T.R. Foster Building, Honolulu

The T.R. Foster Building was developed in 1891, by Thomas R. Foster's Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company. The office was converted into warehouse space in 1918, after which it was neglected for the next sixty years. In 1979, a group of developers renovated the old building, and converted it into a restaurant.

Thomas R. Foster started the Inter-Island Steam Navigation Company in 1878, and it was incorporated as the Inter-Island Company in 1883. Inter-Island's ships served Kauai, and the Kona and Kau coasts of Hawaii. This was similar to the Wilder Steamship Company, started by Samuel Gardner Wilder Sr., which served Maui and Hilo. In 1905, the two companies merged under Inter-Island, under the auspices of John Ena, a former clerk. They remained this way until air traffic came to Hawaii, at which point they developed a subsidiary company, Inter-Island airways, and discontinued their steamboat service in 1947.

In addition to creating Inter-Island, T.R. Foster was famous for salvaging the cargo of the wrecked barque Libelle off of Wake Island in 1867. He passed away in 1889, two years before the T.R. Foster building became his business' headquarters. When the his business successors acquired the T.R. Foster building in 1891, they named it after him.