Peter T Young

September 1, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Pa‘upa‘u

Pa‘upa‘u (lit. drudgery (servants were weary of bringing water to bathe the chief’s child)) is a hill above Lahainaluna School on Maui.

As noted in Pukui’s ‘Place Names’ book, “Not many years ago Mary Kawena Pukui found a colleague, Ke=oho=kapu, hard at work.”

“Instead of the banal comment that a haole would make, she asked cryptically, ‘E ku‘o‘i a‘e ana i ke One=o=Luhi?’ (Are [you] limping along the Beach of Weariness?)”

“Ke=oho=kapu, quick as a flash, said resignedly. ‘He pi‘i-na ke-ia i mauna Pa‘u-pa‘u.’ ([I”m) just climbing up Drudgery Hill.)”

“Both were pleased, and as a result of this repartee, the work may have seemed less like drudgery. The core of these sayings is the double meaning – in the place names Luhi ‘weariness’ and Pa‘u-pa‘u ‘drudgery’ a device rarely used in English sayings.” (Pukui, Appendix 8.1)

Sheldon Dibble had a house on the hill … “…Mon. Dec 14. Dined with Mr. Baldwin whose domicile joins that of Mr. Forbes, & is equally pleasantly situated. Mr. B[aldwin] has a wife & 5 children, the eldest a lad of 12 or 13 apparently…”

“Tues Dec 15th 1846. Rose soon after daylight & with Messrs Alexander & Hunt took a delightful ride on horseback along the base of the hills back of the Seminary.”

“We first rode up the hill to the cottage formerly built & occupied by Mr. Dibble situated on the side of the mountain 1500 ft above the sea (900 above Lahainaluna).”

“This residence was doubtless the means of prolonging the life of Mr. D[ibble] while declining of pulmonary consumption. The great objection to the residence is the difficulty of procuring water which has to be brought from a distance up very steep precipices.”

“The hill which rises back of this cottage on the flank of which it stands is called Mt Ball. The top of it is 2100 ft above the ocean…” (Lyman)

Another missionary, Samuel Whitney, also used the house on the hill … he had “taken ill on the island of Kauai, on the 21st of September last (1845). His symptoms, from the first, indicated a disordered liver.”

“After trying a change of air at his summer retreat at Hanapepeluna and employing various remedies, he, with his family, sailed on the 21st of October for Honolulu, where he arrived in three days …”

“From this, however, he partially recovered, and he was induced, by an earnest invitation, to come to Maui, to try the effects of a residence at the cool and elevated retreat of Mount Ball, above Lahainaluna. … When he arrived, he was quite fatigued, and he was ever afterwards confined mostly to his bed.”

“He now rapidly wasted away under the influence of disease, though his friends generally hoped he would soon begin to mend. …” Whitney died December 15, 1845.

Though David Malo did not die at Pa‘upa‘u, he wanted to be (and was) buried there. “He said this land will fall into the possession of foreigners. Land in Lahaina would be valuable.”

“The graveyards, enriched by the remains of the natives, would be coveted, and the contents of the graves scattered abroad. He wished not his bones to be disturbed. Let him be buried on that summit where no white man will ever build his house.” (Honolulu Advertiser, January 7, 1918)

Pu‘u Pa‘upa‘u has a symbol from Malo’s school (he was one of the first students enrolled at Lahainaluna Seminary). A large ‘L’ (standing for Lahainaluna, reportedly put there in 1929) is visible from most parts below.

Today, Lahainaluna students continue to maintain the ‘L’ on Pa‘upa‘u (a 30-foot letter of the natural red of the hill, outlined with white lime) at about the 2,000-foot elevation. (The school’s colors are red and white.)

Twice a year, students in Lahainaluna’s boarding program lug sacks of lime up to the site to outline the red ‘L’ in white. Hash-marks on the long side of the ‘L’ indicate sports championships.

Students also make the trek to pay reverence to David Malo, who died October 21, 1853 and who is buried on its summit. The school has an annual ho‘olaulea, David Malo Day, that pays tribute to Malo.

Pu‘u Pa‘upa‘u is also referred to as Mount Ball. It is not clear why or when it was named such, but references back to the mid-1840s, at least, use that name.

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lahainaluna-L

The L Lahainaluna-MountBall

Lahainaluna High School L

Lahainaluna L in need of lime

Lahainaluna L-lazarohike

David Malo grave

Rainbow_over_Lahainaluna

Lahaina as seen from Lahainaluna (Maui) Miss Thurston, Attributed to possibly be Eliza Thurston (1807-1873)

August 31, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Emerald Bower of Hilo

Lydia Bingham Coan, second wife of Titus Coan, assembled his letters and told some of his stories in a Memorial to her husband. She speaks of “‘Emerald Bower,’ as they called their Hilo home, was a place of many hospitalities, and for nine years, with the delightful Dr. Coan, Mrs. Coan enjoyed the many social, literary and pastoral experiences of missionary life.”

“After the death of Dr. Coan in 1882, she returned to Honolulu to enter into the home of her brother, Dr. Hiram Bingham, Jr., in Punahou, near the old home of the Bingham family.”

“When Dr. Bingham died in 1908 the American Board gladly gave her a life tenure of the Bingham home, called “Gilbertina,” where with the loving ministrations of her devoted niece, Miss Kate Reynolds, she happily passed her declining years. On Tuesday, Aug. 14, 1915, Mrs. Coan took a severe cold, which developed into pneumonia.”

“Though this disease was soon arrested the frail body could not bear the strain of recovery, and on August 31st Mrs. Coan entered into the rest for which she had long been waiting.” (HMCS) Following are passages from her memorial and remembrances of Coan and Emerald Bower.

“From Boston he wrote to his parents: “December 3, 1834.- ‘We have now been here nearly two weeks, waiting for the ship to be ready. We hope to go to-morrow. Twelve missionaries sailed to-day for Southeastern Africa. There are eight of our number, making twenty in all, who met in this city at the same time.’”

“‘We received our instructions together on Sunday evening, the 23d of November, in Park Street Church. The meeting was crowded, solemn and impressive. The people of Boston take a deep interest in the cause of missions, and are very hospitable to missionaries. We have been kindly entertained since our arrival here.’”

“‘Our ship, the Hellespont, is a very good one, of 340 tons burden, but she is deeply laden. We shall be pent up in small rooms, but they will be large enough to hold our Bibles and our God, if our spirits are contrite.’”

“To His Brother, Heman Coan, Honolulu, June 26, 1835. – ‘My eyes at last behold these ‘isles afar off,’ and my feet tread on these long desired shores. And I would here first record the goodness of God in guiding us through all the perils of the deep and in bringing us to the field of our labors’”.

“‘On the morning of the 5th inst., just six months from the time we lost sight of our native land, we first descried the island of Hawaii, at the distance of sixty or seventy miles. On the morning of the 6th we made this island (Oahu), and at 10 A. M. dropped anchor in the harbor.’”

“‘All the missionaries of the islands, except two, with their wives and little ones, were assembled in general meeting at this place, according to their annual custom.’”

“‘On hearing of our arrival, Messrs. Bingham, Chamberlain and Armstrong came off to the ship in a boat, to welcome and to take us on shore. When we landed, we found the band of brethren and sisters at the seaside awaiting our arrival and ready to embrace us. Every heart seemed to feel more than it could utter.’”

“‘After services Mr. B. introduced me to the governess and some of the high chiefs, who expressed much joy at the arrival of more teachers on their shores. When we turned from our interview with the chiefs, the common people pressed around me in crowds, each one striving to grasp my hand and express his warm welcome.’”

“‘I long to go into the work. I think this is my proper field of labor, and I would not go back for the world, unless I knew it to be the will of God. There is pressing need of laborers here. Thousands who are anxious for instruction must die without it unless help can be obtained.’”

“‘Our location for the present year will be at Hilo, on the island of Hawaii. Our associate is to be Rev. Mr. Lyman. We shall probably be two hundred and fifty miles from medical aid, and can expect none. We have only to trust in God. Dear brother, live near to God and labor for souls. If we are faithful to our Master we shall soon meet in joy.’”

“Mr. and Mrs. Coan remained a month in Honolulu. Then, their location having been assigned by the mission, and an opportunity of reaching it presenting, they went forth to their appointed station.”

“Hilo was to them at the first, ‘a picture of loveliness,’ and forty years later Mr. Coan would write: ‘The ecstatic romance with which I first saw these emerald isles has not abated by familiarity or by age. The picture is photographed in unfading tints upon my heart, and it has become to me the romance of reality.’”

“‘Where can you find within so small a space such a collecting, such massing, such blending of the bland, the beautiful, the exquisite, the gorgeous, the grand and the terrific as on Hawaii?’” Of Hilo he notes, “our lovely, our inimitable landscape, our emerald bowers, our crescent strand and our silver bay”.

“To Mrs. E. Coan. March 8, 1867. – ‘I have just reached home in the dear old Emerald Bower. I went about fifty miles north to meet Bro. Bond, of Kohala, and the native pastors and delegates of N: Hawaii at the meeting of an ecclesiastical association.’”

“‘Thence I went to Waimea, seventy miles from Hilo, to see our dear Brother Lyons, who has not been able to leave his station for more than three years on account of ill health.’”

“To His Children. February 1, 1881. – ‘This is a joyful day. The heavens shine with glory. The earth glows with beauty. The sea sparkles with brilliants. The radiant orbs sing praises. The bland zephyrs murmur sweetly. The rippling rills leap and laugh.’”

“‘The emerald fields rejoice. Silvery notes of praise rise from glen and forest, and mingling strains of harmony and love ascend to the Creator from all his works.’”

“‘I am this day four score years old. God gave me a happy childhood, a cheerful youth, a vigorous manhood, and now a calm old age. My health is good, my spirits buoyant, and my heart is happy in the companion of my choice. My faith is firm, my hope anchored, and my love for you all is deathless as the soul.’”

“‘My experiences have been varied, and I look back upon my life as marked with many mistakes, numerous sins, and much unworthiness.’”

“‘But I also adore the grace of God in his pardoning love, and humbly trust that the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, will cleanse me from all sin. I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to the salvation of every true believer.’”

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Hilo_illustration,_c._1870s

August 30, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Luali‘iloa Pond

Nāpō‘opo‘o and Ka‘awaloa represent the two major settlements along the northern and southern sides of Kealakekua Bay with continuity in occupation from the pre-contact period, around 1600 and earlier, into the 20th Century.

At the time of Cook’s arrival in 1779, high chief Kalani‘ōpu‘u had his chiefly residence at Ka‘awaloa while the priests associated with this chiefly complex had their residences across the bay at Kekua (Nāpō‘opo‘o). Kamehameha I was also residing at Nāpō‘opo‘o in 1779.

The priestly compound at Nāpō‘opo‘o consists of Hikiau Heiau, Helehelekalani Heiau, the Great Wall, the brackish pond to the north of Hikiau Heiau, and the housesites of the priests, including Hewahewa, high priest to Kamehameha I.

Hikiau Heiau was the state-level religious center for this chiefly complex at Kealakekua Bay. The Great Wall marks the mauka (eastern) boundary of this priestly compound. The annual tour of the island associated with the Makahiki season began and ended at Hikiau Heiau. (DLNR)

“During the time when Kalaniʻōpuʻu was in the process of building the Hikiau Heiau, he asked Hewahewa to build him a fish pond. Hewahewa gathered certain men of the ali‘i clan than had his fish pond build.”

“Hewahewa lived across the pond. This pond was filled with fish for only the ali‘i to eat. (The name of the ‘old fishpond’ is Li‘iloa and/or Luali‘iloa.)

“‘Ala rocks (dense waterworn volcanic stones) were gathered from across the bay and was used to cover the bottom of the pond. Every rock was set in place and fitted a certain way until it was completed.” (‘Aunty Mona’ Kapapapkeali‘ioka‘alokai Kapule-Kahele, Maly; DLNR)

“West (north) of the morai (heiau) was the residence of the priest that conducted the ceremony. It consisted of a circle of large cocoanut and other trees that stood upon the margin of a pond of water in the center of which was a bathing place.”

“Upon the north (east) side of the pond were a row of houses standing among the trees and were most delightfully situated. These houses extended almost to the morai, nearest which was that of the priest who was the lord of this beautiful recess.”

“Between the houses and the pond were a number of grass plots intersected by several square holes with water in them which were private baths. On the east (south) side under the wall of the morai was a thick arbour of low spreading trees …”

“… and a number of ill carved images interspersed throughout, to this retreat we were all conducted, and Capt Cook was placed by one of those images which was hund round with old pieces of their cloths and some viands.” (Ledyard – Cook’s crewman)

Vancouver arrived at Kealakekua in 1793 and also noted the priest’s settlement around Hikiau Heiau and the pond. He recorded 200 houses along the 0.5-mile of beach at Nāpō‘opo‘o, as well as, the residence of Kamehameha I located behind the pond.

But by 1814, Kamehameha’s residence was reported as empty and “uncommonly filthy”. Four years later, in 1818, Capt. Golovnin of the Russian ship Kamchatka visited Kekua and “near the pond we saw the ruins of the former houses of the King surrounded by tall shady trees”. (Golovnin; DLNR)

The missionaries arrived at Kealakekua Bay in 1824 and established a mission at Ka‘awaloa Flat. Because of the heat, the missionaries moved the mission upslope to Kuapehu in 1827. However, many of the Hawaiians continued to live along the coast and Rev. Forbes decided to move the mission station to Nāpō‘opo‘o in 1838 and constructed the first Kahikolu Church in 1840.

In the 1850s, the government leased land behind the pond and restored the stone prison originally built by Kapi‘olani in the 1830s. Deputy Sheriff Preston Cummings leased the pond and the adjacent land to support the prison population in the late 1850s.

In the mid 1860s, Mr. Logan purchased the ahupua‘a and developed a sugar plantation while the makai lands and 5 coconut trees were leased by S. Kekumano, the jailer. Pineapple and sugarcane were planted and cultivated by the prisoners. The prison was used until around 1875.

By 1875, the ahupua‘a had been bought and sold a number of times. J.D. Paris, Jr. was the owner of the ahupua‘a, leasing the flat around the bay, the pali, and coconut trees to H. Haili, grandson of konohiki Nunole. Jailer Kekumano still held the pond lease, even though the prison was seldom used by this time.

An 1883 map by George Jackson recorded both ocean depths and land features. Jackson’s map shows the pond and Hikiau Heiau as the prominent features of Nāpō‘opo‘o.

There are 3 houses and numerous coconut trees around the pond (Photo 8). The map also shows the wall defining the southern and eastern boundaries of the subject parcel adjacent to the heiau.

In 1881, H.N. Greenwell purchased the land from Paris and began cattle ranching in the area. H. Haili retained the lease on the flat land around the bay, the pali, and the pond. Evidently, Greenwell had an interest in the pond as “they had kept it stocked with fish and used it”.

However, as a result of cattle overrunning the pond and spoiling it for raising fish, Haili paid a reduced rent for the pond (Haili 1892: 69). In 1892, the lawyer for the Greenwells wrote that the pond was valued as a watering hole. (DLNR)

“(A) Japanese couple had come here. They built a house on the north side of the fishpond. This pond was than neglected. This Japanese family cleaned It up and raised shrimps in it.”

“They kept the pond clean. Shrimps were many were many. I remember the Japanese women going from house to house with her bucket of shrimp to sell. For ten cents you got a bowl full of shrimps. My tutu use to dry them and only eaten when there were no fish in the house.” (‘Aunty Mona’ Kapapapkeali‘ioka‘alokai Kapule-Kahele, Maly; Louis)

The Greenwells gave the pond the name Kalua‘opae and that name became a part of the collective memory of the community. (Louis)

“Soma years ago, some people wanted to dredge that pond but instead the heavy equipment got stuck in the sand and mud that they had to get another machine to pull the other out. What is the mystery, nobody knows. Only the people of the past knows what and how it was built.”

“Perhaps it is better that way for people to see or for those who remember seeing the fishes there.” (‘Aunty Mona’ Kapapapkeali‘ioka‘alokai Kapule-Kahele, Maly; Louis)

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Napoopoo Pond-Lualiiloa Pond-DLNR

Napoopoo Pond-Lualiiloa Pond-Old Prison in Background-DLNR

Napoopoo Pond-Lualiiloa Pond-HMCS-1906

Napoopoo Pond-Lualiiloa Pond-1890s-DLNR

Napoopoo Pond-Lualiiloa Pond-McFarlen’s Hse in Background-1920-DLNR

Lualiiloa Pond – Kealakekua-Napoopoo-Jackson-Reg1324-1883 (portion)

Lualiiloa Pond – Kealakekua-Jackson-Reg1324-1883 (portion)

Napoopoo-Stoke’s Map-early-1900s-DLNR

Kealakekua Bay-Henry Roberts with Cook expedition-1779-portion

August 29, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Keolaokalani

Pauahi was said to be carrying the child of Kāhalaiʻa when she married Kekūanāoʻa. Keʻelikōlani was born and Kekūanāoʻa claimed her as his own in court, and the matter was officially settled, though it would be debated again in later years, even by her own half-brother, Lot. (Nogelmeier)

After Pauahi’s death, Kekūanāoʻa married Kīna‘u, and they became the parents of Lot Kapuāiwa, Alexander Liholiho, and Victoria Kamāmalu, making Keʻelikōlani a half-sister to these three.

Keʻelikōlani was an important figure during her lifetime, known for her high rank in the Kamehameha lineage, her social position as a governor and woman of means, and for her character as a woman of dignity, both strong-willed and kind.

She was a great-granddaughter of Kamehameha, a grand-niece to Kamehameha II and III, and a half-sister of Kamehameha IV and V.

When mentioned in the press, Keʻelikōlani was usually listed as Ka Mea Kiʻekiʻe, Ke Ali‘i Ruta Keʻelikōlani – Her Highness, Chiefess Ruth Keʻelikōlani. Foreigners knew her as “Princess Ruth.” (Nogelmeier)

At the age of sixteen, Keʻelikōlani married William Pitt Leleiōhoku. While serving as governor of Hawai‘i Island, Leleiōhoku died, only twenty-two years old. Their surviving son, William Pitt Kīnaʻu, died at the age of seventeen in an accident on Hawai‘i. (Silva)

Keʻelikōlani’s second husband was the part-Hawaiian Isaac Young Davis, grandson of Isaac Davis, a British advisor to King Kamehameha I. The two had a son, Keolaokalani (also known as Keolaonalani), whom Keʻelikōlani gave as a hānai to Bernice Pauahi.

“Born on the 30th of December, 1862, was a son by Her Highness R. Keʻelikōlani, at Hale Hala‘aniani of Maj. W. L. Moehonua. At 4 in the afternoon was the birth; the mother is in fine health without weakness.”

“The child has been given to Mrs. Bishop (Pauahi) as a hānai, with out hopes that the royal son lives a long life. They are at Haleakala [the residence of the Bishops].” (Hoku o ka Pakipika, January 1, 1863)

Then, “There was a Baptism at the Residence of the Honorable C. R. Bishop, ‘Haleakala;’ baptized was the child of the honorable R. Keʻelikōlani and J. Y. Davis, and he was called, ‘Keolaokalani Paki Bihopa.’”

“The Honorable C. R. Bishop and Pauahi (the wife of Bishop) were those who bestowed the name, and Rev. C. Corwin is the one who performed the baptism.” (Hoku o ka Pakipika, February 12, 1863)

Pauahi Pākī was born on December 19, 1831 in Honolulu, Hawai‘i to high chiefs Abner Pākī and Laura Kōnia Pākī. She was the great-granddaughter of Kamehameha I. (KSBE)

Pauahi was hānai (adopted) to her aunt, Kīnaʻu (the eldest daughter of Kamehameha, who later served as Kuhina Nui as Kaʻahumanu II, a position similar to a Prime Minister.) Pauahi lived with Kīnaʻu for nearly eight years, then Kīnaʻu died suddenly of mumps (April 4, 1839.)

High Chief Caesar Kapaʻakea and his wife High Chiefess Analeʻa Keohokālole had three children, a daughter was Lydia Liliʻu Kamakaʻeha (born September 2, 1838.)

Liliʻu was hānai (adopted) to the Pākīs, who reared her with their birth daughter, Pauahi. The two girls developed a close, loving relationship.

“…their only daughter, Bernice Pauahi … was therefore my foster-sister. … I knew no other father or mother than my foster-parents, no other sister than Bernice.” (Lili‘uokalani)

They lived on the property called Haleʻākala, in a two-story coral house that Pākī built on King Street. It was the ‘Pink House,’ (the house was name ʻAikupika (Egypt.)) It later became the Arlington Hotel.

In 1850, at the age of 19, Pauahi married Charles Reed Bishop, a young American businessman who had made his way to the Kingdom of Hawai‘i from Glens Falls, New York.

Charles became a pillar in the kingdom government and was a successful businessman, banker and philanthropist. He and Pauahi enjoyed traveling the world with particular fondness for museums and art. With no children of their own, they shared a deep commitment for the well-being and education of kamali‘i — young ones. (KSBE)

When her cousin, Princess Ruth Keʻelikōlani, died, Keʻelikōlani’s will stated that she “give and bequeath forever to my beloved younger sister (cousin), Bernice Pauahi Bishop, all of my property, the real property and personal property from Hawaiʻi to Kauaʻi, all of said property to be hers.”

The total land bequest included about 353,000 acres. Keʻelikōlani had previously inherited all of the substantial landholdings of the Kamehameha dynasty from her brother, Lot Kapuāiwa (King Kamehameha V.)

As the Bishop’s marriage was not blessed with children of their own, they made several attemps at adoption. Their first was Ruth’s baby whom they named Keolaokalani Paki Bishop when they officially adopted him in February 1863.

The infant had also been given the nick-name Hoku o ka Pakipika (Star of the Pacific). Unhappiness filled the Bishop’s household when on August 29, 1863, the child died at six months. (Zambucka)

Bernice Pauahi died childless on October 16, 1884. She foresaw the need to educate her people and in her will she left her large estate of the Kamehameha lands in a trust “to erect and maintain in the Hawaiian Islands two schools, each for boarding and day scholars, one for boys and one for girls, to be known as, and called the Kamehameha Schools.”

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Keolaonalani – Kamehameha Crypt-Mauna Ala

August 28, 2018 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Kauai Coffee

The first reference to an attempt to cultivate coffee in Hawai’i was made by the Spaniard, Don Francisco de Paula y Marin, who recorded in his journal dated January 21, 1813, that he had planted coffee seedlings on the island of O’ahu. Evidently his planting was not successful.

When H.M.S. Blonde was bringing the bodies of Liholiho and Kamāmalu, they stopped in Rio de Janeiro Brazil and brought 30 live coffee plants in May, 1825, this introduction was referred to as the first successful introduction of coffee plants into Hawai’i, with an additional remark that ‘if the plant had been introduced before, it had become extinct.’

These live coffee seedlings were brought by John Wilkinson, an Englishman who was commissioned by Governor Boki of O‘ahu to develop and supervise a plantation type of farming in Hawai’i. (Goto)

In 1842, to encourage the production of coffee, the government enacted a law to allow payment of land taxes in coffee as well as in pigs, which had been the common tax payment up to that time. The Act also imposed a three percent duty on all foreign coffee imported into the Kingdom. (This tax was increased to five percent in 1845.)

Response to the government’s policy of encouraging coffee growing was good. Small areas of coffee were planted wherever possible, even in remote and neglected ravines and valleys on O‘ahu, Maui and Hawai‘i. But it was on Kauai where the most impressive development took place.

Godfrey Rhodes, an Englishman, and John Bernard, a Frenchman, started the first large-scale coffee plantations in the beautiful valley of Hanalei. Eventually, when Titcomb also moved to Hanalei, the plantations in the valley became a continuous planting of a thousand acres of coffee trees. (Goto)

“This was a new industry for Kauai, although coffee berries had been brought to Honolulu from Brazil in 1825 on the British frigate Blonde, and a few plants had then been started in Mānoa Valley on Oahu.”

“Four or five years later the missionaries at Hilo and other planters in Kona on the island of Hawaii had begun to grow coffee around their houses, but it was from the original source in Manoa Valley that the seed and young were obtained for Hanalei.”

In October of 1845, Godfrey Rhodes and John von Pfister formed a partnership. By 1846, the Rhodes and Company Coffee Plantation covered seven hundred and fifty acres, so that the two plantations counted over one hundred thousand trees and “a great part of the valley, at least to the extent of a thousand acres, was under cultivation in coffee at this time.” (Damon)

But after a promising start a series of misfortunes in the next decade doomed the Hanalei coffee enterprises.

The first major set-back came in 1846 when, through lack of planning, a shortage of coffee pickers to harvest that year’s huge crop caused a disastrous financial loss.

“In May, 1847, just as the trees were in good condition of full bearing, they had “severe rains for two weeks which did much damage to the valley, flooding the coffee plantations.”

“Masses of rock, trees and earth were loosened and carried by force of water, crushing several hundred trees and doing much other damage.”

“Recovering from this pullback another difficulty was met with the following year by the California gold fever, rendering labor scarcer and dearer.” (Thrum)

Left behind were the aged and crippled, who took advantage of the labor shortage and demanded wages as high as five dollars a day.

The year 1852 was the beginning of the end of the coffee plantations at Hanalei. The drought-weakened coffee trees were attacked by the white scale and its companion, the black fungus smut, which lives on the secretion of the scale.

At that time, there were no control measures for the infestation and the damage continued unabated, spreading throughout the Hawaiian Islands.

In 1856, Rhodes and his associates finally sold their interest in the coffee plantations to RC Wyllie, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom. He abandoned the entire coffee planting of Hanalei and planted the land in sugar cane.

Ultimately, others shifted their interest from coffee to the more secure sugar industry. By 1860, coffee literally disappeared from Kauai and the decline continued in the other islands in the Kingdom. Sugar took its place. (Goto)

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Godfrey Rhodes and his daughter-TGI