes great pride in his craft as other entertainers who bring a fun loving crowd. He would bring the do not talk discussion to the stage of politics and societal ethnic culture as well as current events that would connect with the audience for quality laughs. He is said to have been an absolute gentleman and one of the funniest guys that anyone would ever meet. He would see the stage and performances as a show and treated it as such and those who took it too seriously would tend to forget that it was a show, because they think that a person just goes on stage, is silly and that is as deep as it gets, but there's a complex comedy process. Rarely was he ever at a loss for words, Kent was a master of the English language, Pidgin English, and knew many phrases in Spanish, Tagalog, Japanese, and more as he was very well cultured.


Pioneer of Local Comedy

A pioneer of local comedy by being able to talk casual English that was clear and move up the dial on pidgin to a little bit, pretty good, to the kinda heavy, and da real deal old pidgin. With his mule jokes and his famous "K.K. Kaumanua" (K.K. Cow Manure) politician character that has become the classic way to criticize politicians is what many see as the perfect attitude and joking perspective of late night. One of Hawaii’s all time favorite comedians with old Hawaii Pidgin English that people grew up listening to him and crying from laughter. He would be finding anonymity as important in Hawaii, so he would have cartoons on his records as not everyone would like the comedy he would provide.


His motto was, "You no can say something nice about someone, talk stink about everyone." -Kent Bowman


World War II

He was enrolled in the military during World War II


SS Monterey, the ocean liner, there were entertainers on board and Kent Bowman was one of them that would be there from Honolulu to California.


Born

Born in Hilo, Kent Bowman was born to Donald Scott Bowman and Elizabeth Yates, the youngest in a family of eleven.


Kent Bowman was married to Joyce Shaheen of the Shaheen Clothing stores in Hilo.


Education

Graduated from Iolani High School, Honolulu,

Maritime Academy, he was honorably discharged from the U.S. Army in 1945, and also served in the U.S. Coast Guard.

In the 1950s, Kawaihae Terminal had a boss, the head honcho, the general manager and vice president was Kent Bowman. He worked for Castle & Cooke. . At the job you could see him on the docks looking out to make sure everything was running like a machine. Nearby was the Kawaihae Grain & Elevator Co.


In the 1960s, in a world where Radio ruled, people listened to his stuff over and over on records, a lot, because there weren't many options and his quality of jokes were great. Kent Bowman first recorded under 49th state Records and then Hula records. With Hula Records' founder Don McDiarmid, Jr. he would develop routines of re-interpreting popular nursery rhymes into the Hawaiian "pidgin English" dialect.

Checkers and Pogo

Kent use to write for the Checkers & Pogo Magazine

KCCN Radio

Even if people were in politics they would see the comedy in it and many would love it, even if he used comedy to effectively bring light to community issues that were seen as taboo. K.K. Ka'umanua was concocted at KCCN radio with McDiarmid where they were sitting around one day, talking about creating a character, and he decided on Ka'umanua, giving him all the benefits of every crooked politician the two could think of. He decided on initials instead of a first name, and they joked, one day K.K. Ka'umanua might join the Ku Klux Klan. His recording career served as early inspiration for others to follow, such as Rap Reiplinger, Booga Booga, Andy Bumatai and Frank DeLima.

In the 1970s, he was chief executive officer with Theo H of Davies Marine Agencies where he stayed for 23 years.

In the 1990s, he retired

Eaton Square Talking Trash Cans

Kent used to do the 1970’s voices in the trash cans at Eaton square where the trash cans would talk back to you. If you threw trash in the can there was a sensor that would go and trigger responses to the person tossing the trash, like all pidgin sayings:“Arigato, yeah?”, “eh tanks for da opala”, “eh no throw so hard !”. There were a bunch of recorded responses that he did, so it felt like it was actually alive that mesmerized a bunch of people as to how it worked.

Bowman Ohana
Wright Bowman was his brother and was teaching at Kamehameha Schools as a Master craftsman who helped craft “Hokulea”. He had a group that would be working on canoes at the Bishop Museum where they had built the Hokulea and later the Mauloa and then hang out afterwards on weekends. This was at the time of Frank Palani Vaughan and Sam Kapu.


Sailing
Kent was an avid sailor, participating in the Trans Pacific Yacht Race.


Passing, When he left this world Kent Bowman was, 84, passed away on December 20, 2007, at Summerlin Hospital in Las Vegas. He adopted four children and helped raise his two grandsons in his lifetime and was survived since his passing by: Joyce, children, Sarah Bowman, Kirk Bowman, and Mary Ahrens; grandchildren, Sean Ahrens, Brad Ahrens; and his great-grandchildren, Joseph Edward Ahrens, Samantha Ale 'a Ahrens.