Lamp from Minnesota Tiki Restaurant - Need Help Identifying It

I just purchased this lamp that was part of the decor of an old Polynesian Restaurant in White Bear Lake, Minn.

The seller bought this lamp and three others exactly like it from an estate sale in White Bear Lake. She was able to give me a lot of information - facts she had gotten from the owners of the restaurant - everything but the name of the restaurant itself.

1. The ceramic lamps were custom-made for this Polynesian-themed restaurant.
2. The restaurant opened in 1961.
3. The restaurant was in White Bear Lake.

The actual owners of the restaurant sold her the lamps, and she in turn, sold one to me. She's going to try to get more information for me, but in the meantime I thought I'd see if any of our Minnesota Tiki Centralites would like a crack at identifying it.

I did find a matchbook in my collection from "The Hula Hut" in White Bear Lake, but I'm doubtful that this is it, because the matchbook looks older than 1961. I could be wrong though.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Sabu

How many Tiki joints could there have been in White Bear Lake, Minnesota?
A very cool find, even if the headdress looks more Aztec than Tiki. When will she sell the other two lamps?

Holy Cow!

I just bought a HUGE ceramic tiki lamp and have been trying for weeks to figure out where it came from. The guy I bought it from said it was from an estate sale in the north metro area, except it was the only one of its kind that he saw there.

Mine doesn't LOOK like these, (mine is a Moai sporting face paint and the Tiki base is over two feet high), but how many freakin' places in Minnesota had custom ceramic tiki lamps made for them?

Jeez, what the heck was this place?

Oh, and does that lady want to sell any of her other lamps to a Twin Cities Tiki Nut?

How many Tiki joints could there have been in White Bear Lake, Minnesota?

Evidently a couple. In fact it sounds like one of those little hot spots of tikidom. I just received another matchbook in the mail for my collection and it is from the "Bali Hai" on 2305 White Bear Ave, Maplewood, which is in the same neck-of-the-woods. The tiki on the matchbook looked similar to my lamp, so I thought, "A-ha! This is where my lamp came from".

Wrong again. I e-mailed the seller of my lamp with my suspicions, but she had already tracked down her seller and found out where the lamp actually came from. It was the HOLIDAY HOUSE and WHITE BEAR BOWL - A restaurant and bowling alley that evidently had several themes, including Polynesian.

She had suspected it might be the Bali Hai herself, as she had been there in years gone by. Sadly, the Bali Hai just closed down about two years ago. Here's a link to a review of the Restaurant.

http://www.citypages.com/bestof1998/sexdrugsrocknroll/bestof264.asp

Sounds pretty cool, doesn't it? Unfortunately that means that three White Bear tiki establishments are now gone:

The Hula Hut
The Bali Hai
The Holiday House & White Bear Bowl

Does anybody else know of any other tiki history from this area? Is it all gone? That would be really sad.

I'll e-mail the seller again tonight and let her know that there is more interest in the Tiki community for her other three lamps. Maybe she'll sell.

Sabu

Three?

They can't be gone... I just MOVED here two years ago!

No wonder it's been sorta easy finding tiki stuff in town...

Wo Fat, so now that you are the resident Tiki archeologist, you have to find the owners of said places, dig up menus, postcards, fotos, oral history, etc...

Sabu, I wish you would photograph or scan in your postcard/ match book collection for all of us to enjoy. I would really love to see some of the artwork on them.

Kinda looks like these lamps!

For those of you who don't already know, I stated a Tiki Gallery that now has almost 800 photos of mugs, bowls, art, postcards, menus, and more for you to enjoy. You can add comments on each item, and also post photos of your own to the appropriate gallery. Sabu says he will add more of his stuff as he gets the chance. There is also a Tiki Trade Gallery where you can post photos of stuff you want to trade- and then add the link back here to TC to advertise it.
Enjoy!
http://www.tikiroom.net

On 2003-02-09 23:24, Luckydesigns wrote:
Sabu, I wish you would photograph or scan in your postcard/ match book collection for all of us to enjoy. I would really love to see some of the artwork on them.

i found another review of Bali Hai in Maplewood

http://www.citypages.com/databank/19/894/article4189.asp

Here is another set of the lamps like the one Sabu previously purchased. I let him know that these were available, but wasn't in the market for adding to his collection at this time, but asked me to post this in case any other TC'ers were interested. Hope this doesn't spoil anyones "secret".

Good luck!

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2948807389&category=1467

(Sorry Hanford, I have no way of editing and adding "ebay" to this original post).