I have been doing a little research on the AKANA name and thought I might share what I found so far. This bit of information has made a huge difference in my family history search and hope it helps someone else as well.
"Chinese immigrants frequently adopted Hawaiian-sounding names, such as Aloiau for Wong Lo Yau and AKANA for Wong Kwon. These Hawai- ianized names serve as a reminder that many of the early Chinese learned to speak Hawaiian, at least to some extent, so as to be able to communicate with the local population. They also used the Hawaiian language as a common medium when they could not understand each other’s Chinese dialects. Judging from accounts of the late monarchy, many of the island Chinese still preferred to speak Hawaiian rather than English, despite the growing American influence." (
http://chsa.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/CHSA_HP2010.pdf)
This makes a lot of sense to me considering I am constantly running into roadblocks with finding accurate information with this name during the Chinese immigration to Hawaii in the 1800's. Now, I'm pretty sure that WONG KWON was not the only Chinese name transcribed to Hawaiian, but it's a good start.