Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Saddle Road

By the early 1800s, foreign visitors began making regular trips across the ‘āina mauna [mountain lands] and to the summit of Mauna Kea. Based on their accounts, travel in the region through the middle 1800s basically followed the old trails, or cut across new areas.

By the 1850s, the Kingdom of Hawai‘i entered into a program of improving ancient trails and identifying new routes, by which to improve travel between various locations and facilitate commerce. (Maly)

At its May 23, 1849 meeting, the Privy Council of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi (a private committee of the King’s closest advisors to give confidential advice on affairs of state) sought to “facilitate communication between Kailua, the seat of the local government, and Hilo, the principal port.”

They resolved “that GP Judd and Kinimaka proceed to Kailua, Hawaiʻi, to explore a route from that place to Hilo direct, and make a road, if practicable, by employing the prisoners on that island and if necessary taking the prisoners from this island (Oʻahu) to assist; the government to bear all expenses”. (Privy Council Minutes, Punawaiola)

In planning the road, the words of the Privy Council’s resolution were taken literally, and the route selected ran to the high saddle between Mauna Kea and Mauna Loa on a practically straight line between the terminal points.

What became known as the “Judd Road” (or “Judd Trail”) was constructed between 1849 and 1859; construction began at the government road in Kailua (what is now known as Aliʻi Drive) and traversed through a general corridor between Hualālai and Mauna Loa.  (Remnants of perimeter walls can still be seen at Aliʻi Drive.)

“This was the road that Dr. Judd … would have built from Kona in a straight line across the island of Hawaii. It was meant, of course, as a road for horsemen and pack animals. In the generation of Dr. Judd it was a great work, and the manner of its building showed that he meant it to be a monument to him for all time.”  (Ford, Mid-Pacific, 1912)

In 1859, when the road had been built about 12-miles from Kailua into the saddle between Hualālai and Mauna Loa, the project was abandoned – a pāhoehoe lava flow from the 11,000 foot-level of Mauna Loa crossed its path.  Though incomplete (it never reached its final destination in Hilo,) people did use the Judd Road to get into Kona’s mauka countryside.

This road was not the only attempt of linking East and West Hawaiʻi.  The western section of the trail from Waimea to Kalai‘eha (Humu‘ula Sheep Station) had become a ‘cart road’ by 1873; it was only a dirt road through the pasture then and in rainy weather it turned to mud.

There were no automobiles in 1910 and very few in the 1920s, all transportation was by foot, horse, or by wagon, carriage and buggy.  In 1920, the cart road left the Waimea/Kona road at Pu’u Nohona‘ohae and went through Waiki’i village to The Saddle.

The cart road initially began a little farther north, however, the manager of Parker Ranch, AW Carter, got the entrance of the road moved so that it passed between Pu‘u Nohona’ohae lki to the north, and Pu‘u Nohona‘ohae Nui to the south. (This is the alignment of the old Saddle Road where it meets the Waimea to Kona ‘Mauka Road.’)

In the saddle area, the old cart road ran directly east from Pōhakuloa to Kalai‘eha (Humu’ula Sheep Station).  The eastern section, from Kalai‘eha down to Hilo, remained a trail until World War II, except at the Hilo end. ‘Kaumana Road’ was built (paved) up to the Countly Club Road intersection in Kaumana by the “FTRA” about 1936.

Because there was no road up from Hilo, to get to Kalai‘eha (near Pu‘u Huluhulu and the present Mauna Kea Access Road) and surrounding uses. From Hilo, you had to drive all the way along the Hāmākua Coast (Mamalahoa Highway) around through Waimea and back east through the Saddle.  As described by Roy Blackshear, to get to Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō Ranch (owned by his grandfather):

“The first time I went to Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō was about 1931. But at that time, of course there was no Saddle Road there, and to get to Pu‘u ‘Ō‘ō Ranch we left Kea‘au before sunrise in the morning, traveled north along the Hāmākua Coast, going through all the valleys and small bridges and so on and finally we reached Waimea and had lunch at Waimea.”

“And then we continued from Waimea along the Mamalahoa Highway. Out to where, I think it was just about where the present Saddle Road takes off. …  And of course any car going up at that time would have to carry chains because they did run into mud.”

[They stopped first in Waiki‘i.] “And then we headed on east from there, climbing all the time. So then we continued on and we reach Humu‘ula sheep station. And they put more water in the radiator. And then we started from, there up towards the Keanakolu road …” (Blacksher; Rosendahl)

While ‘Kaumana Road’ was built (paved) up to the Country Club Road intersection in Kaumana by about 1936, from there it was an unpaved wagon road until World War II and above that a horse trail.  Above Kaumana, the eastern section (from Kalai‘eha) remained a trail until World War II.

The Saddle Road was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and the US Army Engineer District, Honolulu (USED, now called the US Army Corps of Engineers) during World War II in order to provide an access route in case of Japanese invasion.

Near the top of Kaumana, the army had a camp and barred everyone who didn’t work there from traveling up into the interior of the Island.

Henry Auwae ran the lead bulldozer to clear the road in 1943, coming up from Hilo on the 1881 and 1855 lava flows and choosing a route which kept to no more than a 6% grade. Cinders were then hauled down from Humu‘ula toward Kaumana by the CCC and later the USED, then oiled to make a narrow “gravel” road.

The west section of the road was paved right after the war. The east section of the road was not paved until later, about 1949. At that time the road was moved at several points to cut off some large loops. These old loops still exist, including one north of the road around milepost 9 and another around milepost 22.

Then, starting with an accepted EIS in 1999, what is now known as Daniel K Inouye Highway (renamed on what would have been his 89th birthday) was realigned and widened.  Starting in 2007, successive phases of the improved road have been opened up.

© 2024 Ho‘okuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hofgaard Store

Christopher Blom Hofgaard was born in Skien, Norway, on October 5, 1859. His parents were Gerhard Didrik and Didrikka (Blom) Hofgaard. He received his education at high school and at the Christiana Handelsgymnasium.

Hofgaard arrived in Hawai‘i on January 22, 1882. The first job of the newly-arrived young man in the islands was on the Wailuku sugar plantation where he worked several months, leaving to accept a clerkship in CH Dickey’s store at Haiku. Later, he was promoted to manager of the Dickey store at Paia.

In April 1885, he left Dickey’s employ to enter business for himself. He moved to Kauai and started the firm of CB Hofgaard & Co, in October of 1885.

In addition, from 1885 to 1886 he was a clerk in the post office and served as postmaster at Waimea, Kauai, from 1886 to 1918.  With respect to his postmaster role, Hofgaard wrote,

“Mrs MJ Rowell was postmaster in Waimea when I started the store in 1885, but in May 1886, she wrote to Fred Wunderberg, the postmaster general, that she desired to get rid of the postoffice and proposed to him that he appoint me postmaster.”

“Mrs Rowell turned over the postoffice and handed me the letter from the postmaster general as authority for the act, and I started to act at once.”

“Everything went on all right till some time in 1887, when I was suddenly arrested for accepting money under false pretenses. The women had started a ‘Hui Kuonoono’ and when the first installment came in, the treasurer of the hui deposited the money in the postal savings bank and I receipted for the money signing CB Hofgaard, postmaster.”

“Appeared in court the following morning and had my case postponed one week and wrote to the postmaster general to send me a commission in return mail, and date it back some six months, as I was arrested for impersonating an officer of the government.”

“By return mail I received the commission but the sheriff maintained it was a forgery.” It was an embarrassing moment, but with no apparent consequence. (SB, June 12, 1930)

The CB Hofgaard Store was so successful that he was enabled to retire from active management twelve years later, but retained the presidency of the company, which was incorporated in 1901.

For more than 30 years Mr. Hofgaard was the representative of the Equitable Life Assurance Society in the islands. In addition to the presidency of the Hofgaard firm he also was treasurer of Waimea Stables.

In addition to his business and public offices, welfare and church work drew much of Mr. Hofgaard’s attention. He was a member of the district committee of the Hawaiian Board of Missions, a member of the YMCA committee, president of the board of trustees of the Waimea foreign church society, a trustee of the Mahelona hospital, and a member of the Kauai board of child welfare. (Nellist)

Hofgaard served as auditor for the county of Kauai in 1905 and road supervisor from 1886 to 1898. He was appointed district magistrate in 1904.

Waimea’s Hofgaard Park, that narrow strip of land in Waimea that has the statue of Captain James Cook and other historical plaques is named for Hofgaard.

It seems the Hofgaard Store had a role in Hawai‘i’s banking industry … “Mr and Mrs Wilson P Cannon and little son arrived from Berkley en route to Waimea Kauai, where Mr Cannon, who is a dry goods man, will be associated with the Hofgaard store.”

“Mrs Cannon was born on Kauai and has not been in the islands for 17 years. She is the niece of Mr and Mrs CB Hofgaard of Waimea.” (SB, January 1, 1921)

The son, Wilson P Cannon Jr, was born in Berkely on August 25, 1919 and grew up on Kauai and Maui and was graduated from Maui High School in 1937.  After WWII, he worked his way through the ranks at Bank of Hawai‘i and later became Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the bank.

American Factors (Amfac) bought the store in 1921. (SB, August 18, 1928) During WWII, the store was used by the Army as a quartermaster warehouse.

Businessman HS Kawakami bought and renovated the Hofgaard store in 1947 and moved his retail business into it. In 1966, the Hofgaard building was demolished to make way for a newer building opened by Kawakami in 1967 that would house the Bank of Hawai‘i, HS Kawakami Stores, and Big Save market. (Soboleski)

© 2024 Ho‘okuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Cow Palace

“It was built in 1916 by a Hackfeld & Co as a lumber warehouse. The firm later was sold to the American Factors, now Amfac, and the building continued to be a warehouse until World War II. … It endured the 1946 and 1960 tidal waves.” (HTH, April 14, 1970)

“Anyone who looks at the modified false front of the building, which stores in those days thought necessary to identify themselves, can read the date 1916 near the top and the faded inscription ‘American Factors Ltd.’ below it.”

“It was a proud building in those days and a big one for Hilo. The train which ran just sea ward of the building ran its freight cars on special tracks to the Hamakua side of the building to unload merchandise onto the broad lanai which runs the length of the building.”

“Another track led to the extensive lumber yard on the opposite side of the building. Here the lumber was piled by hand in neat stacks under an open sided shed which protected the clean smelling lumber from sun and rain yet let the air play through.”

“This building and the one now housing Koehnen’s store at Waianuenue and Kamehameha Avenues in Hilo were the chief warehouse facilities on this island for American Factors, Ltd., now known as Amfac Inc.” (Baldwin, HTH July 28, 1969)

“During the war, the building was turned into a recreation center for servicemen and acquired the nickname, ‘Cow Palace.’ Ever since, the Cow Palace has been the official name for the building.”  (HTH, April 14, 1970)

“The ‘Cow Palace’ building housed hardware, general building supplies, farm equipment, etc., and had its own office. The uptown one stored dry goods, drugs and sundries on its top floor; office space, groceries and general merchandise on its main floor, and larger items and crated goods in Its basement.” (Baldwin, HTH July 28, 1969)

“We have been renting the waterfront property on a permit issued to us by the Commissioner of Public Lands since February 1, 949. An Indenture of Exchange was made between the Territory of Hawaii and American Factors on May 17, 1949 …”

“… in which our waterfront properties were exchanged for a parcel of land in the Waiakea area. Here a lumberyard was established and a mill erected and an area cleared for the erection of a warehouse.”

“In the early part of 1950 we were advised by the Territory to vacate one end of our building to make way for the highway through the Hilo waterfront. This received our immediate attention.”

“On August 21, 1951, Frank G. Serrao, then Commissioner of Public Lands, gave us a copy of a letter [that states] ‘I wish to assure you that the American Factor warehouse and the surrounding premises on Kamehameha Avenue, Hilo, Hawaii …”

“… will be made available to the County of Hawaii within two years.’ This would indicate that we could continue our tenancy into 1953.” (EG Solomon, President of American Factors)

Then, “The old American Factors warehouse in the bayfront zone is going to be given some repairs and turned into a band practice hall and recreation department center.”

“After repairs are completed, members of the county band will hold their practice sessions there. Currently, they practice in their old facility on Kaiulani street.”

“Offices of the Hilo recreation committee will move into the old Amfac building from Piihonua gymnasium, which is being used now. Summer program indoor activities will also be held in the repaired bayfront facility. (HTH, June 9, 1954) It “became a sports center of the County Department of Parks and Recreation.”

“Until a roof cave-in last February [from significant heavy rains], Cow Palace was home for the County Band and several civic organizations. … But now it is coming down as required by the County General Plan.” (HTH, April 14, 1970)

© 2024 Ho‘okuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Ka‘ahumanu’s Kailua-Kona Home Site

For centuries, Kaiakeakua (also spelled Kaiakekua) was a favored place for royalty.  Kamakahonu Royal Center at Kailua Bay was the residential compound of Kamehameha I from 1813 until his death in 1819. It had previously been the residence of a high chief, and it was undoubtedly a residential area back into the centuries prior to European contact. 

During Kamehameha’s use of this compound reportedly 11 house structures were present. These included his sleeping house, houses for his wives, a large men’s house, storehouses and Ahuʻena heiau.  Kamehameha’s entourage (wives and chiefs, etc) had homes surrounding Kaiakeakua Bay (we now call it Kailua Bay in Kona).

Liholiho’s (Kamehameha II) house was where the Kona Inn is; Keōpūolani (mother of Kamehameha II and III) had her house on the south side, at Oneo Bay; and Ka‘ahumanu’s house was adjacent to (on the south side of) what is now Mokuaikaua Church property.

Fast forward … a couple pioneers in neighbor island hospitality helped form Hawaiʻi’s early fledgling visitor industry.  At the time, emphasis and facilities were focused in Waikīkī.  However, two locally-grown chains saw the opportunities and put their attention on the neighbor Islands.

The first, Inter-Island Resorts under the Child family, grew into a number of ‘Surf Resorts’ on the neighbor islands; the other, Island Holidays, under the Guslanders, had several neighbor island ‘Palms Resorts.’

With several smaller business-oriented hotels downtown Honolulu and spotted across the neighbor islands, on November 1, 1928, the Kona Inn in Kailua-Kona (at the place of Liholiho’s house), the first neighbor island visitor-oriented resort hotel, opened with great fanfare.  (Hibbard, Schmitt)

The Inter-Island Steam Navigation Co originally intended to build the Kona Inn on the site of Huliheʻe Palace.  The idea was met with considerable opposition and the Territory bought the Palace and the company erected its new hotel on a 4-acre parcel adjoining the former Royal Residence.  (Hibbard)

A Star-Bulletin editorial noted on February 7, 1928, “The land of the first Kamehameha; the land which cradled the old federation of the Hawaiian Islands, the storied land where an English ship’s captain was worshipped before natives found him human and slew him there …”

“… is to be opened at last to the comfort-loving tourists of the world. … Soon after the completion of the hotel, the territory will have cause to be grateful to the foresight and enterprise of Inter-Island.” (SB, Feb 7, 1928)

It wasn’t until 1955, in the area where Ka‘ahumanu lived, that Guslander brought his competing Palms Resorts to Kona, and was the third facility in the hotel chain that included the Maui Palms and the Coco Palms on Kauai. (HTH Sep 6, 1955)

“The former Kailua-Kona Hotel, now a part of the Kona Palms operation, provides an additional 16 rooms for a combined total of 38 rooms which will be available.” (HTH Aug 26, 1955) “A new restaurant and cocktail lounge, the Kona Marlin club will open between July 5 and 10 as a part of the Kona Palms development though operated by another lessee.” (Adv June 12, 1955)

At the dedication of the hotel and restaurant (Kona Palms and the Kona Marlin Club), “The Rev Abraham Akaka of Haili church gave the dedication prayer, anointed the old stone of King Kamehameha I and Queen Kaahumanu’s residence still at the site, and cut the cord which combined ‘the old and the new’ of Kona.” (Adv Sep 7, 1955)

In 1964, “The Kona Palms Hotel in Kailua-Kona has been sold to the former-publisher of the Honolulu Advertiser and his wife Mr. and Mrs Lorrin P Thurston … the property was sold because … [the owner] will make a substantial investment in the Outrigger Hotel being developed by Roy C Kelley between the Royal Hawaiian and Moana Hotels.” (SB July 11, 1964)

Then, in 1972, “HC [‘Pat’] Patterson … announced forthcoming development of The Dolphin Condominium in Kailua, Kona.  The four-story condominium apartment is planned as 75 residential units and some 10,600 square feet for retail specialty shops and office condominiums”. (HTH Feb 27, 1972)

“HC Patterson, the creator of the Dolphin Condominiums in Kailua, Kona, has lived on the Big Island since his return from Japan in 1962. In Japan, he had been involved in plywood manufacturing in Osaka and the logging industry in Fiji.

“Patterson built the Marlin Plaza in 1962, which was Kona’s first modern shopping center, and the Dolphin Plaza in 1964, which is adjacent to the Marlin.” (HTH May 8, 1975)

Unfortunately, “Glenn Construction Corp, one of the Big Islands’ contracting firms, has gone out of the active construction business.  The firm’s apparent financial demise leaves behind a tangled web of more than 80 unsettled lawsuits and countersuits [most involving subcontractors claims of not being paid] … The majority of these involve work on the Kona Dolphin condominium …” (SB Oct 31, 1974)

The Dolphin condominium property went into foreclosure and project lender, Independence Mortgage Trust Co of Georgia, was the only bidder and ended up with the property. (SB May 20, 1976) Shortly thereafter, the Dolphin project name was changed to Kona Plaza.

© 2024 Ho‘okuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Sugar Changed the Social Fabric of the Islands

He keiki aloha nā mea kanu
Beloved children are the plants
(ʻŌlelo Noʻeau 684)

The early Polynesian settlers to Hawaiʻi brought sugar cane with them and demonstrated that it could be grown successfully in the islands; sugar was a canoe crop.

In pre-contact times, sugarcane was not processed as we know sugar today, but was used by chewing the juicy stalks. Its leaves were used for inside house thatching, or for outside (if pili grass wasn’t available.) The flower stalks of sugar cane were used to make a dart, sometimes used during the Makahiki games. (Canoe Crops)

The first written record of sugarcane in Hawaiʻi came from Captain James Cook, at the time he made initial contact with the Islands. On January 19, 1778, off Kauaʻi, he notes, “We saw no wood, but what was up in the interior part of the island, except a few trees about the villages; near which, also, we could observe several plantations of plantains and sugar-canes.” (Cook)

As a later economic entity, sugar gradually replaced sandalwood and whaling in the mid‐19th century and became the principal industry in the islands, until it was succeeded by the visitor industry in 1960.

Since it was a crop that produced a choice food product that could be shipped to distant markets, its culture on a field scale was started in about 1800 and has continued uninterruptedly up to the present time.

The first sugar to be made in Hawai‘i is credited to a man from China. The newspaper Polynesian, in its issue of January 31, 1852, carried this item attributed to a prominent sugar planter on Maui, LL Torbert:

“Mr. John White, who came to these islands in 1797, and is now living with me, says that in 1802, sugar was first made at these islands by a native of China, on the island of Lānaʻi.”

“He came here in one of the vessels trading for sandalwood, and brought a stone mill and boilers, and after grinding off one small crop and making it into sugar, went back the next year with his fixtures, to China.”

While HSPA – HARC states, “The first successful sugarcane plantation was started at Kōloa, Kauai in 1835. Its first harvest in 1837 produced 2 tons of raw sugar, which sold for $200”, others suggest the first commercial production actually started on Maui.  (Hawai‘i Agriculture Research Center (HARC – successor entity to Hawai‘i Sugar Planters Association (HSPA))

A couple guys named Ah Hung and Ah Tai combined their names in order to identify their company – a 1939 news ‘Short’ says Hungtai “is said to have been one of the earliest manufacturers of sugar in the islands, at Wailuku, Maui in 1823.” (Star Bulletin, April 6, 1939) Others say Hungtai started commercial sales in 1828; still, seven years before Koloa.

Hungtai had a plantation and a water-powered mill in Wailuku and sold the sugar in their store at Merchant and Fort Streets in Honolulu. They were still selling that sugar as late as 1841, when they were advertising in local newspapers.  (TenBruggencate)

Early plantations were small and didn’t fare too well.  Soon, most would come to realize that “sugar farming and sugar milling were essentially great-scale operations.”  (Garvin)

Likewise, King Kamehameha III sought to expand sugar cultivation and production, as well as expand other agricultural ventures to support commercial agriculture in the Islands.  In a speech to the Legislature in 1847, the King noted:

“I recommend to your most serious consideration, to devise means to promote the agriculture of the islands, and profitable industry among all classes of their inhabitants. It is my wish that my subjects should possess lands upon a secure title; enabling them to live in abundance and comfort, and to bring up their children free from the vices that prevail in the seaports.”

“What my native subjects are greatly in want of, to become farmers, is capital with which to buy cattle, fence in the land and cultivate it properly. I recommend you to consider the best means of inducing foreigners to furnish capital for carrying on agricultural operations, that thus the exports of the country may be increased …” (King Kamehameha III Speech to the Legislature, April 28, 1847; Archives)

Capital was scarce, profits were uncertain, and failures frequent. There was a market In California and Oregon, but the tariff and competition from Philippine and American producers created difficulties for the Hawaiian planters. (Davis)

Hawaiʻi had the basic natural resources needed to grow sugar: land, sun and water.  Hawai‘i’s economy turned toward sugar in the decades between 1860 and 1880; these twenty years were pivotal in building the plantation system.

The gold rush and settlement of California opened a lucrative market.  Then, there was a jump in price and demand for the Hawaiian Islands product following the outbreak of the Civil War.  The Civil War virtually shut down Louisiana sugar production during the 1860s, enabling Hawai‘i to compete with elevated prices for sugar.

Sugar‐cane farming gained this prestige without great difficulty because sugar cane soon proved to be the only available crop that could be grown profitably under the severe conditions imposed upon plants grown on the lands which were available for cultivation.  (HSPA 1947)

Though a demand for the product was essential for success, two other factors had to be provided before the demand could be met – more arable land and a larger labor supply. For the first, water was necessary, only along the Hāmākua coast of the island of Hawai‘i and in a few other places was this resource abundantly present together with a suitable land area.

Most plantations depended upon rain for this basic need. There had been a few efforts at irrigation, notably the Lihue Ditch constructed on Kauai in 1856 by William Harrison Rice and extended several times after that date.

But the most Important expansion came on Maui with the construction of the Hāmākua Ditch during the period of 1876 to 1878, and of the Spreckels Ditch in 1879. By means of these two great Irrigation projects water was brought from the mountains to the dry but potentially fertile plains, and thousands of additional acres of land suitable for sugar cane growing were made available.

By 1875 economic and political pressures in Hawai‘i and the US led to additional benefits. The United States saw a double danger in the Sandwich Islands which reciprocity might overcome.

First, there was the influence of a strong group consisting of both Hawaiians and Europeans whose sympathies and ties were with England rather than America and who would like to see the Hawaiian Kingdom allied closely with that country. Second, there was the possibility of losing the Hawaiian trade to Australia, New Zealand, and British Columbia.  (Davis)

As a result, the Reciprocity Treaty was negotiated in 1875 and put into effect on September 9, 1876. This agreement provided for the tariff-free entry of a number of Items into each country. For Hawaiian sugar planters the most Important was the admission of unrefined sugar without duty into the USs.  The Reciprocity Treaty with the United States brought about the phenomenal growth of the sugar industry in Hawaii.

Hawaiians had provided the original labor supply, and as late as 1873, 79% of the workers on 36 plantations were from that group. This number included more than 50% of the able-bodied native males.  But the indigenous population had been decreasing at an alarming rate over a period of many years, probably reaching its lowest ebb about the time of the Reciprocity Treaty.

Hence, even if the long, hot, arduous days in field or mill continued to attract Hawaiians, they were numerically unable to fill the increased need. Importation of workers seemed the only answer. (Davis)

Though the demand for sugar and the conditions for producing it continued to improve, this one necessity was lacking. Sugarcane went to ruin in the fields, building and development were delayed, production fell short of estimates, all for lack of enough workers.

The Hawaiian government favored the importation of South Sea Islanders so that the declining Polynesian population could be rebuilt. Several other groups were considered but rejected for various reasons – American Negroes, Hindus, Malaysians. (Davis)

Labor for the expanding plantations was hired under contracts regulated by the ‘Act for Government of Masters and Servants,’ originally passed in 1850 and amended several times thereafter.

This Act applied to workers of any kind, Including household servants, yard and stable boys, washerwomen, shop clerks, and others. The contract could cover any period not to exceed five years and might be made in a foreign country for service In Hawai‘i.

There were severe penalties for absence from or refusal to work, and some protection against a master’s cruelty, misuse, or violation of contract. Its form was determined by law, and It required that both parties Involved appear before an agent of the Hawaiian Government, listen to the terms of the contract, voluntarily assent to it and accept its obligations.

There were many who objected to this system as a kind of slavery or serfdom in which most of the legal safeguards were on the side of the employer, but it was defended by planters as essential to the success of the sugar Industry. Only by means of the contract, they felt, could labor of the type needed by the plantations be controlled and held to the land.

Sugar changed the social fabric of Hawai‘i.

The sugar industry was the prime force in transforming Hawaiʻi from a traditional, insular, agrarian and debt‐ridden society into a multicultural, cosmopolitan and prosperous one. (Carol Wilcox)

There were three big waves of workforce immigration:
• Chinese 1852
• Japanese 1885
• Filipinos 1905

Several smaller, but substantial, migrations also occurred:
• Portuguese 1877
• Norwegians 1880
• Germans 1881
• Puerto Ricans 1900
• Koreans 1902
• Spanish 1907

It is not likely anyone then foresaw the impact this would have on the cultural and social structure of the islands.

The sugar industry is at the center of Hawaiʻi’s modern diversity of races and ethnic cultures. Of the nearly 385,000 workers that came, many thousands stayed to become a part of Hawai‘i’s unique ethnic mix.

Hawai‘i continues to be one of the most culturally-diverse and racially-integrated places on the globe.

For nearly a century, agriculture was the state’s leading economic activity. It provided Hawai‘i’s major sources of employment, tax revenues and new capital through exports of raw sugar and other farm products.

At the industry’s peak in the 1930s, Hawai‘i’s sugar plantations employed more than 50,000 workers and produced more than 1-million tons of sugar a year; over 254,500-acres were planted in sugar.  That plummeted to 492,000 tons in 1995.

With statehood in 1959 and the almost simultaneous introduction of passenger jet airplanes, the tourist industry began to grow rapidly.

A majority of the plantations closed in the 1990s.

As sugar declined, tourism took its place – and far surpassed it.  Like many other societies, Hawai‘i underwent a profound transformation from an agrarian to a service economy.

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC

Koloa-Sugar-Monument
Koloa-Sugar-Monument