It was perhaps fitting that the kickoff of the 18-month-long University of Hawai'i Centennial Celebration began yesterday with a civilized display of old-fashioned dissent on the steps of Hawai'i Hall, the institution's oldest building.

"Save UH — Stop UARC!" shouted about two dozen students, alumni and faculty members who were part of a "Counter-Centennial Call to Action" in protest of plans by UH President David McClain and the Navy to establish at UH a University Affiliated Research Center, or UARC.

Former UH Regent AhQuon McElrath, 91 — who had no knowledge of the protest before her arrival moments earlier — was nevertheless hustled to the hallowed steps by protesters and handed a microphone.

"I do not believe that the university should contribute to the continued militarization of our lives," began McElrath in an eloquent, off the cuff, five-minute speech urging the Board of Regents to oppose and reject the UARC.

That finished, the regent emeritus surrendered her mike and strolled 10 yards to the stage where official ceremonies were getting under way. There, McElrath was greeted with a warm hug from McClain.

The president began his own address to the standing crowd and invited guests seated under a shady tent canopy by thanking everyone for coming.

"Let me also welcome those who have chosen to express their concerns today about the UARC — and that is not the Utah Amateur Radio Club, although if you Google it these days, that's one of the things you get," McClain said above occasional shouts from protesters in the background.

"It is the case that my take on this issue ... is different than those who are with us today. But I will defend to the last their right to make their statement and to engage in dialogue on this issue."

The dissemination of differing viewpoints — popular, unpopular and otherwise — is what the university has been about for the past 100 years, McClain said.

After the opening ceremonies, Valdo and Frances Viglielmo waxed favorably about the protest and polite reaction.

"It was civil," Frances Viglielmo said. "It was apropos in that the protest had its say and then it permitted the official ceremony to have its say."

But by that time, much of the crowd had moved on to other things — bird and acupuncture lectures, hula, music and taiko drum performances, exhibits and tours, and a theatrical production rehearsal.

Booths lined the campus lawn offering everything from storytelling sessions to a chance to look at sun spots through an 8-inch telescope with a special lens that filtered out 99.99 percent of the light to prevent scorched retinas.

"I didn't actually see the sun spots, but maybe that's just my eyes," said Brenda Ha, a secretary at Kapi'olani Community College. Ha, who was luxuriating in a day off from her husband and teenage son, was still all smiles.

"Today, I do what I want!"

One of the more popular booths was the Physics Booth, which featured a tornado in a bottle.

Part of the appeal was Mike Nassir, a 36-year-old physics instructor with the unique ability to mesmerize and spout impossible concepts simultaneously:

"This quantity of angular momentum that nature tries to keep constant depends on the distance from the spin axis times the speed of the material doing the spinning," explained Nassir, while a group gathered around his booth nodded with rapt attention as they eyed the watery cyclone whirling inside a plastic bottle.

But even Nassir's incredible tornado couldn't top what may have been the most popular attraction for kids on campus yesterday: the soda bottle rocket launcher.

This apparatus consisted of little more than a makeshift bottle launcher, a plastic bottle, a half cup of water, and an ordinary bicycle tire pump. Even 4-year-old Tyler Kahmann of Salt Lake seemed to understand the principle:

Plastic bottle with water planted upside down on launcher plus mounting tire pump pressure equals unbelievable liftoff and lots of whooshing.

After his first attempt blasted the bottle 30 feet in the air, Tyler lined up to have another shot at it.

"Tyler really enjoyed it," his mom, Michiko Kahmann, said with a laugh. "He wants to do it again."

When his second turn finally came, Tyler strained over the tire pump until it looked as if his arms would give out. Then, suddenly ... SPLOOSH! The bottle shot skyward, cleared a 40-foot palm, and sprayed water over the rocket boy in the process.

Tyler shrieked with glee, squeezed the water out of one leg of his shorts, and then bounded off with his mom and sister, Miki, 7, to investigate the physics booth and the tornado in a bottle.

Reach Will Hoover at whoover@honoluluadvertiser.com.