General | Page 20 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

August 8, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Kanakaleonui

Mauna Kea, like Hawai‘i’s other older volcanoes, Hualālai and Kohala, has evolved beyond the shield-building stage, as indicated by:

the very low eruption rates compared to Mauna Loa and Kīlauea;
the absence of a summit caldera and elongated fissure vents that radiate its summit;
steeper and more irregular topography (for example, the upper flanks of Mauna Kea are twice as steep as those of Mauna Loa); and
different chemical compositions of the lava. (USGS)

Mauna Kea’s peaceful appearance is misleading. The volcano is not dead. It erupted many times between 60,000 and 4,000 years ago, and some periods of quiet during that time apparently lasted longer than 4,000 years. Given that record, future eruptions seem almost certain. (USGS Volcano Watch)

Pu‘u Kanakaleonui is one of the younger cones of the Laupāhoehoe Volcanics and is less than 13,000 years in age. (USGS) Kanaka-Leo-Nui (loud-voiced person) “was the name of a retainer of ʻUmi-a-Līloa, a chief who is said to have had a house at the top of Mauna Kea with doors facing each of the six districts of Hawaiʻi.”

“If the chief wanted the Hilo people to bring supplies, he called from the Hilo door to Kanaka-leo-nui, who shouted out the orders from the top of the hill bearing his name.” (Hawaiian Place Names)

About the time Columbus was crossing the Atlantic, ʻUmi a Līloa (‘Umi, son of Līloa), was famous in Hawaiian history for being the first aliʻi (chief) to unify Hawaiʻi Island under a singular rule.

ʻUmi was a religious chief and was known to have erected a number of ahu (shrines) throughout the ʻāina mauna (mountain lands) to make offerings to the akua. After unifying the island, ʻUmi a Līloa chose to live in the ʻāina mauna with his people rather than returning to the lower ahupuaʻa (land divisions) where kānaka typically lived.

“Umi was a trail builder …. Where the a-a was level, his men marked their way across it by smooth going. Where there were depressions in it, they were filled up to the general level, much as a modern engineer would fill them.”

“Where there were hillocks to be crossed, these were cut away if not too high and passed over in a straight line if their altitude forbade grading.” (Sol Sheridan, Mid Pacific Magazine, Oct 1912)

Pu‘u Kanakaleonui is one of the younger cones of the Laupāhoehoe Volcanics and is less than 13,000 years in age. The dark-colored deposit partly surrounding and mantling Pu‘u Kanakaleonui consists of tephra and ejecta blocks of lava mostly 10 to 50 cm in diameter but as large as 3 m long.

Some of the ejecta are from underlying lava flows that were erupted more than 65,000 years ago from the Hāmākua Volcanics. The light-colored surface below the cone consists of lava flows that are not mantled by the explosive tephra and blocks. (USGS)

The next eruption could take place anywhere on the upper flanks of the volcano. As Mauna Kea evolved from its early shield stage (equivalent to Kīlauea and Mauna Loa today) to its present post-shield stage, the volcano lost its rift zones. Consequently, the post-shield eruptions are not concentrated along narrow zones but instead are scattered across the mountain.

A prominent cinder cone will probably be constructed at each vent. The cinder cones responsible for the ‘bumpy’ appearance of Mauna Kea’s surface. The cones were built during the latest eruptive period 6,000-4,000 years ago. The next eruption will likely produce a similar cone.

For example, the most recent eruptive period, 6,000-4,000 years ago, involved eight vents on the south flank of the volcano between Kala‘i‘eha cone (near Humu`ula) and Pu‘ukole (east of Hale Pōhaku). During this same period, eruptions took place on the northeast flank at Pu‘u Lehu and Pu‘u Kanakaleonui.

Lava from Pu‘u Kanakaleonui flowed more than [12 miles] northeastward, entering the sea to form Laupāhoehoe Point. (USGS Volcano Watch)

“[Right back [of the double Hill Holei Kanakaleonui], there is a Hawaiian graveyard. They used to bury there. When they go up and make their adze, and the Hawaiians die up there, they had a little … above Kanakaleonui, in between Red Hill and Kanakaleonui.” (John “Johnny” Ah San Oral History Interview with Kepā Maly)

With the exception of the possible adze maker interments, the apparent restriction of the higher elevation burials to the apex of cinder cones is in sharp contrast to many of the burials found at Kanakaleonui, a well-known burial center located not too far outside of the Science Reserve, just below Pu‘u Mākanaka and the summit plateau.

On current evidence there are more burials in the general environs of Kanakaleonui than probably exist higher on the mountain, possibly on all of the summit plateau. (AIS Mauna Kea Science Reserve)

The disproportionate number of burials in the environs of Kanakaleonui suggests that the edge of the plateau might have been a major social boundary, with the area below reserved for commoners and the plateau for persons of higher social status (chiefs and priests).

If the very top of the cones were reserved for higher status individuals and the ground below for commoners, then Kanakaleonui must have both. (AIS Mauna Kea Science Reserve)

Laupāhoehoe is the true ‘Umi’s Trail. ‘Umikoa one, that’s when they go up and they turn around, and they meet ‘Umi Trail. (Mr. Ah San noted that Laupähoehoe-Waipunalei Trail runs up the mountain from near the heiau of ‘Umi – recorded as being named Mämala or Ha‘akoa.)

The trail runs mauka past Ke-ana-kolu (The-three-caves), which was a known resting spot on the trail up the mountain. The caves are approximately one-mile mauka from the old Keanakolu ranch house. (Maly)

Kanakaleonui Bird Corridor (KBC), located on the east slope of Mauna Kea, is a unique transition zone from a Tropical Montane Cloud Forest to a colder, drier subalpine forest. (Pigao)

The KBC corridor is a continuous uphill slope that currently represents a gradient of woodland to grassland. The dry subalpine landscapes show sharp climate changes with small elevational changes that are easily distinguishable by the amount and type of vegetation present.

Kanakaleonui Corridor is on Department of Hawaiian Home Lands land between Mauna Kea Forest Reserve and Hakalau Forest NWR). It has many forest birds, especially ‘i‘iwi, ‘apapane, ‘amakihi, ‘elepaio, ‘akiapōlā‘au, and ‘io.

These species (and juveniles of these) are known to travel between wet forests and subalpine māmane forests during the bloom. The Kanakaleonui Bird Corridor is an interconnecting corridor for this travel. (Hawaii’s Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy)

August 5, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Prohibition

The first temperance movement emerged in New England as clergy began to equate drinking alcohol with sins like Sabbath breaking and blasphemy. In 1808, the first temperance society was formed, but it singled-out hard liquor, such as rum, as its only target.

Very early in the temperance movement of Reverend Thomas P Hunt, a Presbyterian minister organized a children’s organization called ‘The Cold Water Army.’ In 1831, the large and influential American Temperance Union urged everyone to only drink cold water (not alcoholic beverages) and take a Cold Water Pledge.

Although Kamehameha III broke it regularly, he made intermittent appeals for abstinence among his fellows. For some years in the 1840s, no liquor was served at official functions. (Daws)

Pūʻali Inuwai (“The water drinking host”) was formed on March 15, 1843 – the Cold Water Army – Hawaiʻi’s version of the Temperance Movement.

Following the model elsewhere, they first looked at the children, suggesting: if you had 100 drunkards and tried to reform them, you would be lucky to save maybe 10; however, if you had 100 children and taught them temperance from a young age, you could save 90 out of the 100.

Hawaiʻi youth were encouraged to join. Thousands of children enlisted in the ‘cold water army.’ Once a year they came together for a celebration. They had a grand time on these anniversary occasions. (Youth’s Day Spring, January 1853)

The Cold Water movement apparently saw some early success. “Recruits to strengthen the ranks of the cold water army, adds real force to this nation; and not-only to this nation, but to every other nation where the principles of total abstinence are making progress. Formerly the Sandwich Islanders were a nation of drunkards; but, as a nation, they are now tee-totallers.” (The Friend, 1843)

However, as time went on the push toward prohibition waned. From the 1850s, it was legal to make wine. In 1864-1865, acts were passed permitting legal brewing of beer and distillation of spirits under license at Honolulu. (Daws)

Later, in hopes that free drinking water would entice sailors to stay out of nearby grog shops, “The Temperance Legion has caused to be erected a Drinking Fountain at the corner of King and Bethel streets, on the Bethel premises – a neat and ornamental fountain. … ‘Free to all.’” [dedicated, June 15, 1867] (The Friend, June 1, 1867)

Through the 1870s, Honolulu was the only place in the kingdom where liquor could be sold legally (another instance of the attempt to isolate vice,) but contemporary comment and court reports make it clear that the illegal liquor traffic was brisk everywhere, from Lāhainā and other port towns to the remotest countryside. (Daws)

Honolulu’s The Friend newspaper began as “Temperance Advocate.” Then, it meant to many, moderate-restrained-use of liquor. Not so in all these years. “It meant total abstinence – nay, even prohibition before there was any such term.” (The Friend, 1942)

Then, came prohibition.

On the continent, into the 1900s, Americans debated whether the sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages should be legal. Members of the temperance movement sought to reduce drinking – or even eliminate it. The Civil War disrupted the movement temporarily, but after the war ended, supporters resumed its mission with renewed enthusiasm. (US House)

John Granville Woolley was a prominent figure in the American temperance and prohibition movement – he was nominated for the US presidency on the Prohibition party ticket. The Prohibition party – the only party whose principal aim was a ban on the sale of liquor – was founded at a Chicago convention in 1869.

Woolley lobbied for the Prohibition party nationally from the 1880s to the early 1900s and then for the American Anti-Saloon League, a national organization that supported candidates for legislation restricting liquor sales. In 1907, when Woolley vacationed in Hawai‘i, he started a chapter in the Islands. (Hawai’i Digital Newspaper Project)

The Hawaiian legislature passed a liquor licensing law in 1907 in the hope of slowing liquor traffic in the territory. In 1910 Woolley of the Anti-Saloon League of America testified before Congress that the Hawaiian legislature’s licensing law had failed.

Prince Kūhiō stepped in and noted, “There are many good people in Hawaii who believe in prohibition but who do not believe that Congress should enact it.” Woolley pushed Congress to dismantle territorial home rule and Kūhiō fought for home rule. “We are fully capable of settling all our domestic problems,” Kūhiō declared. (US House)

Congress decided that Hawai‘i should hold a special election on Prohibition. The vote occurred in July 1910. The Hawaiian Gazette ran political cartoons to persuade people to vote for prohibition in Hawai‘i.

The newspaper’s editorials and political cartoons portrayed the saloon owners as profiting from the sale of alcohol, or “The White Man Burden,” and the alcohol bringing societal ills to the native Hawaiians. (HDNP)

Kūhiō argued against the bill, asserting that Hawai‘i was guaranteed a large degree of local self-governance. (Curtis) “There are many good people in Hawaii who believe in prohibition but who do not believe that Congress should enact it.,” (Kūhiō, GovInfo)

Ultimately, the Hawai‘i voters voted against prohibition in Hawai‘i. … The Evening Bulletin reported, “The annihilation of the prohibitionists is increasing. If that he possible, in its overwhelming effect as later reports are being received from the other Islands.”

Not one precinct did the pro-Prohibition vote carry on Hawai‘i and the partial returns also indicate this to be a fact on Maui. … The vote indicated anti-prohibitionists’ vote was 7,283 and supporters of prohibition in the Islands tallied 2,185 votes.

“The overwhelming nature of the defeat that has been visited upon the adherents of the [Prohibition] platform in Hawaii, is best indicated by the fact that the anti-prohibitionists polled more votes on Oahu than the prohibitionists polled in the Territory at large.” Evening Bulletin, July 27, 1910)

Pressure in favor of US prohibition grew; in 1917, when O‘ahu was declared a military zone, serving alcohol on the island was banned. Kūhiō viewed the restriction as unfair, since the manufacture and sale of alcohol were still permitted. (GovInfo)

Kūhiō put up a billboard that stated, “You are aware that I am not one who does not touch liquor, neither do I abstain, and I do not want a law which segregates people because they are not white. The days of those activities are over for Hawaii. Kuhio.”

Later, Congress passed the 18^th Amendment – the constitutional amendment known as Prohibition – on December 18, 1917. But before it could be added to the Constitution, three-fourths of the states needed to ratify – or approve – the measure. (US House)

While the 18^th Amendment prohibited the manufacture, sale and transportation of intoxicating beverages, it did not outlaw the possession or consumption of alcohol in the United States.

The 18th Amendment split the Country; everyone was forced to choose – you were either “dry”, in support of Prohibition, or “wet.” But one thing was clear, Prohibition had little effect on America’s thirst.

Congress imposed prohibition in Hawai‘i in 1918 as a war measure, about a year and a half before the Eighteenth Amendment became effective on the continent. Then, in 1921 in an act supplemental to the National Prohibition Act, the prohibition Act was specifically applied to Hawai‘i, and the territorial courts were given the necessary enforcing jurisdiction. (LRB)

The 18^th Amendment would eventually be repealed and overridden by the Twenty-first Amendment in 1933 – it is the only Constitutional amendment to have been fully repealed. (Reagan Library)

August 4, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Making Sugar

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 Kauai, 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)

Cook notes that sugar was cultivated, “The potatoe fields, and spots of sugar-canes, or plantains, in the higher grounds, are planted with the same regularity; and always in some determinate figure; generally as a square or oblong”. (Cook)

Sugarcane, a tall perennial grass, is grown in tropical and semitropical climates. (USDA)

To plant it, short sections of sugar cane plant stalk containing one or more node are first planted in soil which has been deep-plowed and formed into furrows that follow the contour of the land. In about 24 months a mass of vegetation (up to 10-feet high) has developed and is ready for harvest.

There are two factors that distinguish cane sugar production in Hawaii from cane sugar production in other parts of the world. First, growers do not harvest Hawaiian sugarcane until it is an average of two years old. In most other areas, sugarcane is harvested after one year of growth. (EPA)

Prior to World War II, almost all cane was cut by hand and transported to the sugar mills through an extensive network of water flumes. When water flumes did not exist, mule-drawn wagons carried the cane to rail roads for transport.

Following World War II, mechanical harvesting completely replaced the hand cutting of cane. The most common method of harvesting is to snap off the cane at ground level with a bulldozer-type push rake on a large standard tractor. (EPA)

Sugar cane is processed at two facilities: processing starts at a raw sugar factory and finished at a sugar refinery. The following address raw sugar processing. (Sugar Association)

When harvested, the root structure is left intact so that a second, third, or even fourth crop of sugar cane may be produced from suckers which grow from the root structure of old harvested plants. This process is known as ‘ratooning.’

Bulldozers then rake the cane into piles for cranes, equipped with special grabs, to load the cane into special cane haulers usually consisting of an enormous truck-tractor unit and semi-trailer. (EPA)

The operations necessary for making raw cane sugar are as follows :

The extraction of the juice.
The purification of the juice.
The evaporation of the juice to syrup point.
The concentration and crystallization of the syrup.
The preparation of the crystals or grains for the market by separating them from the molasses. (Rolph)

The cane initially moves to a feeder table, up a conveyor, and then contacts a drum which spreads it out into a thin even blanket. Next it passes over a set of rollers which acts as a primary rock extractor. From there it falls into a flotation bath where rocks and other heavy foreign matter settle in the tank and are carried away. (EPA)

Following the flotation bath, the cane proceeds up a conveyor where heavy washing begins. Next it passes over drums to be shaken and leveled. The root structure holding the stalks together is then broken and here also final washing occurs.

The cane then moves over trash extractors (oppositely spinning rollers) which grab and strip leaves from the stalks. The resulting trash is conveyed away from the cleaning plant. A series of knives then cut the cane into small lengths for crushing by a pair of corrugated rollers.

Typically, the milling is through a tandem of three rollers, and the chopped cane passes through each mill in succession to remove the sugar cane juice. Either three, four, or five mills in a series are employed to squeeze the juice out of the cane stalks. (EPA)

Following extraction, sugar cane juice is sent through a clarifier; after leaving the clarifier, the juice enters a multi-effect steam evaporator from which it emerges with greater density as ‘syrup.’

The syrup then enters vacuum pans where it is converted into molasses. In the pans, sugar crystals are also formed from the syrup by the process of evaporation to saturation. At the end of this operating cycle, the crystals are centrifuged to remove the molasses.

The sugar from the first pan operation is of commercial raw sugar quality and is ready for shipment to a mainland refinery. The molasses remaining from centrifuge of the first boiling operation is called ’A’ molasses. This is returned directly to the pans for a second cycle.

The material from the second pan operation is centrifuged and the sugar produced is also of commercial quality. The molasses remaining from the second pan operation is called ‘B’ molasses. ‘B’ molasses is of low quality sugar content and must be specially processed before additional sugar can be produced. (EPA)

The raw sugar is then sent in bulk to refineries (C&H) for finishing, packaging and marketing/shipping. The initial step in cane sugar refining is washing the sugar, called affination, with warm, almost saturated syrup to loosen the molasses film.

There are a variety of steps of heating, separation of sugar crystals (in centrifuges), screening, washing and clarification. Two clarification methods are commonly used: pressure filtration and chemical treatment.

To produce refined granulated sugar, white sugar is transported by conveyors and bucket elevators to the sugar dryers. The most common sugar dryer is the granulator, which consists of two drums in series. One drum dries the sugar and the other cools the dried sugar crystals.

In addition to granulated sugar, other common refined sugar products include confectioners’ (powdered) sugar, brown sugar, liquid sugar, and edible molasses. (Food and Agricultural Industry; EPA) (The color and flavor of brown sugar come from the residual molasses left in the crystals during the refining process.)

Several waste products are produced by the sugar industry in raw sugar processing – one was bagasse, and the mills would flume it out of the mill and simply dump it in the ocean.

Later, some of the bagasse was made into canec. In 1929, Hawaiian Cellulose Ltd, a subsidiary of the Waiākea Mill Company applied for a patent for the manufacture of it. (County of Hawai‘i) They made ‘canec.’

Canec was originally the brand name for pressed fiber board made by Hawaiian Cane Products, Ltd., but it has become commonly used to refer to all pressed board of this type.

Also, later, “After passing through the last mill, as much cane pulp (bagasse) as needed is fed into the mill fireroom for use as fuel.” (EPA) The bagasse was pelletized and fueled the boiler.

In 1906, the California and Hawaiian Sugar Refining Company (C&H) began refining pure cane sugar in the small town of Crockett, California, near San Francisco. As cargo ships offloaded raw cane sugar from the Hawaiian Islands, the refinery employed 490 people and produced 67,000 tons of refined cane sugar.

August 3, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Explorers and Traders … the Pacific and Hawai‘i

The word ‘spice’ is derived from the Latin ‘species’, or ‘special wares’, and refers to an item of special value, as opposed to ordinary articles of trade. Spices were highly valued because, as well as being used in cooking, many had ritual, religious or medical uses.

They were of high value because of their relative geographical scarcity. Spices could only be grown in the tropical East; South Asia served as a major source of spices – in the South of China, Indonesia, as well as in Southern India and Sri Lanka.

Among the most widespread were the spices cinnamon, pepper, clove, nutmeg, and mace. (Hancock) Some spices, such as cloves and nutmeg, grew nowhere else in the world.

The spice trade was conducted mostly by camel caravans over land routes (known as the Silk Roads). The Silk Roads were important routes connecting Asia with the Mediterranean world, including North Africa and Europe. (Deepanjana, UNESCO)

From as early as 2000 BC, spices, such as cinnamon from Sri Lanka and cassia from China, were exported along the Silk Road as far west as the Arabian Peninsula and the Iranian Plateau. Other goods were also exchanged/traded – cargoes from China included ivory, silk, porcelain, metals and gemstones. (Deepanjana, UNESCO)

Later, Spice Routes were established; these were the name given to the network of sea routes that linked the East with the West. The journey of the goods between all these links in the chain is called a trade route (the word ‘trade’ derives from a term meaning a track or course).

One of the major motivating factors in the European Age of Exploration was the search for direct access to the highly lucrative Eastern spice trade.

in 1513, a Spanish captain, Vasco Nuñez de Balboa, went into the interior of Darien (Panama). On September 24, 1513, Balboa sighted a new ocean. He called it the Mar del Sur, or ‘sea of the south’ (South Sea); later (1520), Ferdinand Magellan called it the Mare Pacificum, or Pacific Ocean.

The accounts of the first explorers revealed the potential for high-value commodity exchange, and voyages of exploration were soon followed by those of spice traders. (BOEM)

From 1500 AD onward, first Portugal, and then other European powers, attempted to control the spice trade, the ports which marketed spices, and eventually the territories which grew them. (Cartwright)

The Portuguese established trading posts in China at Macau in 1513, in Timor in 1515, and finally at Nagasaki, Japan in 1543. Within the next decades, Dutch competitors followed the Portuguese across the Indian Ocean and into Southeast Asia. (BOEM)

Then came the Spanish … on November 28 1520, Spaniard Fernao de Magalhais (Ferdinand Magellan) entered the eastern Pacific from the opposite direction, by way of the tip of South America, discovering the strait that now bears his name, and thereby opened up to Spain the possibility of an alternative route between Europe and the spices of the Orient.” (Lloyd)

Magellan crossed the ocean to the Philippines, which he named Las Islas Filipinas in honor of the Spanish king, Felipe. (Spate) The Spanish ultimately prevailed against other European competition in terms of Pacific trade. They did this through the founding of their outpost at Manila (Philippines) in 1571 and the establishment of regular transpacific Manila Galleon voyages.

Once a year, gold and silver were transported west from Acapulco to Manila in exchange spices (pepper, clove and cinnamon), porcelain, ivory, lacquer and elaborate fabrics (silk, velvet, satin), collected from both the Spice Islands (Moluccas, Indonesia) and the Asian Pacific coast.

The Pacific fur trade was pioneered by the Russians, working east from Kamchatka along the Aleutian Islands to the southern coast of Alaska. (ESDAW)

Originally, Russia exported raw furs, consisting in most cases of the pelts of martens, beavers, wolves, foxes, squirrels, and hares. Between the 16th and 18th centuries, Russians began to settle in Siberia, a region rich in many mammal fur species, such as Arctic fox, lynx, sable, sea otter and stoat (ermine).

it was the French and British who dominated Pacific exploration in the eighteenth century. Beginning in the mid-1700s, the rival nations began to send out scientific expeditions to explore and chart the islands of the Pacific.

British explorers included Samuel Wallis (1767–68) and Philip Carteret (1767–68). But by far the most wide-ranging and accomplished of the eighteenth-century explorers was the Englishman Captain James Cook, who made three separate voyages to the Pacific in 1768-71, 1772-75, and 1776-80. (Kjellgren, MetMuseum)

After Cook was killed in Hawai‘i, one of his officers – and later a Captain – George Vancouver continued to explore and chart the Northwest Coast. Commercial traders soon followed, exchanging copper, weapons, liquor, and varied goods for sea otter pelts. (Barbour)

Following Cook’s ‘discovery’ of the opportunities in the fur trade, the North American maritime fur trade became the earliest global economic enterprise. Cook’s ‘discovery’ resulted in the British and then the Americans participating in the trade.

Following the American Revolution, the new nation needed money and a vital surge in trade. In 1787, two ships (Columbia, captained by John Kendrick, and Lady Washington, captained by Robert Gray) left Boston on a mission around Cape Horn and into the Pacific Ocean. to establish new trade with China, settle an outpost on territory claimed by the Spanish, and find the legendary Northwest Passage.

Within ten years after Captain Cook’s 1778 contact with Hawai‘i, the islands became a favorite port of call in the trade with China. The fur traders and merchant ships crossing the Pacific needed to replenish food supplies and water.

Needing supplies in their journey, the traders soon realized they could economically barter for provisions in Hawai‘i; for instance, any type of iron, a common nail, chisel or knife, could fetch far more fresh fruit, meat, and water than a large sum of money would in other ports.

A triangular trade network emerged linking the Pacific Northwest coast, China and the Hawaiian Islands to Britain and the United States (especially New England). Practically every vessel that visited the North Pacific in the closing years of the 18th century stopped at Hawai‘i for refreshment and recreation.

As trade and commerce expanded across the Pacific, numerous countries were looking for faster passage and many looked to Nicaragua and Panama in Central America for possible dredging of a canal as a shorter, safer passage between the two Oceans.

Finally, in 1881, France started construction of a canal through the Panama isthmus. By 1899, after thousands of deaths (primarily due to yellow fever) and millions of dollars, they abandoned the project and sold their interest to the United States.

After Panamanian independence from Columbia in 1903, the US restarted construction of the canal in 1905. Finally, the first complete Panama Canal passage by a self-propelled, oceangoing vessel took place on January 7, 1914.

Later, when Navy Commander John Rodgers and his crew arrived in Hawaiʻi on September 10, 1925 on the first trans-Pacific air flight, they fueled the imaginations of Honolulu businessmen and government officials who dreamed of making Hawaiʻi the economic Crossroads of the Pacific, and saw commercial aviation as another road to that goal.

Two years later on March 21, 1927, Hawaii’s first airport was established in Honolulu and dedicated to Rodgers. 1959 brought two significant actions that shaped the present day make-up of Hawai‘i, (1) Statehood and (2) jet-liner service between the mainland US and Honolulu (Pan American Airways Boeing 707.)

Here is a link for more on Explorers and Traders: https://imagesofoldhawaii.com/wp-content/uploads/Explorers-and-Traders.pdf

July 25, 2025 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Waikahalulu Falls

‘Pan-Pacific Union’ was the local expression of the larger ‘Hands-around-the-Pacific’ movement, which embraced all countries in and about the vast western ocean – the future theatre of the world’s greatest activities. (The Friend, May 1, 1918)

The projected calling of a Pan-Pacific conference to meet in Hawaiʻi, the establishment of a Pan-Pacific commercial college in Honolulu and the project of a Pan-Pacific peace exposition here after the war was launched by a number of influential business men. (Mid-Pacific Magazine, 1918)

A Pan-Pacific commercial college was considered one of the best means to bring Hawaiʻi into closer communion with the countries of the Far East while the exposition and general conference would create a sentiment in the countries of the Pacific to make the Pacific independent in its resources and make Hawaiʻi a real cross-road of the Pacific. (Oregon News, June 26, 1918)

Folks selected a site along the Nuʻuanu Stream, in the heart of Honolulu, near two waterfalls, as the nucleus of a Pan-Pacific Park; here all resident races of the Pacific might re-create their national life and customs.

It turns out the site was at the former home of the former Queen, Liliʻuokalani. Here, once stood the grass house of the parents of Hawaiʻi’s last Queen. As a child she played and bathed in the pool below the falls. (Some call it the Queen’s Bath.)

At first, the Japanese offered to make of Liliʻuokalani Gardens a bit of old Japan. With more land, they suggested different nations around the Great Ocean come for the 1920 Exposition. (Mid-Pacific Magazine, January 1917)

During initial discussions of the proposed Pan-Pacific Exposition came up, Mr Ishii announced that he would provide a Japanese tea house section that would be a credit and honor to his race in Hawaiʻi.

In the garden, and tea houses, there should be no intoxicants of any kind, and only the real lovers of simple pleasures, and those who enjoy the beautiful in nature, would be welcomed. (Mid-Pacific Magazine, August 1918)

Ishii’s Garden in Pan-Pacific Park, a bit of old Japan in Hawaii, was looked upon as one of the most charming spots in Honolulu. The entire grounds were formerly known as Yoraku-en—the Pan-Pacific tea garden.

The garden was planted with Japanese grass, and the landscape gardening there is patterned after the Land of the Cherry Blossoms. Buildings, too, are designed along Japanese lines. It was Ishii’s plan to will the park and garden to the Pan-Pacific Union as its headquarters.

For ten years, Ishii has been improving these remarkable Japanese gardens. They adjoin the Liliʻuokalani Park, one of the most beautiful bits of landscape in Hawaii. The building of a native Hawaiian village is contemplated, adjoining both Liliʻuokalani and Ishii’s gardens, so that in time all may be thrown into one Pan-Pacific park.

Here, perhaps each Pacific race in Hawaiʻi may have its individual club house and grounds. Mr. Ishii is a public benefactor in pointing the way for better understanding and co-operation among the men of all races in Honolulu. (Pan-Pacific Union, March 1923)

Glance up the Nuʻuanu Stream, beneath the finest (and most forgotten) avenue of monkeypod trees in the Island. It was a bit of Japan at its fairest, and there, far up at the end of the arching of green, were two tumbling white waterfalls.

There are many beauty spots in Hawaiʻi, but none more beautiful than those that congregate about that section of the Nuʻuanu Stream, flowing through Honolulu, where it was proposed to hold the Pan-Pacific Peace Exposition after World War I.

Their philosophy was, work hard enough and long enough for the thing you want, and you will get it; and so any good idea may be made to grow into a reality.” (Mid-Pacific Magazine, August 1918)

Unfortunately, there are no records of the Pan-Pacific Union holding the exposition (like a World’s Fair) in Honolulu. The City later acquired the Liliʻuokalani Park – it’s now a small, streamside passive park. Waikahalulu Falls are still there, too.

The City notes, portions of this garden were once the property and favorite picnic grounds of Queen Liliʻuokalani, the last reigning monarch of Hawaiʻi. She later donated her land to the City and County of Honolulu to be used for the public’s enjoyment. This developing garden is devoted to native Hawaiian plants. (C&C)

Records do note that the Nagoya Pan-Pacific Peace Exposition was a world’s fair held in Japan from March 15 to May 31, 1937.

It was intended to promote industry, transportation, education, science, construction, architecture, social welfare, tourism, fine arts and crafts. The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) erupted only two months after the Exposition closed.