Images of Old Hawaiʻi

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.

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Koloa-Sugar-Monument
Koloa-Sugar-Monument

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hilo Gas

“Hawaii … has two public-utility gas companies, the first having been incorporated April 15, 1903 for the purpose of supplying Honolulu with a manufactured supply of gas for fuel and illuminating purposes.”

“Ten years later, the second utility, the Hilo Gas Company was incorporated, and a franchise was obtained for manufacturing and supplying gas in the district of South Hilo on the Island of Hawaii.” (Historic Inventory of the physical, social and economic, and industrial resources of the Territory of Hawaii, 1939)

“Hilo Gas Company Formed – Articles of incorporation of the Hilo Gas Company, Ltd, were filed with the territorial treasurer yesterday, the capital stock being given as $100,000.  Bids for the erection of a gas plant have already been advertised for by the company and the contract will be let the latter part of this month.” (Hawaiian Gazette, January 5, 1917)

One of the incorporators and President of the new Company was Peter Carl ‘Pete’ Beamer, “who became the patriarch of a famous music and hula clan in Hawaii”. (Downey, Civil Beat)

Hilo Gas “was engaged as a public utility in the manufacture and distribution of gas in the City of Hilo and in the nonutility business of distributing bottled liquefied petroleum gas outside of the city.” (Hawaiian Trust Co. v. United States, 1961)

Over the years, this facility manufactured water gas [a kind of fuel gas], butane, and propane. Their facility was on Ponahawai street, down by Kamehameha Highway; Hilo Gas Company constructed its original oil-gas facility on the site in 1917.

“By 1935, the facility could produce 120,000 cubic feet of gas in eight hours. The facility was upgraded periodically, and over the years included a 45,000-gallon capacity above ground fuel storage tank, two 52,000-cubic foot gas holder tanks, a gas generator, a water filter, a scrubber tower, storage tanks, gas purifiers and pressurized gas cylinders.”

“The manufactured gas process was reportedly operated 24 hours per day and involved the injection of pre-heated crude oil and steam in a fire brick-lined gas generator to produce the raw gas. The crude oil was delivered to the site by rail car and stored in the 45,000-gallon storage tank.” (Weston)

“In 1948 and 1949 Hilo Gas lost money and was in financial difficulties. In the spring of 1950, Orlando Lyman, its president and largest stockholder, approached AE Englebright, the general manager of [Pacific Refiners], for assistance in solving the problems of Hilo Gas.”

“It was first proposed that Hilo Gas should cease the manufacture of gas and buy butane from Refiners, thus saving manufacturing costs. Further negotiations, in which alternative plans were considered, proved unsuccessful.”

“About the middle of September, 1950, Lyman offered to sell his shares of Hilo Gas to Refiners or Honolulu Gas. With his stock and that of another stockholder who was willing to sell, Refiners could acquire in excess of 75% of Hilo’s stock.”

“The original plan of Refiners as controlling stockholder of Hilo Gas had been to sell the utility assets to Honolulu Gas and dissolve Hilo Gas at such a time as the directors determined to be convenient.”

“On September 27, 1950, the directors of Honolulu Gas authorized the acquisition of the assets of Hilo Gas … subject to the approval of the Public Utilities Commission.” (Hawaiian Trust Co. v. United States, 1961)

“Purchase of the recently organized Pacific Refiners, Ltd is the first step in moves which will ultimately lead to acquisition of the Hilo utility firm by the Honolulu Gas Co.” (HTH Oct 7, 1950)

“‘The purchase by Pacific Refiners and ultimately by Honolulu Gas Co. means in effect,’ Mr. Lycurgus asserted, ‘the investment of some 2,500 gas consumers in over a quarter of a million dollars in gas appliances has been saved.’ Better utility service and lower rates sum up the ultimate effects of the purchase, according to Mr Lycurgus.” (HTH Oct 7, 1950)

On May 22, 1960, a tsunami struck Hilo town, destroying many homes and businesses, and claiming 61 lives while causing $24 million in damage. The Hilo Gas Company facility was destroyed. 

Following the disaster, the State of Hawaii assumed ownership of the parcel and designated it part of a tsunami buffer zone. Hilo Gas Company relocated to an inland site and recommenced operations in 1962.  (Weston)

In 1960, “The gas-fired luau torch, developed by Honolulu Gas Co, has been accepted for patent by the US Patent Office … Gasco engineers first developed it in 1953, and have since made refinements.”

“The company says thousands now are used in Honolulu, and that a ‘considerable quantity’ is sold on the Mainland … Queen’s Surf had the first major installation here.” (Adv Dec 3, 1960)

What was Hilo Gas is now a part of The Gas Company, LLC dba Hawaii Gas.  The Gas Company has grown to serve Oahu, Hawaii, Maui, Kauai, Molokai, and Lanai. (Legislature)

(In 1997 folks found that the former Hilo Gas site was contaminated with Poly Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs), Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), and sulfide compounds stemming largely from Hilo Gas Company’s former activity on-site.)

(In response, the US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) encapsulated and removed the contaminated soil in a plastic liner resembling a ‘burrito.’ The burrito was left near the site until 2004 when Hawai‘i Health Department, USACE, and the County of Hawai‘i removed the extracted soil encapsulated in the burrito and the additional soil from the second portion of the site. (EPA))

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

$25,000 Annuity

“In an interview, ex-Queen Liliuokalani said of the proposed treaty between the United States and Hawaii: ‘Fifteen hundred people are giving away my country.’”

“‘The people of my country do not want to be annexed to the United States. Nor do the people of the United States wants annexation. It is the work of 1,500 people, mostly Americans, who have settled in Hawaii. Of this number those who are not native born Americans are of American parentage.’”

“‘None of my people want the island annexed. The population of the islands is 109,000. Of this number 40,000 are native Hawaiians. The rest are Americans, Germans, Portuguese, Japanese, Chinese, English and a small proportion from other countries. The 1,500 Americans who are responsible for what was done to-day are running the affairs of the islands.’”

“‘There is no provision made in this treaty for me. In the Harrison treaty I was allowed $20,000 a year, but that treaty never went into effect. I have never received one dollar from the United States.’”

“‘No one looked after my interests in the preparation of this treaty. Yet my people, who form so large a part of the population of the islands, would want justice done me.’” (Los Angeles Herald, June 18, 1897)

Then, a couple American newspapermen (Charles L MacArthur, a former New York state senator and then editor of the local newspaper in Troy NY and William Shaw Bowen, a journalist with the New York World newspaper) independently supported an effort to arrange a $25,000 annuity to Liliʻuokalani.

In responding to questions noted in the Morgan Report, MacArthur stated, “I went to Mr. Dole. I had trouble in my own mind as to whether the Queen had not some personal rights in the crown lands, for the reason that the treasury department had never asked her to make a return on the income …”

“… which was about $75,000 a year, from these lands and which she had received, and as the treasury had never asked her for a return I thought she had an individual right in the lands.”

“I said to the people, ‘She has individual rights, and you have not asked her to make a return to the treasury of what she has received and what she did not receive.’ The President explained it all to me, the grounds of it. “

“When Mr. Neuman indicated that they were willing – I had made the suggestion and others had – that they ought to buy her out, pay her a definite sum, $25,000 or some other sum per year for her rights.”

“Her rights had been shattered, but I thought they ought to pay for them, and so I went, in accordance with Mr. Neuman’s suggestion, or by his consent, to see President Dole.”

“Mr. Neuman said he wanted to talk with President Dole about this matter, but he had not been there officially, and he could not go there publicly to his official place. I talked with Mr. Dole, and Mr Dole said he could not officially do anything without consulting his executive committee …”

“… but he said he would be very happy to meet Mr. Neuman and see what they wanted – see if they could come to any terms about this thing by which the Queen would abdicate and surrender her rights.”

“Mr. Neuman and his daughter called, nominally for the daughter to see Mrs. Dole, so that it could not get out, if they made a call, they could say it was merely a social call, not an official call.”

“Of course, I do not know what their conversation was; but Mr. Neuman, acting on that, called on the Queen. Mr. Dole and Mr. Neuman both impressed on me the importance of not having this thing get out, or the whole thing would go up in smoke. Mr. Neuman said he could bring this thing about if he could keep it from the Queen’s retainers – her people.”

“He said, ‘That is the difficulty about this thing.’ This matter went on for three or four days. Mr. Neuman saw the Queen and she agreed not to say anything about it, so Mr. Neuman tells me, and I got it from other sources there which I think are reliable. They came to some sort of understanding; I do not know what it was.”

“They went so far as to say this woman would not live over three or four years; that she had some heart trouble; and if they gave her $25,000 a year it would not be for a long time. … Mr. Neuman said she assented to it, if she could satisfy one or two of her people.”

Bowen noted in testimony in the Morgan Report, “One day while dining with Paul Neuman I said: ‘I think it would be a good thing if the Queen could be pensioned by the Provisional Government; it would make matters harmonious, relieve business, and make matters much simpler.’”

“I also said that I was aware that certain gentlemen in Washington were opposed to pensioning the Queen; that certain Senators raised that objection to the treaty that was brought from the islands because it recognized the principle of the right of a queen to a pension.”

“There was one Senator, especially, from the South, who said, without discussing the treaty, that that was objectionable to him; that his people would object to it. I said, “If there is no annexation it is a serious question; if there is, the Queen should be taken care of.”

“Neuman agreed with me. He was a strong friend of the Queen, disinterested and devoted. But he said it could not be done. I told him that I had become acquainted with the members of the Provisional Government who were high in authority, and I thought I would try to have it done.”

“Mr. Dole said he would not make any propositions himself and asked me what I thought the pension ought to be. On the spur of the moment, not having considered the matter, I said I thought the Queen ought to get a very handsome pension out of the crown lands.”

“I asked if there was any question about raising the money, and he said none whatever. He finally asked me to name the figures. He had the idea that the figures had been suggested. I said, ‘You ought to give $20,000 a year to furnish her followers with poi. That is the native dish.’ Mr. Dole said he would consider that question.”

“The result was that Mr. Dole told Mr. Neuman that if the Queen would make such a proposition to him it would receive respectful attention and intimated that he thought it would be accepted. Mr. Seaman saw the Queen and told me that he thought it would be done; that the more he thought of it the more convinced he was that it would be better all around.”

“In the meantime he (Blount) had been to the Queen, to Mr. Dole, and had done what he could to prevent the carrying out of the plan. Mr. Neuman had an interview with the Queen.”

“She told him that she would do nothing more in the matter, and asked him to give back her power of attorney, and he tore it up in her presence. This was the 22d, that he tore up his power of attorney.”

“On the 21st instant Mr. Claus Spreckels called to see me. He said that he suspected there was an effort at negotiation between the Queen and the Provisional Government, and that he had urged the Queen to withdraw her power of attorney from Paul Neumann.”

“How much or how little Mr. Spreckels knows about this matter I am unable to say, as I do not know how to estimate him, never having met him before. He promised to see me again before the mail leaves for the United States on next Wednesday, and give me such information as he could acquire in the meantime.”

“I have no doubt whatever that if Mr. Blount had not prevented, and secondarily Mr. Claus Speckels, the agent for the sugar trust, that plan would have been carried out. I have no doubt of it in my own mind.” (Bowen; Morgan Report)

“Thus Blount intervened to scuttle negotiations between the Queen and President Dole that were strongly on track toward a mutually agreeable settlement whereby the Queen would give up all claims to the throne in return for an annuity.” (MorganReport)

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Liliuokalani_in_1917
Liliuokalani_in_1917

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

New ‘Road’ into the Ala Wai

In the early-1900s, Lucius Pinkham, then President of the Territorial Board of Health and later Governor, developed the idea of constructing a drainage canal to drain the wetlands, which he considered “unsanitary.”  This called for the construction of a canal to reclaim the marshland.

The Waikīkī Reclamation District was identified as the approximate 800-acres from King and McCully Streets to Kapahulu Street, near Campbell Avenue down to Kapiʻolani Park and Kalākaua Avenue on the makai side (1921-1928.)  The dredge material not only filled in the makai Waikīkī wetlands, but it was also used to fill in the McKinley High School site.

During the 1920s, the Waikīkī landscape would be transformed when the construction of the Ala Wai Drainage Canal, begun in 1921 and completed in 1928, resulted in the draining and filling in of the remaining ponds and irrigated fields of Waikīkī.

By 1924, the dredging of the Ala Wai Canal and filling of the wetlands stopped the flows of the Pi‘inaio, ‘Āpuakēhau and Kuekaunahi streams running from the Makiki, Mānoa, and Pālolo valleys to and through Waikīkī.

With construction of the Ala Wai Canal, 625-acres of wetland were drained and filled and runoff was diverted away from Waikīkī beach.  The completion of the Ala Wai Canal not only gave impetus to the development of Waikīkī as Hawai‘i’s primary visitor destination, but also expanded the district’s potential for residential use.

Then, in 1956, Hawaiian Electric installed cables across the Ala Wai Canal to provide Waikīkī with additional electric power capacity. (HECO)

As part of the installation process, “A ‘road’ nearly spanning the Ala Wai has appeared almost overnight, surprising thousands of passers-by who are accustomed to seeing the canal as an unbroken ribbon of water from Kapahulu to the sea.”

“But Hawaiian Electric Co. assured the public yesterday that the ‘road’ would stay there only as long as to bury a 44,000-volt cable needed to bring more electricity to an expanding Waikiki.”

“The ‘road’ will support cranes which will dig a trench 23 feet deep and four feet wide under the Ala Wai. Then the cable will be laid across the canal, down Kaiolu St. and ino the Waikiki sub station.”

“Erling V Schoenberg, Hawaiian Electric’s superintendent for the job, said the Ala Wai ‘road’ was the cheapest way of getting the digging equipment into the area.”  (Advertiser, Sep 11, 1956)

“Clam shell cranes will begin digging a ditch in the floor of the Ala Wai from a causeway today or tomorrow, according to Erling V Schoenberg, Hawaiian Electric Company underground superintendent.”

“The dirt and rock causeway was been built four-fifths of the way across the canal from the Iolani School area to Kaiolu Street. A 50-foot passage was left on the makai side for boats.”

“The cranes will dig a trench 23 feet deep and four feet wide under the Ala Wai in which a 44,0000-volt cable will be buried.  When this is accomplished, the causeway will be removed.”  (Star Bulletin, September 11, 1956)

“As electricity use increased, the original cables were replaced in 1990 with higher capacity cables …. In 2002-03, when the Canal was last dredged, it was determined the cables were at risk of damage from dredging.”

“Hawaiian Electric, DLNR and the dredging contractor developed an interim solution to dredge around the cables. The current cable relocation project will be a permanent solution to not interfere with future dredging operations.” (HECO)

Then, “The State Department of Land and Natural Resources (DLNR) plans to dredge the Ala Wai Canal for flood control and increased recreational use starting in 2019, pending approval of permits. Hawaiian Electric currently has 46 kilovolt (kV) electrical cables buried under the canal that must be removed for efficient dredging.”

“Hawaiian Electric plans to install new 46kv cables about 40 feet below the canal using horizontal directional drilling. Once new cables are in service, the old cables will be removed. Hawaiian Electric plans to install new 46kv cables about 40 feet below the canal using horizontal directional drilling.”

“To minimize disruption from conventional trenching in the city streets, Hawaiian Electric will use horizontal directional drilling to install the new cables.”:

“As with any major construction, however, some short-term impacts are unavoidable. Hawaiian Electric will make every effort to limit closed traffic lanes, noise and dust.”  (HECO)

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Levee

Starting about 500 years ago, early Hawaiians used the Kawainui wetland as a fishpond and to grow taro. Dryland crops around the wetland at the time of the Great Mahele included sweet potatoes, gourds, wauke (paper mulberry for making kapa), ‘awa (kava), pia (arrowroot for starch), bananas and sugar cane. (Drigot)

Rice was cultivated from the 1850s to the 1920s and then ranching and grazing became the predominant uses. (Ramsar Wetlands Information Sheet)

In the Māhele, Queen Kalama, Kamehameha III’s wife, received land within the area in and around Kawai Nui.  The land ownership changes which occurred to Queen Kalama’s ownership of the ‘ili of Kawai Nui mirrored the land use changes in general both in the region and in the islands as a whole.

Then, this area encompassing much of the Kailua ahupua‘a, was inherited by her stepfather and uncle. He promptly sold it in 1871 to a haole, Charles Coffin Harris, an American lawyer, who had by that time consolidated claim to the ahupua‘a of Kāne‘ohe as well as that of Kailua.

One of his children, Nannie Roberta Harris, became sole heir to the Harris estate, including the Kailua ahupua‘a at that time. She owned the Kailua ahupua‘a until 1917 when she and her husband sold nearly all of their interest in both Kailua and Kāne‘ohe to

Harold KL Castle. (Drigot)

When I was a kid, we referred to this area as the “swamp” – many of the old maps referred to it as such.  Auto parts shops lined the road at its edge; the dump was nearby.

Kawainui is the largest remaining wetland in Hawai‘i, encompassing approximately 830 acres of land in Kailua, Oahu. It provides important habitat for waterbirds and migratory bird species.  (Kawai Nui Marsh Master Plan, 1994; Army Corps)

When it rained hard, there were flood issues … “Damage to private dwellings, farms and property in Kailua was caused today by flood waters backing up from the swamp land in the Coconut Grove area. Residents said water was more than three feet deep in some places and was rising.” (Star Bulletin, Mary 13, 1940)

Flooding was not the only local concern … “We want to eliminate the mosquito problem and we want to reclaim the area, if possible.” (Castle; Drigot)

As late as 1956, the Kaneohe Ranch had installed a vertical pump and began pumping with such energy that, four months later, the water table of the Marsh had dropped “almost four feet and made the once forbidding marsh a lush grazing land”. (Drigot)

A stream runs through Oneawa ‘ili to the sea, providing a natural drainage for the Kawainui marsh. The Oneawa Canal (Kawainui Canal, former approximate location of Kawainui Stream) was constructed in the 1950s to provide flood control and stability for real estate development.  (Dye)

The Oneawa Canal connects Kawainui Marsh to Kailua Bay, is 9,470 feet long, and is located at the northeast corner of Kawainui Marsh. The upper streams and surface water stored in the marsh are freshwater, while the salinity of water within Oneawa Canal is brackish and tidally influenced. (Army Corps)

“Even though the Oneawa Channel (Kawainui Canal) was constructed in 1950 to prevent the major flooding of the Kailua residential area situated on the edge of the marsh, five subsequent severe floods occured in 1951, 1956, 1958, 1961 and 1963.” (Drigot)

“In 1964, after a two year intense battle for development rights to the central portion of Kawainui Marsh, Centex-Trousdale Construction Co. surrendered its claim and the City of Honolulu emerged victorious in its seven-year battle to acquire 749 acres of the Marsh for flood control and park purposes when, with federal assistance, they purchased the Centex-Trousdale properties”. (Drigot)

Then, they built a levee … “Construction of the original Kawai Nui Marsh Flood Control Project was authorized by the Flood Control Act of 1950 and was completed in August 1966 by the Corps. Project features included … a 6,850-foot-long earthen levee with a maximum crest elevation of 9.5 feet; a 50-foot-long stub groin and 50-foot-long revetment at the outlet of Oneawa Channel”.  (Army Corps)

Over the years, vegetation within the marsh created a dense mat that affected the hydraulics of the marsh causing the project to be overtopped during the January 1988 storm.

“From December 31, 1987 through January 1, 1988, severe flooding of the Coconut Grove community occurred when the water level in the marsh exceeded the crest of the existing levee. Following this storm event, an emergency ditch was excavated alongside the levee to increase outflow from the marsh.” (Army Corps)

The floodwall has a maximum height of four feet and is 6,300 feet long extending from Kailua Road on the south to the Oneawa outlet channel on the north. The levee fills 1.8 acres of wetland fringe and provides a higher level of flood damage reduction to a larger part of Coconut Grove, which has more than 2,000 structures. (Army Corps)

By then, the Kawainui wetland reference had changed from “swamp” to “marsh.”  More recently, Kawainui Marsh was recognized as a Ramsar Wetland of International Importance in 2005 for its historical, biological, and cultural significance. (DLNR)

Ramsar is the name of the city in Iran where the Ramsar Convention, or the Convention on Wetlands of International Importance, was signed in 1971 and came into force in 1975.

Ramsar is not an acronym, and the convention is also known as “Ramsar”. The convention’s goals are to stop the loss of wetlands worldwide and to conserve the remaining wetlands through management and use.  (Ramsar Convention of Wetlands)

Sacred to Hawaiians, Kawainui Marsh, the largest remaining emergent wetland in Hawaii and Hawai‘i’s largest ancient freshwater fishpond, is located in what was once the center of a caldera of the Ko‘olau shield volcano.

The marsh provides primary habitat for four of Hawai‘i’s endemic and endangered waterbirds (Hawaiian Duck, koloa; Hawaiian Coot (‘alae ke‘oke‘o); Hawaiian Moorhen (‘alae ‘ula) and Hawaiian Stilt (kukuluae‘o (abbreviated as ae‘o)) and contains archaeological and cultural resources, including ancient walled taro lo‘i where fish were also cultivated. (Ramsar)

In addition, the levee has become a pathway that people within the surrounding community use for walking, running and biking.  Other recreation includes bird and wildlife watching.

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