Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Charles Brewer

Charles Brewer was born in Boston in 1804. His father was Moses Brewer, his mother Abigail May Brewer.  After his father died in 1813, his mother moved to her family home in Jamaica Plain, where she remained until she died in 1849 at 79 years.

“At a very early age (he) had a strong desire to be a sailor, but, being an only son, (his) mother strongly objected, and sent (him) to a woman’s school at East Sudbury. (He) remained there two summers.  During the year following (he) attended the East Sudbury Academy.”  (Brewer; Reminiscences)

Then, “One day, my mother, without my knowledge, called on several of her old friends to consult with them about my going to sea … each of whom had been a sailor in his youth, and afterwards had been engaged in shipping business from Boston for many years.”  (Brewer)

“Their advice … was that, if I was so anxious to become a seaman when I was twenty-one, she had better give her consent for me to go when I was seventeen, so that perhaps I might become an officer by the time I was twenty-one.”

“Their advice proved good, for (he) was second officer of the ship” Paragon” when (he) was twenty-one, and first officer of the same ship when was twenty-two.”  (Brewer)

After some sailing experience, Brewer had an interest in going to the Sandwich Islands.  “(He) learned that the ship ‘Paragon’ was going to the Sandwich Islands and to China, so (he) made application at once, and was shipped on board as an ordinary seaman at eight dollars a month.”  (Brewer)

They left Boston on February 23, 1823 with two passengers, Thomas Crocker. Esq., US consul for the Hawaiian Islands, and Robert Elwell, consul’s clerk.  Second officer (and also acting sail-maker) on board was John Dominis (father of John Owen Dominis who was later the husband of Queen Liliʻuokalani.)

After arriving in Honolulu and ongoing attempts to gather sandalwood for trade, the King asked to charter the Paragon for the funeral of Queen Keōpūolani.

“The king, with all his officers, together with all the foreign consuls, was on board the ‘Paragon.’ On the arrival of the fleet at Lāhainā, minute-guns were fired, and it was continued all the day.”

“There were nearly 12,000 natives at the landing at Lāhainā to witness the funeral; and they expressed their deep grief and sympathy for the king by a loud wailing and wringing of hands.  The next day the fleet returned to Honolulu.”  (Brewer)

After serving on several other ships trading between the Northwest, Hawaii and China, Brewer headed for Honolulu (on his third voyage for the Islands,) arriving in November, 1830.

Part of the cargo was plants, including night-blooming cereus.  They looked dead and he was ordered then thrown overboard; one looked survivable and he nursed it back and when they arrived in Honolulu the flowers were in full bloom and “was a great curiosity.”

“When I was at Honolulu in 1879, I found the plant no longer a curiosity, for the walls in many parts of the town were covered with it.”  (Brewer)

(Punahou School’s dry stack rock wall along Punahou Street was constructed in 1834.  The night-blooming cereus (known in Hawaiʻi as panini o kapunahou) that today continues to cover the Punahou walls (that back in 1924 was noted to have “world-wide reputation and interest”) was planted by Sybil Bingham (Hiram’s wife.))

As Brewer was sailing back and forth to the Islands, James Hunnewell was doing the same.  On one trip, on the Thaddeus, Hunnewell returned to the Islands in 1820.

“This was the memorable voyage when we carried out the first missionaries to the Hawaiian Islands (including Hiram and Sybil Bingham.”)  He stayed … “it was urged by some of the chiefs that knew me on my previous voyage that I should remain instead of a stranger to trade with them.”  (Hunnewell)

Later, in 1825, Hunnewell negotiated with the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, “to take the missionary packet out, free from any charge whatever on (his) part for sailing and navigating the vessel—provided the Board would pay and feed the crew, and allow (him) to carry out in the schooner to the amount (in bulk) of some forty to fifty barrels”.  (Hunnewell)

He then purchased the premises of John Gowen for the sum of $250, to which I added some land by exchange in 1830.  “As soon as I secured this place, I landed my cargo, and commenced retailing it…”  (Hunnewell)  This was the beginning of a company that would later carry the Brewer name.

Hunnewell first partnered with Henry A Peirce.  Peirce then took Thomas Hinckley as a partner; but Hinckley soon retired due to his health.  Next, in steps Brewer; he commanded Peirce’s trading vessels on their voyages to China and the Russian possessions.

In December, 1835, a co-partnership was formed by Peirce and Brewer.  Under this partnership, the firm of Peirce & Brewer conducted a general merchandise and commission business at Honolulu.  (Peirce)

“When I was received as a partner in business with Mr Henry A Peirce, I continued the firm name of Peirce & Brewer until Mr Peirce retired, in 1843.  I then continued the business as C Brewer & Co., with my nephew C Brewer, 2d, until the year 1845.”  (Brewer)

After various partnerships and name changes, it was not until 1859 that the firm again and finally resumed the name of C Brewer & Co., when in September of that year, Charles Brewer II, a nephew of Captain Brewer, engaged in partnership with Sherman Peck and took over the business.  (Nellist)

Brewer returned to Boston.  “We arrived in Boston on March 26, 1849, and from that time, my sea life may be said to have ended.”  (Brewer)

However, “I continued my business alone for about one year, and then joined with Mr. James Hunnewell and Mr. Henry A. Peirce in the Sandwich Islands and East India trade, as well as general freighting in various parts of the world. Our Partnership consisted only in our ships, and we were one third owners each of our several vessels.”  (Brewer)

In reminiscing of life in the Islands, Brewer noted, “My life at the Sandwich Islands during a period of nearly twenty-six years was a very pleasant one, and I shall always remember with gratitude the kindness I received from the many friends in Honolulu, and especially from his majesty King Kamehameha III, who, from his boyhood to his death, was always my firm friend.”

The image shows Charles Brewer.

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H Hackfeld

On September 26, 1849, sea captain Heinrich (Henry) Hackfeld arrived in Honolulu with his wife, Marie, her 16-year-old brother Johann Carl Pflueger and a nephew BF Ehlers.

Having purchased an assorted cargo at Hamburg, Germany, Hackfeld opened a general merchandise business (dry goods, crockery, hardware and stationery,) wholesale, as well as retail store on Queen Street.

In 1850 he moved to a larger location on Fort Street. This store was so popular, it became known as “Hale Kilika” – the House of Silk (because it sold the finest goods available.) As business grew, the nephew took over management of the store while Hackfeld traveled the world for merchandise. The company took BF Ehlers’ name in 1862.

Hackfeld developed a business of importing machinery and supplies for the spreading sugar plantations and exported raw sugar. H Hackfeld & Co became a prominent factor – business agent and shipper – for the plantations.

Its shipping interest, manufacturing and jobbing lines developed a web of commercial relationships with Europe, England and the eastern seaboard of the US. German whalers were still sailing the Pacific in the 1850s and Hackfeld bought and outfitted several whalers, brought in Pacific Coast lumber beginning in 1855 and engaged in the trans-shipment trade.

By 1855, Hackfeld operated two stores, served as agent for two sugar plantations, and represented the governments of Russia, Sweden and Norway. (Later the firm or its principals also represented Austro-Hungary, Belgium and Germany.)  When Hackfeld left on a two-year business trip to Germany and Pflueger took charge in his absence.  (Greaney)

In 1871 Hackfeld and Pflueger both went back to Europe to launch a German affiliate in Bremen. There they placed into service a line of ships sailing under the Hawaiian flag between Bremen and Honolulu with wheat, oil, wool and hides for the Islands and sugar shipments on the way back.

The old Honolulu Courthouse site was advertised for sale at auction in the Pacific Commercial Advertiser of May 9, 1874; H Hackfeld & Co bought it at the upset price of $20,000. As reported by the Hawaiian Gazette, “It is the best business stand in Honolulu.”

Then, the Treaty of Reciprocity (1875) between the US and the Kingdom of Hawai‘i eliminated the major trade barrier to Hawai‘i’s closest and major market.  Through the treaty, the US gained Pearl Harbor and Hawai‘i’s sugar planters received duty-free entry into US markets.  Sugar boomed.

In 1881, Hackfeld and Paul Isenberg became partners.  Isenberg, who had arrived in Hawaiʻi in 1858, had extensive experience in the sugar industry, previously working under Judge Duncan McBryde and Rev. William Harrison Rice in Kōloa and Lihuʻe.

From that time on Mr. Isenberg was a factor in the development of the Hackfeld business, which became one of the largest in Hawaiʻi.

Hackfeld became the first Swedish and Norwegian Consul in the Islands. In 1862, he returned to Hamburg, and afterwards to Bremen, where he settled and managed the business of H. Hackfeld & Co. there until 1886, when he retired from the firm.  In 1886 Hackfeld sold his interest in the company and returned to Germany; he died there on October 20, 1887.

When the partnership was incorporated in 1897, a new building was erected at the corner of Fort and Queen Streets; it stood there for 70-years.

After the US annexation of Hawaii in 1898, Isenberg returned to Germany to live; however, he retained the role of president, with Hackfeld’s son, Johan (John) Friedrich Hackfeld serving as 1st vice president and Isenberg’s son, Alexander Isenberg as 2nd vice president.

John later took over; however, he, too, returned to Germany in 1900.  His cousin, George F Rodiek, became the executive in charge of H Hackfeld & Co.  (Weiner)  In 1905, Rodiek built an estate in Nuʻuanu.

A few years later, with the advent of the US involvement in World War I, things changed significantly for the worst for the folks at H Hackfeld & Co.

In 1918, using the terms of the Trading with the Enemy Act and its amendments, the US government seized H Hackfeld & Company and ordered the sale of German-owned shares.  (Jung)

The Alien Property Custodian’s Office noted, “The powerful German hold on the sugar industry of the Hawaiian islands has been crushed. The control of Hawaii’s most important industry has been restored to its people.”

“This is the effect of the announcement of A Mitchell Palmer, alien property custodian, that he had completed the Americanization of the H Hackfeld Co, the threat German owned corporation which for years has played so important a part in the sugar situation of the Hawaiian islands.”

“Mr. Palmer Americanized this German concern by … selling the entire assets and business of the German Hackfeld Co to (an) American company, whose stockholders are all loyal American citizens, most of them residents of the Hawaiian islands.”  (Alien Property Custodian’s Office; Daily News Almanac, 1919)

The patriotic sounding “American Factors, Ltd,” the newly-formed Hawaiʻi-based corporation, whose largest shareholders included Alexander & Baldwin, C Brewer & Company, Castle & Cooke, HP Baldwin Ltd, Matson Navigation Company and Welch & Company, bought the H Hackfeld stock.  (Jung)  Thus, the German-started H Hackfeld & Co became one of Hawaiʻi’s “Big Five.”

(Hawaiʻi’s Big 5 were: Amfac – starting as Hackfeld & Company (1849;) Alexander & Baldwin (1870;) Theo H. Davies (1845;) Castle & Cooke (1851) and C. Brewer (1826.))

At that same time, the BF Ehlers dry goods store also took the patriotic “Liberty House” name.  In 1937 a second store was opened in the Waikiki area. Eventually there would be seven stores on Oahu, and several more on the other islands.

During the 1970s, Liberty House expanded into California, Nevada and Washington, but the Washington stores were sold in 1979 and the California and Nevada locations were sold in 1984.  In 2001, Federated Department Stores Inc bought Liberty House, Hawaiʻi’s oldest and largest department store chain, and turned it into Macy’s.

American Factors shortened its name to “Amfac” in 1966.  The next year (1967,) Henry Alexander Walker became president and later Board Chairman.  Walker bought the former Rodiek estate.

Over the next 15-years, Walker took Amfac from a company that largely depended on sugar production in Hawaiʻi to a broadly diversified conglomerate. After adding so many companies, Amfac sales were $1.3 billion by 1976, up from $575 million in 1971.  (hbs-edu)

After subsequent sales of controlling interests in the company and liquidation of land and other assets, in 2002, the once dominant business in Hawaiʻi, the biggest of the Hawaiʻi Big Five, Amfac Hawaiʻi, LLC filed for federal bankruptcy protection.  (TGI)

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Wetland Taro

Wākea and Papa, sky-father and earth-mother, who by the ʻOpūkahonua lineage were half-brother and half-sister, were said to be the parents of islands, Hawaiʻi and Maui (and later Kauaʻi, Niʻihau, Lehua, and Kaʻula – the rest were added later.)  According to tradition, their first human offspring was a daughter, Hoʻohōkūkalani (to generate stars in the sky.)

Wākea seduced his daughter, Hoʻohōkūkalani.  Their first child was born prematurely; they named him Hāloa-naka (quivering long stalk.)  They buried him in the earth and from that spot grew the first kalo (taro) plant. The second child, named Hāloa in honor of his elder brother, was the first Hawaiian Aliʻi Nui and became the ancestor of all the Hawaiian people.

Thus kalo, which was the main staple of the people of old, is also the older brother of the Hawaiian race.

Traditions on the island of Oʻahu provide the names of a dynasty of ruling chiefs including Mā’ilikūkahi, around 1500 (about the time Columbus crossed the Atlantic.) Māʻilikūkahi is said to have enacted a code of laws in which theft from the people by chiefs was forbidden.

A son of Mā’ilikūkahi was Kalona-nui, who in turn had a son called Kalamakua. Kalamakua is said to have been responsible for developing large taro gardens in what was once a vast area of wet-taro cultivation on Oʻahu: the Waikiki-Kapahulu-Mōʻiliʻili-Mānoa area. The extensive pond fields were irrigated by water drawn from the Mānoa and Pālolo Valley streams and large springs in the area.

Other chiefs mentioned in Oʻahu traditions were associated with organizing activities in more systematic ways than those in times previous to them; one such high chief was Kākuhihewa.

Another great chief of Oʻahu, Kualiʻi, was famous for the kolowalu law: “If a man says, ‘I am hungry for food’ feed (him) with food, lest he hungers and claims his rights by swearing the kolowalu law by his mouth, whereby that food becomes free, so that the owner thereof must observe the law faithfully.”

In pre-contact (prior to Captain Cook) times, kalo played a vital role in Hawaiian culture. It was not only the Hawaiians’ staple food, but the cultivation of kalo was at the very core of Hawaiian culture and identity.

The early Hawaiians probably planted kalo in marshes near the mouths of rivers. Over years of progressive expansion of kalo lo‘i (flooded taro patches) up slopes and along rivers, kalo cultivation in Hawai‘i reached a unique level of engineering and sustainable sophistication.

Hawaiians knew the productive advantages of growing wetland taro and placed the greater effort in this area very early, when required to increase food production capabilities for the rapidly increasing number of people. By the time of Captain Cook’s visits in 1778 and 1779, every large river valley in the islands contained many loʻi (pond fields,) and each was systematically irrigated by means of ditches delivering water to the fields spread throughout the valley.

Usually, water was fed into an irrigation ditch from a stream. A loose-rock dam built across the stream allowed water to flow between and over the top of the rocks to provide for farmers living downstream. The dam functioned to raise the water level just high enough at that point to permit water to flow into the ditch leading to the terraces.

In this way the amount and speed of the water could be controlled. If too much water was found to be flowing into the ditch, a few stones could be removed from the dam, thus lowering the water level and reducing the volume of water entering the ditch.

The speed of the flow of water into the pondfields was controlled by the length and slope of the ditch. By varying the length and grade of the ditch, its builders were able to maintain a constant and low-level gradient over variegated terrain. The flow through the pond fields was controlled by the height of the terraces.

Kalo lo‘i systems are typically a set of adjoining terraces that are typically reinforced with stone walls and soil berms. Wetland taro thrives on flooded conditions, and cool, circulating water is optimal for taro growth, thus a system may include one or more ʻauwai (irrigation ditches) to divert water into and out of the planting area.  (McElroy)

The ʻauwai construction and maintenance formed foundations around which an entire economy, class system and culture functioned.  The ʻauwai, lo‘i and the taro plant’s mythical and spiritual connections in Hawaiian society influenced individual and social activity within the ahupua‘a.  (Handy, HART)

The different representatives in the ahupuaʻa taking part in the work furnished men according to the number of kalo growers on each land.  (The quantity of water awarded to irrigate the loʻi was according to the number of workers and the amount of work put into the building of the ʻauwai.)

David Malo explained how a taro garden could keep a large number of people in vegetable food continuously:  “Some farmers did not plant a great deal at a time. They would plant a little, and after waiting a few months, they planted more land. So they continued to plant a little at a time during the months suitable for planting. The food did not all ripen at once, and by this plan the supply was kept up for a long time and they had no lack of food.”

On the question of the productivity of wet-land taro versus dry-land taro, some missionaries recorded their experiences and observations in 1847 and 1848. They helped answer the question: What number of people could be fed by one acre of land, of average quality in the district, if cultivated for kalo?

Rev. Armstrong suggested that there would be ‘food enough for ten persons’ on an acre of average taro land in Honolulu, that is, subsistence for ten persons.  “With proper management, kalo (taro) land needs no rest. So the natives tell me. Let the water be kept constantly upon it and the weeds cleared out and that is all that is needed. The kalo plants, however, must be changed every crop. It requires about a year to bring a crop of kalo to maturity.”  (Armstrong)

Rev. Johnson of Hanalei, Kauaʻi, a noted wetland taro-producing valley, suggested that 25 people subsist on an acre of good taro land.

Writing from his experiences on the well-watered windward side of Oʻahu, Rev. Parker wrote:  “An acre of kalo land would furnish food for from twenty to thirty persons, if properly taken care of. It will produce crops for a great many years in succession, without lying fallow any time.”

Rev. Bishop, writing from ʻEwa District on Oʻahu, suggested that 15-20 people could be fed from an acre of taro:  “Good kalo land, irrigated by water, improves by cultivation. It only requires time enough between crops to rot the weeds, which serve as manure.”

Rev. Emerson lived and worked in Waialua District on Oʻahu where several large rivers and numerous springs watered the land.

He wrote: “Twenty persons, I think can be fed on an acre of good kalo land. The land can generally be cultivated perpetually, if it has two or three months between each crop, in which to decompose the weeds which might grow during the time the kalo was ripening.”

“I have a large kalo patch that has not been left to rest one month at a time for fifteen years, and yet it produces as largely as fifteen years since. I presume the same parch was cultivated centuries before I knew it. It requires one year for kalo to come to maturity.”

In 6 to 12-months, depending upon plant variety along with soil and water conditions, the taro is generally ready to harvest. Each parent tuber produces from two to 15 ʻohā, side tubers of corms, up to 6 inches in diameter.

The Hawaiian concept of family, ‘ohana, is derived from the word ‘ohā (Fig., offspring, youngsters,) the axillary shoots of kalo that sprout from the main corm, the makua (parent.)  Huli, cut from the tops of mauka and ‘ohā are then used for replanting to regenerate the cycle of kalo production.

Taro or Kalo has been a traditional form of food sustenance and nutrition, particularly in ancient Hawaiian culture.  Reportedly, it is the world’s fourteenth most-consumed vegetable.  All parts of the plant are eaten, including poi, table taro (the cooked corm,) taro chips and luau leaf.

The foregoing information (primarily from Marion Kelly and Lilikalā Kameʻeleihiwa (with some help from some others to fill some gaps)) helps answer some of the When, Why, Where and How Much questions related to wetland taro farming.

The 22nd Annual East Maui Taro Festival is being held May 3-4, 2014.

The image shows kalo (Markell.)  In addition, I have included more related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park (KAHO)

Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park (KAHO) was established in the Kekaha region of North Kona (Kailua to Kalaoa) in 1978 in order to preserve and protect traditional native Hawaiian culture and cultural sites.

The park is the site of an ancient Hawaiian settlement and is considered a locale of considerable cultural and historical significance. Cultural resources include fishponds, petroglyphs and a heiau (temple.)

The physical location of Kaloko-Honokōhau made the settlement easy to manage. Situated on the lower portions of a sloping terrain, the settlement’s activities were directed by kahuna chiefs, from a vantage point, such as the bluff overlooking the fishpond of ʻAimakapā, where a commanding view of Kaloko-Honokōhau was available.

“In ancient times, the chiefs would regularly live along the shore, that is, the chiefs of Kaloko and Honokōhau. At the place called Ahauhale, is where the chiefs of Kaloko lived. The place called Waihalulu, is where the chiefs of Honokōhau lived.”  (“Ka Wai o Kahinihini‘ula” (1923) Kumu Pono)

“There were men, women, and children, the houses were filled with large families. Truly there were many people (in Kekaha.) …  The lands of Honokōhau were filled with people in those days, there were many women and children with whom I traveled with joy in the days of my youth.  Kaloko was the same … Those families are all gone, and the land is quiet. There are no people, only the rocks remain, and a few scattered trees growing, and only occasionally does one meet with a man today”.  (“Na Hoonanea o ka Manawa” (1924) Kumu Pono)

The two dominant features in the Kaloko-Honokōhau National Park are Kaloko and ʻAimakapā Ponds.  (Prior to conversion and utilization as ponds, they were originally inland bays.)

The two ponds are different types of Hawaiian fishponds.  Kaloko is a loko kuapā (what we consider the typical coastal fishpond, artificially enclosed by an arc-shaped seawall (or in this case a seawall enclosing the mouth of a small bay) and containing at least one sluice gate (mākāhā.))

ʻAimakapā is a loko puʻuone (an shore fishpond containing either brackish or a mixture of brackish and fresh water, formed by development of a barrier beach paralleling the coast and connected to the ocean by a channel or ditch.)

Nearby (also in the Park) are the remnants of the ʻAiʻōpio fishtrap.  An opening in the trap to the sea enabled fish to enter, and the walled sections of the trap allowed fish to be stored until needed.

At high tide, fish entered the trap by swimming through the seaward opening or over the submerged walls.  At low tide, the fish were trapped in the enclosure and were easily netted.  Fishtraps differ from fishponds in that the fish are trapped and caught, but not raised.

The 1,160 acre park, a landscape of rugged lava rock, was at one time a thriving ancient Hawaiian settlement. More than 200 archeological sites document the Hawaiian’s use of the area over time.

The Hawaiians of this ancient settlement harvested fish from the sea and from fishponds they constructed. They grew coconuts, sweet potatoes and gourds and raised chickens and pigs.

Those living closest to the shore harvested fish and other food from the sea, while others living within the ahupuaʻa (sea to mountain land division) grew staple resources such as taro, breadfruit, paper mulberry, wood, and fiber for clothing. To ensure everyone’s survival, they would trade these items with one another.

Archeological resources at Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park also include kahua (ancient house site platforms), heiau (temples,) a holua (toboggan slide), kiʻi pōhaku (petroglyphs), papamu (kokane game boards), stone enclosures, ahus (stone mounds that serve as altars, shrines, or security mounds), lava tube shelters and parts of the Māmalahoa Trail (Kings trail.)

Of all the Aliʻi associated with Kaloko-Honokōhau, the most famous is Kamehameha l, who settled and established his Royal Center at Kamakahonu in Kailua-Kona.  (Some believe Kamehameha was buried at Kaloko.  Kaloko is also believed to be the resting place of King Kahekili from Maui.)

Hale Ho’okipa Visitor Center, the Hawaii Pacific Parks Association store, and the adjoining parking area are open from 8:30 am to 4:00 PM daily.  (The Kaloko road gate is open from 8:00 am to 5:00 PM daily.)  Admission to the park is Free.

The image shows Kaloko Fishpond at Kaloko-Honokōhau National Historical Park (USGS.)  In addition, I have added other images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Nāhiku Rubber Company

Nāhiku comes from “Na Ehiku” meaning “the Seven” and it relates to the seven stars of the constellation Pleiades, or the Seven Sisters – suggesting seven lands.  This area is just outside of Hāna.

Nāhiku is a fertile ahupuaʻa that was cleared and terraced with irrigated taro cultivation by the Hawaiians. To the east of Nāhiku out to Hamoa, the land slopes gently down to the ocean. No large gulches or streams run through the ahupua’a, although there is plenty of rain.

Along the shore there was a hala forest that extended from ʻUlaʻino to Hāna. The forests above Nāhiku were traditionally forested with native trees such as koa, ʻōhiʻa lehua and sandalwood. Many plants that were used for native medicine also grew there.
 In modern times, when Hāna was without a road, and the coastal steamer arrived on a weekly schedule, Hāna-bound travelers unwilling to wait for the boat drove their car to the road’s end at Kailua, rode horseback to Kaumahina ridge, then walked down the switchback into Honomanu Valley. Friends carried them on flatbed taro trucks across the Keʻanae peninsula to Wailua cove. (Wenkam, NPS)

By outrigger canoe it was a short ride beyond Wailua to Nāhiku landing where they could borrow a car for the rest of the involved trip to Hāna. Sometimes the itinerary could be completed in a day. Bad weather could make it last a week.  (Wenkam, NPS)

Today, Nāhiku is located off Hāna Highway (360) on Nāhiku Road between Wailua and Hāna.  Just past the 25-mile marker, you head makai on Nāhiku Road about three miles down to the bay. Nearby is the Pua’a Ka’a State Wayside for picnicking, as well as the Kopilula and Waikani Falls. The lower Hanawi Falls is located in Nāhiku.

Nāhiku is the site of an attempt to create a rubber plantation on Maui. The need for automobile tires made rubber a valuable product in the late-1800s.  In 1898, Mr. Hugh Howell, of Nāhiku, obtained some seeds of the Manihot glaziovii (Brazilian) and planted them in Nāhiku. These seem to be the first trees of any commercial species that have been tried.

After some initial experimentation in producing rubber, the company was not started until it was definitely ascertained that rubber trees of the best quality would grow at Nāhiku, and the yield of rubber from these trees was sufficient to make it a profitable investment. A number of trees of the Ceara variety have been growing at Nāhiku for six years, and when these were tapped it was found that the rubber obtained was equal to the best.  (Thrum)

The first Hawai’i rubber company incorporated in 1905 and on February 4, 1907, the Nāhiku Rubber Plantation was officially established. It was the first rubber plantation on American soil.

There are many thousands of acres of land on the Islands where it is rainy and not too windy, where rubber will thrive, and if this first rubber company proves a success, it is hoped that many other rubber companies will be started.
As this is the first rubber plantation ever started on American soil the officials of the Department of Agriculture at Washington arc greatly interested in its success, and are doing everything they can to help it along. (Thrum, 1905)

According to ‘Rubber World’ 7 (1913,) rubber was steadily becoming an important Hawaiian product.  On the island of Maui many trees have been planted and these are tapped in large numbers.  Steady efforts are being made to improve the methods of preparation in order to increase the marketable value: 35,000-trees were tapped during 1912, and altogether some 8,000-pounds of rubber were produced, most of which was exported.  For 1913, an output of 20,000-pounds is anticipated.  (Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, 1913)

Attention has been directed to an indigenous rubber tree (Euphorbia lorifolia) which grows in several localities; one place in particular on the Island of Hawaiʻi has 6,000-trees averaging 75-trees to the acre, whose product is 14-17 per cent of rubber and 60 per cent resin (chicle.)  It is reported that the latex contains 42 per cent of solid material and that one man can collect 16-30 pounds of crude product per day.  (Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, 1913)

Others followed the Nāhiku Rubber Company, each were in the area around Nāhiku:
Company………………Founded…Acres
Nāhiku Rubber Co……..1905…….480
Hawaii-American Co…..1903…… 245
Koʻolau Rubber Co…….1906……..275
Nāhiku Sugar Co……….1906……..250
Pacific Development…1907……..250
(Journal of Industrial and Engineering Chemistry, 1913)

Cultivation grew with companies and individuals controlling nearly 5,600-acres of land on Maui, Kauai, Oahu and the Big Island.

At the height of the rubber production, Nāhiku had a Chinese grocery and post office, a plantation general store; Protestant, Mormon and Catholic churches and a schoolhouse attended by twenty children. One visitor to the area in 1910 said, “Every place has its peculiarities and characteristics; so with Nāhiku. It is rubber, first, last and all the time there.”

However, the quality and quantity of rubber produced by these plantations, despite the hard work of the laborers (who were paid 50 cents for a ten-hour day with a 30-minute lunch break) was not good enough to make a substantial profit for the investors. The companies began to phase out production as early as 1912. The oldest of the rubber companies, the Nāhiku Rubber Plantation, closed on January 20, 1915.
 After the rubber plantations closed, some residents moved out of Nāhiku. Those who stayed resumed cultivating bananas and taro for food. Some tried growing bananas as a cash crop and when this didn’t work began growing roselle for jelly. Eventually these attempts also failed. The exodus out of Nāhiku to the “outside” continued.
 According to U.S. Census Bureau statistics, in 1930 there were only 182 people living in Nāhiku. Of them, 101 were Hawaiian. By 1941 only fifteen families and two non-Hawaiian families lived there, clustered around a one-room school and the churches.

In December, 1942, Territorial Governor Ingram Stainback tried to help the World War II effort by sending 40 prisoners from Oʻahu Prison to the Keanae Prison Camp (now the YMCA camp) to revive the old Nāhiku rubber plantation. The plan was to produce 20,000 to 50,000 pounds of crude rubber annually. The plan did not work.  Now, rubber trees left over from that time line the roads of Nāhiku.

The image shows Nāhiku Rubber trees (Ka Nupepa Kuokoa, 12-07-1906.)  In addition I have added other images related to the property in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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