Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young 3 Comments

Ginaca

‘Pineapple’ was given its English name because of its resemblance to a pine cone. It was first recorded in the Islands in 1813 by Don Francisco de Paula Marin, a Spanish adviser to King Kamehameha I.

Although sugar dominated the Hawaiian economy, there was also great demand at the time for fresh Hawaiian pineapples in San Francisco; then, canned pineapple.

The pineapple canning industry began in Baltimore in the mid-1860s and used fruit imported from the Caribbean. (Bartholomew)

Commercial pineapple production (which started about 1890 with hand peeling and cutting operations) soon developed a procedure based on classifying the fruit into a number of grades by diameter centering the pineapple on the core axis and cutting fruit cylinders to provide slices to fit the No. 1, 2 and 2-1/2 can sizes. (ASME)

Up to about 1913, various types of hand operated sizing and coring machines were used to perform this operation. The ends of the pineapple were first cut off by hand. The pineapple was then centered on the core and sized.

Production rates were about 10 to 15 pineapples per minute. A large amount of labor was required, and it was not practical to recover the available juice material from the skins. (ASME)

The first profitable lot of canned pineapples was produced by Dole’s Hawaiian Pineapple Company in 1903 and the industry grew rapidly from there. (Bartholomew) In 1907 Hawaiian Pineapple Company opened it cannery in Iwilei.

About 1911, Henry Gabriel Ginaca of the Honolulu Iron Works Company, Honolulu, was engaged by Mr James Dole, founder of Hawaiian Pineapple Company, to develop the machine which made the Hawaiian pineapple industry possible and which bears his name today. (ASME)

The early Ginaca had a production capacity of about 50 pineapples per minute and required from three to five operators depending on how much inspection of the machine product was performed at the machine.

The increase in production from 15 to 50 pineapples per minute was enough to reduce the cannery size to economical proportions and made possible the design of efficient preparation lines. Once the new preparation and handling systems were proven the industry grew rapidly.

The term “Ginaca” is now generally applied to a variety of machines which are designed to automatically center the pineapple on the core, cut out a fruit cylinder, eradicate the crushed and juice material from the outer skin, cut off the ends and remove the central fibrous core.

The cored cylinder leaving the Ginaca machine is then passed to a preparation line where each fruit is treated individually to remove cylinder defects or adhering bits of skin. (ASME)

After a number of years of constantly increasing production, a new high-speed machine was designed at the Hawaiian Pineapple Company capable of preparing from 90 to 100 pineapples per minute depending on fruit size.

The Ginaca machine made canning pineapple economically possible. As a result, until the “jet age” Hawaii had an agricultural economy and pineapple was the second largest crop (behind sugar.)

Henry Ginaca was born May 19, 1876. The records are not clear whether he was born in California or in Winnemucca, Nevada, where his father had worked as a civil engineer. His father was Italian, his mother French.

While a teenager, he became an apprentice at the old Union Iron Works in San Francisco. He also took a course in mathematics to enable him to become a mechanical draftsman.

He was hired by the Honolulu Iron Works and came to Honolulu, apparently to work on engine designs. Dole later hired Ginaca to work specifically on a mechanical fruit peeling and coring machine.

He joined Hawaiian Pineapple Co in March, 1911, at a salary of $300 per month, a substantial wage in those days. Ginaca was 35 years old.

In the first year of Ginaca’s employment he came up with the initial design for his machine. From then until 1914 he added improvements and refinements to it.

Though many “bugs” had to be worked out, Ginaca’s machine was a success from the beginning. The machine was awarded a gold medal at the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco in 1915.

In 1914 Ginaca and his two brothers decided to return to the mainland and try their hand at mining. The mining ventures of the three brothers were failures.

For Henry Ginaca, a productive career came to an untimely end on October 19, 1918, when he died of influenza and pneumonia at the old Mother Lode mining camp of Hornitos. He was only 42. (ASME)

Dole bought the island of Lānaʻi and established a vast 200,000-acre pineapple plantation to meet the growing demands. Lānaʻi throughout the entire 20th century produced more than 75% of world’s total pineapple.

By 1930 Hawai‘i led the world in the production of canned pineapple and had the world’s largest canneries. Production and sale of canned pineapple fell sharply during the world depression that began in 1929, but rapid growth in the volume of canned juice after 1933 restored industry profitability.

But establishment of plantations and canneries in the Philippines in 1964 and in Thailand in 1972, led to a decline in Hawai‘i (mainly because foreign-based canneries had labor costs approximately one-tenth those in Hawai‘i.) As the Hawaii canneries closed, the industry gradually shifted to the production of fresh pineapples. (Bartholomew)

In 1991, the Dole Cannery closed. Today, Dole Food Company, headquartered on the continent, is a well-established name in the field of growing and packaging food products such as pineapples, bananas, strawberries, grapes and many others.

The Dole Plantation tourist attraction, established in 1950 as a small fruit stand but greatly expanded in 1989 serves as a living museum and historical archive of Dole and pineapple in Hawai‘i.

© 2026 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Tree-named Hotels

Edward Payson Irwin was born in DeWitt, Iowa, May 7, 1875; he graduated from the University of Kansas in 1897.  After enlisting and serving in the US Army during the Spanish-American War, he came to Hawai‘i in 1906 to be a reporter for the Bulletin. (HSA)

“Irwin was an accomplished newsman who acted as a gadfly over many years against the establishment and its press and against the fiscal ‘extravagance’ of the government. Progressive in politics and social issues.” (Guide to newspapers of Hawaiʻi, 1834-2000, Chapin)

Irwin served as City Editor and later Editor for the Advertiser. He later founded and was editor for the Weekly Times (also called the Honolulu Times). (Hawai‘i Sate Archives) He worked at other publications.

Irwin developed an interest in Waikīkī.  Historically, Waikīkī encompassed fishponds, taro lo‘i, coconut groves and a reef-protected beach that accommodated Hawaiian canoes.

Waikīkī shifted from agricultural to residential uses, with private residences for the Hawaiian royalty and the well-to-do.  Near the turn of the 20th century, some of these homes were converted into small hotels and eventually into world-class resorts.

Robert Lewers (whose firm Lewers & Cooke supplied much of the lumber for O‘ahu homes) built a two-story wooden frame bungalow with an open veranda overlooking a coconut grove in 1883. 

In 1907, Irwin leased the Lewers’ house and converted the structure into a small hotel called the Hau Tree, in honor of the many trees that shaded the beachside lawn. (Halekulani)

Irwin had another tree-named hotel; this time in central O‘ahu.

“Wahiawa is 25 miles from town by rail. It is the original pineapple district founded by a colony of American agriculturists in 1899. It is a small village surrounded by pineapple fields, and being of an elevation of 1000 feet offers to pleasure-seekers and those seeking the cool atmosphere, recreation and rest.” (Aloha Guide, 1915)

It “also (has) several stores, markets, shops, laundry, etc., and two pineapple canneries. Now that the mails come twice a day by rail instead of twice a week by stage from Pearl City, as was the case formerly, a number of Honolulu people have built country houses.”  (Paradise of the Pacific, Oct/Nov 1905)

Mr and Mrs Henry C Brown converted their Wahiawa home into the “Malukukui, their home-hotel among the pineapples at Wahiawa.”  (Hawaiian Gazette, September 29, 1909)

“(I)ll health sent them to seek a quiet country life. They settled in Wahiawa, the largest pineapple country in the world, where they bought several acres of ground and built their home, evolving from it a small country inn in which they are now able to accommodate some fifty guests.”

“Every room has a fine view either over the restful pineapple fields or down the deep ravine on the edge of which the house is built. In the distance can be seen magnificent mountain ranges and glimpses of the Pacific ten miles distant.”  (The Craftsman, 1909)

Then, in 1911, Trent Trust Co placed advertisements offering the Malukukui and its 10-acres of land for sale or lease. This was followed by, “The lease giving EP Irwin the control of the Wahiawa country resort formerly the Malukukui Hotel was signed yesterday by the trustees of the Atherton estate and the new proprietor took possession at once.”

“Numerous expensive additions and repairs about the place have been already planned and will be immediately executed increasing the capacity of the hotel and making it cosier and nearer the standards of the comfort in city hostelries.”

“An automobile will meet the trains at Wahiawa from the hotel and in its off moments act as a link between the Hau tree Irwins Waikiki Hotel and his new Wahiawa enterprise.” (Hawaiian Gazette, March 7, 1911)

“The Kukui Tree, formerly known as Malukukui, at Wahiawa, is now open and ready to receive guests. Extensive Improvement are under way and will soon be completed. No place in Hawaii is as suitable to spend a week end at as the Kukui Tree.”

“Run up today or tomorrow and stay over Sunday and see if this is not true. If you try it once, The Kukui Tree will become a habit with you. The table is excellent, as are the accommodations. Inquiries may be made of EP Irwin, at the Hau Tree, phone 1389.” (Hawaiian Star, March 24, 1911)

“The necessity for a place such as Mr Irwin has reopened exists and he deserves all the patronage his enterprise should bring him. As managers of the Hau Tree at Waikiki, Mr and Mrs Irwin have demonstrated the fact that they know how. (Hawaiian Gazette, March 24, 1911)

However, “The Kukui Tree would pay big in the hands of anyone who could get a liquor license, or who would run a blind pig. … EP Irwin has decided to close the Kukui Tree, at Wahiawa. …”

“The place has not been paying. Mr. Irwin will devote all his attention now to his Waikiki place, the well known Hau Tree.”  (Hawaiian Star, July 17, 1911) 

However, Irwin’s Waikīkī enterprise also faltered, his lease expired, and the landowners ran an ad for new tenants. (Halekulani)

 “Despite its location and modest rent, the business they took over was little better than a boarding house. There were three guests the day they moved into their 40-guest capacity hotel.” (From “Hali‘a Aloha o Halekulani”; Halekulani)

Nearby, the J Atherton Gilman family bought 3-acres and built a two-story house from a man named Hall.  La Vancha Maria Chapin Gray rented the Gilman house in 1912 and converted it into a boarding house and named it Gray’s-by-the-Beach.  The sandy area fronting it was soon referred to as Gray’s Beach.

In 1917, Clifford and Juliet Kimball acquired the Hau Tree Inn near Gray’s Beach and, in the late 1920s, they decided to expand and bought the Gilman property, including Gray’s-by-the-Sea and an adjacent parcel belonging to Arthur Brown.

When their expansion project was completed, the Kimballs had acquired over five acres of prime Waikīkī beachfront for their resort, which they named Halekūlani, or “house befitting heaven.” 

© 2026 Ho‘okuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Gooneyville Lodge

Midway is an atoll in the middle of the northern Pacific. It is about 3,200 miles west of San Francisco, about 3,600 miles east of Shanghai, China, and approximately 1,300 miles northwest of Oahu. (HABS UM-1)

(An island is a body of land surrounded by water.  (Continents are also surrounded by water, but because they are so big, they are not considered islands.) An atoll is a ring-shaped coral reef, island, or series of islets. The atoll surrounds a body of water called a lagoon. (National Geographic))

In January 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt placed Midway Atoll under the control of the U.S. Navy. A few months later, the Commercial Pacific Cable Company brought in the first permanent residents of Midway Atoll.

Their mission was to install and maintain a trans-Pacific telegraph cable as part of the first round-the-world communications system. The cable company constructed four two-story buildings. (Friends of Midway)

Midway Atoll’s three small islands (Sand, Spit, and Eastern (W2E)) provide a virtually predator-free safe haven for largest nesting colonies of Laysan and Black-footed Albatrosses in the world.  (FWS)

Beautiful in flight, but ungainly in their movement on land, the albatrosses were called “gooney birds” (or just “gooneys”) by the men stationed on the islands during World War II. (Marine Conservation Institute)

Midway’s gooneys did not become widely known until Pan American Airways built a base for its transpacific clippers on the mid-Pacific atoll in 1935.

Pan American Airways pioneered the transpacific air route between the US mainland and China, using US jurisdictions and territories across the Pacific as “stepping stones.” This extended the American Home Front westward, and sparked Americans’ imaginations and their excitement for the Airline. (NPS)

These large flying boats flew from San Francisco to China, marking the fastest and most luxurious route to the Orient at that time.  This service not only connected distant regions but also brought tourists to Midway, operating until 1941​​.

Pan Am’s establishment of Midway Island as a stopover was part of a larger strategy to set up refueling stops across the Pacific, which included locations in Hawai’i, Wake Island, Guam, and the Philippines.  (Midway-Island)

In April 1935 Pan Am began the construction of an intermediate base at Midway for their air route from the U.S. mainland to the Orient. Their air route across the Pacific used seaplanes, so no runways were needed, but a wooden dock and a mooring barge in the lagoon were constructed. (HABS UM-1)

The latter is where the seaplanes discharged cargo and passengers; they were then carried to the dock in small boats. Carrying air mail had been the first intended use for the Pan American planes, but demand for passenger service became so great, plans were drawn up to includes hotels at the isolated bases.  (HABS UM-1)

A prefabricated hotel building was sent out. It was Y-shaped, with the lounge and dining room in the center and 20 rooms in each of the two flanking wings. Other prefabricated buildings were erected for the permanent base crew.

In 1938 the Pan American Airways settlement consisted of some 20 frame buildings, including “a machine shop, refrigerator plant, radio station, radio beacon, offices, and power plant”.

In 1939, “There are three ‘towns’ on this island: Cable City [for Commercial Pacific Cable company], Gooneyville [Pan Am’s facilities] and Used [the US Engineering Department] …”

“… but there are no boulevards, no street lamps, no telephone poles, no fire hydrants, no dogs, no traffic cops, no neon signs, no drug stores, no theaters, no daily newspapers (except a couple of sheets of news furnished by courtesy of the cable company). no post office, no almost anything!”

Buildings were “amidst a multitude of nesting white gooneys the Pan American Airways people staked claim and moved in on April 7, 1935. Neat, huff-colored cottages and work shops, all red-roofed, are scattered over the sandscape …”

“… unpainted board walks run along the cottage side of ruts in the sand which mark the main thoroughfare, while the PAA hotel – the first and only one of the island – sprawls apart by itself, a huge blue-trimmed ivory Y surrounded by wide-eyed gooneys and recently planted shrubbery.” (Adv, Apr 3, 1939)

During WWII, the military took over Midway … the Pan American Airways hotel was taken over as a recreation and recuperation center for the submariners, and its name changed to “Gooneyville Lodge” (HABS UM-1) A golf course received world-wide billing as the only one with gooney birds nesting on fairways. (Aldrich)

The Japanese planned to assault and occupy the atoll in order to threaten an invasion of Hawaiʻi and draw the American naval forces that had survived the attack on Pearl Harbor out into an ambush against the brunt of the Imperial Japanese Navy.

Midway was of vital importance to both Japanese and American war strategies in World War II, and the raid on the atoll was one of the most significant battles of the war, marking a major shift in the balance of power between the United States and Japan.

As dawn approached at around 0430, June 4, 1942, the American carriers (Enterprise, Hornet, and Yorktown) were about 300 miles north north-east of Midway. Their Japanese counterparts (Akagi, Kaga, Sōryū and Hiryū) were 250 miles northwest of the atoll.

In their attack, the Imperial Japanese Navy lost two thirds of its fleet aircraft carriers (four Japanese aircraft carriers and their accompanying aircraft and crews.) The loss of USS Yorktown was a major blow to the US, but the American wartime production of men and materiel would soon make up the difference and outpace that of the Japanese.

While the primary carrier fleet engagement occurred well to the north of Midway Atoll, much of the “secondary” action occurred within or originated from the atoll.

The Battle of Midway (June 4-7, 1942) is considered the most decisive US victory and is referred to as the “turning point” of World War II in the Pacific.  The victory allowed the United States and its allies to move into an offensive position.

Then, in 1950, “Midway atoll, the United States’ oldest off-shore possession and once a bristling sentinel of the North Pacific, is being turned over to its first settlers, Gooney Birds.”

“The navy has ordered its personnel out by June 30, and long before then Pan American Airways and Civil Aeronautics administration employes will have packed up and left. … The navy’s deserted submarine base and two strategic airfields will be only symbols of America’s Pacific war strength.” (Adv, Apr 30, 1950)

“One navy wife explained the sentiments of the islands’ departing residents: ‘They must have called it Midway because its halfway between Heaven and Earth.’” (Adv, Apr 30, 1950)

Today, the US Fish and Wildlife Service staff, volunteers and contractors live on Midway to support the recovery and integrity of wildlife habitat and species while balancing their own human impact on the land and seascape, and protecting historical resources.  (FWS)

While in the chain of islands, atolls, and seamounts of the Hawaiian Islands Archipelago, Midway is part of the US but not part of the State of Hawai‘i. (The Hawai‘i Admission Act (Public Law 86-3, March 18, 1959) excluded Midway – “The State of Hawaii shall consist of all the islands … but said State shall not be deemed to include the Midway Islands …”)

https://maps.app.goo.gl/xrFBTvL3miZPr84R8

A little personal side story … When Pan Am used Midway and Wake as stopping points for flights across the Pacific, my grandmother (Laura Sutherland) was Assistant Head Librarian for the Library of Hawai‘i in charge of the “Extension Department.”

My grandmother took advantage of these flights and expanded the reach of her “Extension Department” by supplying reading material to residents on Midway and Wake, with the cooperation of Pan Am.  Each week, a new supply of books was added to the flights in what is believed to be America’s only Flying Library Service.

© 2026 Ho‘okuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hakipuʻu

The nine ahupuaʻa of Kāneʻohe Bay, beginning at the boundary between Koʻolauloa and Koʻolaupoko Districts (west) and moving eastward, are Kualoa, Hakipuʻu, Waikāne, Waiāhole, Kaʻalaea, Waiheʻe, Kahaluʻu, Heʻeia and Kāneʻohe.

The ahupuaʻa of Hakipuʻu (Broken Hill – referring to the jagged ridge top) is located at the northern end of Kāne’ohe Bay, between Kualoa and Waikāne.

Paliuli (green cliff,) a “legendary paradise of plenty” with many proclaimed sites throughout the islands, was said to have existed in the mauka regions of Hakipuʻu.

The legendary and historic navigator Kahaʻi a Hoʻokamaliʻi was said to have landed on the beach here, on his return trip from Tahiti. He is credited for bringing and planting the first ʻulu (breadfruit) tree, in this ahupuaʻa. (Mālama ʻĀina)

“The area is typical of Oʻahu, in contrast to Kauai, Maui, and Hawaiʻi, in combining: (a) bay and reef coast line which make cultivation feasible right to the shore where coconuts thrive; (b) extensive wet-taro plantations with ample water; (c) swampy areas where taro and fish were raised …”

“… (d) sloping piedmont and level shore-side areas well adapted to sweet-potato farming; (e) ample streams whose mouths are ideal seaside spawning pools; (f) fishponds in which systematic fish farming was practiced; (g) upstream terraced stream-side lo‘i; (h) accessible forested slopes and uplands, for woodland supplies and recourse in famine times”. (Handy; Klieger)

“The bay all round has a very beautiful appearance, the low land and vallies being in a high state of cultivation, and crowned with plantations of taro, sweet potatoes, sugar-cane, etc. interspersed with a great number of coconut trees”. (Portlock, 1786)

Fishponds, loko i‘a, were things that beautified the land, and a land with many fishponds was called a ‘fat’ land (‘āina momona.) They date from ancient times. (Kamakau)

Moliʻi fishpond (within Hakipuʻu) has a pond wall about 4,000-feet in length (attributed to the work of Menehune) that separates about 125-acres of shallow water (one of the largest ever built) from the northern rim of Kāneʻohe Bay. The main species of fish raised in ponds were ʻawa (milkfish) and ʻanae (mullet.)

Handy described the taro flats at Hakipuʻu, originally more than one-half mile south from Moliʻi Fishpond, where all the level land along Hakipuʻu Stream was once in terraces.

It was especially interesting as the only swamp plantation on Oʻahu in which a marshland patch was cultivated in the old mounding method. (Devaney)

“An acre of kalo (taro) 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.” (Wyllie, 1848)

Based on the estimated rates of population decline due to the introduction of European disease, Hakipuʻu would have had a population of about 300 at the time of ‘contact’ in 1778, decreasing to about 225 by 1800. In the first formal census in 1832 the population of Hakipuʻu had declined to 180.

Later, in Hakipuʻu, “fields were fenced and plowed for the cane, small flumes were put up and Chinese coolies imported for laborers”; by 1867, however, it became evident that the land was poor for sugarcane and it was abandoned.

The land was later used for rice cultivation (1860s,) then pineapple. However, by 1923, it was evident that pineapple cultivation on the Windward area could not keep up with that in other O‘ahu areas.

Crops on the Windward side were not yielding tonnages as compared with the Leeward side, fields were smaller, with wilt more prevalent, and growing costs considerably higher. Plantings were therefore reduced. (Libby; Devaney)

Much of the land was converted to pasture for cattle ranching. Some of the Hakipuʻu land remains part of the Kualoa Ranch.

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Carrollton

The coal industry was a major foundation for American industrialization in the nineteenth century. As a fuel source, coal provided a cheap and efficient source of power for steam engines, furnaces and forges across the US.

The influence of coal was so pervasive that by the advent of the twentieth century, it became a necessity of everyday life. In an era where smokestacks equaled progress, the smoky air and sooty landscape of industrial America owed a great deal to the growth of the availability of coal. (Adams)

A peculiar feature of 1907 was that in spite of the coasting laws, foreign vessels were chartered to bring domestic coal from the Atlantic ports of the US for the use of the American battleships ordered to the Pacific.

The coal trade of San Francisco was practically in the hands of one firm. Coal was always dear in California, as no supply is produced locally, but since the formation of this combination it has doubled in price. … 80,000-tons were on the way from Australia. (Great Britain, Trade & Commerce Report, 1908)

Coal was first discovered in Australia in 1791 by an escaped convict near the site of Newcastle. Mining began in 1799 with the collection of coal from outcrops near Newcastle for sale in Sydney; the cargo resulted in Newcastle becoming Australia’s first commercial export port. (Australia Bureau of Statistics)

Fast forward about a century … the three-masted bark Carrollton was en route from “New South Wales” Australia to San Francisco, via Honolulu, with a load of coal.

The Carrollton was built in 1872 by the Arthur Sewall Shipyard in Bath, Maine. Bath-built down-easters were some of the most celebrated commercial sailing vessels of their day.

Sewall ships, though not the fastest, were proven economic winners in the long-haul maritime trades of the mid- and late-19th century.

In the midst of her career in the Pacific lumber, grain, and coal business, the Carrollton under the command of Captain Hinrichs was accidentally lost on December 26th, 1906, when she ran bow-on onto the reef on the southern side of Sand Island at Midway. (PMNM)

Here’s a link to a Google Earth ‘Street View’ on the southern part of Sand Island at Midway:
https://goo.gl/WVhYhb

All of her crew were saved (rescued by the cable ship Restorer,) but the vessel was a total loss.

Typical of wooden ship wreck sites, all exposed hull and superstructure have vanished. But the heavier elements (anchor, chain, stanchions, fasteners, deck machinery, donkey boiler, lead scuppers, pintles and gudgeons etc.) remain scattered in an area near the reef.

The confused path of the anchor chain on the bottom adds to the story of the wreck. The chain locker, its wooden sides long gone, is now a fused mass of iron almost indistinguishable from reef. The windlass has grown corals. The ship remains will ultimately be ‘recycled’ as reef substrate in this fashion. (Van Tilburg)

A large variety of artifacts from the shipwreck lie scattered over an area almost 1,000 feet long. A portion of the ship’s cargo of coal testify to the sea’s power to break apart what the best wooden shipwrights once created. (PMNM)

© 2025 Hoʻokuleana LLC