Woman Proud of Last Name

Most people are usually concerned about how their photo looks on their driver's license or ID card.  However, a woman from Hawaii is more concerned about her name, or more specifically, the amount of space for her name.

With a maiden name of Worth, Janice Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele married into the traditional Hawaiian name and has never considered using a shorter version.

Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele, who is originally from New York, has carried her driver's license and an official Hawaiian state ID card for identification purposes.  Both of the cards only have 34 spaces available for the name portion on the cards and  Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele needs 35 spaces for her last name alone. When she recently renewed her ID card, it came back the same as her driver's license.  The last letter of her last name was missing, and there was no room for her first name.

Then a police officer pulled her over.  After showing her identification to the officer, he suggested she go back to using her maiden name.  This hurt Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele's feelings. She has always had great pride of the heritage she married into.  So rather than trying to change her name, she opted to change the system.

Along with the help of a local Hawaiian TV station, Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele pressured the Hawaiian Department of Transportation.  Because of the pressure, what would have originally taken her 2 years to get changed, Keihanaikukauakahihuliheekahaunaele only has to wait until the end of the year.  The Hawaiian Department of Transportation will have new character limits in place:   40 characters for the first and last names, 35 characters for the middle, and five for the suffix.

This is great for her identification cards, but she still is going to have a hard time putting that on the back of a t-shirt!