Images of Old Hawaiʻi

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Kona Coffee Living History Farm

The Kona Coffee Living History Farm (on the former Uchida Coffee Farm) is a 5.5-acre historic coffee farm, first homesteaded in 1900, and is the only living history coffee farm in the nation.
The Uchida Coffee Farm is an intact example of the lifestyle of early Kona Coffee farmers, many of whom were Japanese and brought Japanese customs and culture to Hawai‘i.
Don Francisco de Paula y Marin recorded in his journal, dated January 21, 1813, that he had planted coffee seedlings on the island of Oʻahu.  The British warship H.M.S. Blonde brought coffee trees, to Hawaii, from Brazil in 1825.
Coffee was planted in Mānoa Valley on O‘ahu, and from a small field, trees were introduced to other areas of O‘ahu and neighbor islands.
Reverend Samuel Ruggles moved trees to Captain Cook, Kona in 1828.  Hanalei Valley on the North Shore of Kaua‘i was home to the first coffee plantation.
Between 1868 and 1924, more than 140,000 Japanese came to Hawai‘i with 3-year labor contracts to work for the sugar plantations and, when their contract expired, many decided that a different lifestyle suited them better.
The 1890s boom in coffee-growing in North Kona was encouraged by rising prices.  Although sugarcane plantations expanded with US annexation in 1898, coffee-growing grew in Kona because of its adaptability to land that was too rocky for sugarcane.
During the early coffee boom, Portuguese and then Japanese laborers had filtered into Kona.  As one coffee plantation after another gave up when coffee prices fell and sugar plantations became more attractive, these plantations were broken up into small parcels (3 to 5-acres) and leased to these laborers.
Many worked on the newly formed sugar plantations and worked their coffee orchards as side lines.  As the coffee prices remained low, the Portuguese abandoned the coffee orchards, and by 1910, the Japanese were about the only growers left to tend the coffee trees.
By the 1930s there were more than 1,000 farms and, as late as the 1950s, there were 6,000-acres of coffee in Kona.
At the turn of the last century there was coffee on all the major Hawaii islands, and now 100 years later, there is once again coffee on all the major islands.
The Uchida Coffee Farm illustrates the development of small-scale coffee farming facilities along the Kona coffee belt of the Big Island, now considered a world class coffee.
It serves as an intact example of the structures that typify the coffee farm lifestyle and technology used in the 1900-1950s by Japanese coffee farmers in Kona.
The house is an excellent example of architecture adapted to the climate and needs of a particular family; it demonstrates some of the influences Japanese culture and tradition has had on Hawai‘i’s architecture.
The “Living History Farm” brings the coffee pioneer’s story to life by depicting the daily lives of early Japanese immigrants during the period of 1920-1945.
Electricity was installed just before the war in the early-1940s and hot running water wasn’t established until the late-1960s, when the modern bathroom was added.  There was never a shower or bath tub, the furo was used.
Although the family did use a gas stove in the last years at the farm, the stone fireplaces, used up until recently for rice and wok cooking, are still in place.
The Farm museum, operated by the Kona Historical Society, is open for tours and 100% Kona coffee sales Monday – Thursday, 10:00 am – 2:00 pm.  There is a small fee for the tour.  Please call for special group arrangements: (808) 323-2006 or email at coffeefarm@konahistorical.org.
Living history gives visitors an opportunity to experience history “brought to life” by costumed interpreters who demonstrate traditional crafts, agricultural activities and the everyday tasks of people from the past.
Visitors may walk through the coffee and macadamia nut orchards, tour the historic farmhouse, talk story with the interpreters and visit with the donkey and chickens.
               
The Kona Historical Society is raising money to expand its award-winning Kona Coffee Living History Farm.  The money raised will be used to create a permanent exhibit space for “The Kona Coffee Story: Along the Hawai`i Belt Road.”
The image shows the mill on the Uchida Farm; in addition, I have included other images on Kona Coffee in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook page.

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Pearl Harbor Historic Trail

Pearl Harbor Historic Trail is a partially-existing heritage and recreational corridor that has the goal of establishing an 18+ mile multi-use recreational trail that will highlight historic sites from the USS Arizona Memorial to the west coast Oʻahu community of Nānākuli.
The full Pearl Harbor Historic Trail is still only an idea, but there is already a multi-use trail from the Arizona Memorial parking lot to Waipi’o Point Access Road.  The path is intended to be improved as part of the historic trail project.
The long-range Master Plan (prepared in 2001) stemmed from the Aiea-Pearl City Community Vision Group’s Year 2000 project.
The Pearl Harbor Historic Trail is a vital element in the Aiea-Pearl City Livable Communities Plan as its proposed projects for the area are integrated into the Plan.
The former Oahu Railway and Land Company (OR&L) right-of-way is the foundation upon which the proposed Pearl Harbor Historic Trail will be built.
A key project of the Master Plan is the re-establishment of the historic railway operation for the entire 18+ miles of the Trail.
The Hawaiian Railway Society (HRS) currently operates a six-mile long narrated railway train tour between its Ewa station museum and Kahe Tracks Beach Park in Nanakuli.
The Community Vision Group saw the 40-foot wide OR&L right-of-way as a valuable asset within their community that had the potential to meet a number of community needs such as safe bicycle and pedestrian paths, a natural and historic preservation project, a recreation resource, a means of opening up shoreline access, and an opportunity for economic revitalization.
The Master Plan incorporates a combination shared-use path and railway that includes major components, attractions and activity centers that will establish the Trail as a world-class heritage and recreation corridor.
The Trail will feature a continuous path for bicyclists and pedestrians alongside an historic train, diverging from the OR&L right-of-way where advantageous to take in shoreline views.
Miles of greenway and bikeway connections and gateways to the path are proposed, enhancing access to nearby communities and attractions. 
A few years ago, Nelia and I biked from Aiea Bay State Recreation Area, first to the Arizona Memorial side, then to Waipiʻo Peninsula along the existing portion of the trail.
At that time, it was in generally good condition; it is used daily by bikers, joggers and walkers.  There are great views of Pearl Harbor, as well as other odds and ends along the way.
The image shows the general route of the bike path; I have also included some photos of the bike trip we took a few years ago on the trail in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook page.

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Cemetery Pupu Theatre at Oʻahu Cemetery, Hawai‘i – 6 pm, June 22-23

This is waaay cool – we went last night.
Founded in 1844, O‘ahu Cemetery is Hawai‘i’s oldest public graveyard.  Over the years, O‘ahu Cemetery has become the permanent resting place of hundreds of prominent history makers.
Located on 18-acres in lower Nu’uanu Valley, near downtown Honolulu, O’ahu Cemetery is a “classic” example of an early American “rural” cemetery, distinguished by a park-like setting, and an eye-catching array of ornately carved tombstones.
Hawaiian Mission Houses is presenting Cemetery Pupu Theater – actors dressed in period costume telling the life events of select individuals buried at O’ahu Cemetery – at their respective grave sites.
There was nothing ghoulish about it; rather, it was very effective storytelling.  When you get there, you are separated into groups then go from gravesite to gravesite for each presentation.
$60 per person – includes drinks and pupu, seating limited, RSVP required.  Click here to make your reservation:  https://safesite.4agoodcause.com/mission-houses-museum/event1.aspx?eventid=15
Portrayed in the June Hawaiian Mission Houses Cemetery Pupu Theater program include:
John Papa I‘i (1800-1870)
John Papa Ii was a leading citizen of the Hawaiian kingdom during the nineteenth century. Born in 1800 and raised under the traditional kapu system, I‘i was trained from earliest childhood for a life of service to the high chiefs.
I‘i served as a general superintendent of O‘ahu schools and was an influential member in the court of Kamehameha III. He was appointed by the king to the Treasury Board; was a member of the Privy Council; Board of Land Commissioners and was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Hawai‘i .
Cherilla Lowry (1861 – 1917)
Cherilla Lowry founder and first president of the Outdoor Circle (TOC) (100-years ago) whose mission was to “Keep Hawai‘i clean, green and beautiful.”  Twenty-two Monkeypod trees were planted in A‘ala Park as the organization’s first tree planting project.
Through its mission, much of TOC’s activities strive to educate youth and local citizens about environmental issues that concern the preservation and conservation of Hawai’i’s natural resources, including planting trees, beautifying parks and public areas including parks, streets, playgrounds and schools and bicycle paths.
Eliab Grimes (1780–1848)
Captain Eliab Grimes, a native of Massachusetts, was a Honolulu merchant of many years and operated with his nephew Hiram, as the firm E & H Grimes.  Eliab Grimes persuaded John Sinclair to occupy the Rancho Del Paso (a 44,371-acre Mexican land grant in present day Sacramento County, California)  until such time as he (Grimes) could take legal title to it.
In 1844, Eliab Grimes received the official land grant. Over the next four years, Grimes and Sinclair, raised cattle and harvested wheat on the property.  Grimes, who subsequently became an important trader and political figure in San Francisco, died in 1848
Lucy Thurston (1795 – 1876)
Asa Thurston (1787–1868) and Lucy Goodale Thurston were in the first company of American Christian Missionaries to the Hawaiian Islands.  Lucy Goodale Thurston voyaged to the Hawaiian Islands in 1820 intent on bringing the word of God to its inhabitants.  During the next fifty years she raised a family, dealt with tragedy and helped to change the future of Hawaii forever.
The Thurstons, unlike most missionary couples, spent most of the rest of their lives in the islands.  Lucy compiled her letters and other writings into one of the most vivid accounts of the early mission days.  She underwent a mastectomy without anesthetic in 1855.  She died on October 13, 1876 in Honolulu.
Lorrin Andrews (1795–1868)
Lorrin Andrews was an early American missionary to Hawaii and judge.   In June 1831 the mission hoped to establish a seminary on Maui, since it was somewhat centrally located among the Hawaiian Islands. Andrews was selected to run the school called Lahainaluna for “upper Lahaina.”
On September 5, 1831 classes began in thatched huts with 25 married Hawaiian young men. It was the first college west of the Rocky Mountains.  His students published the first newspaper and were involved in the first case of counterfeiting currency in Hawaiʻi. He later served as a judge and became a member of Hawai‘i’s first Supreme Court.
Please also consider visiting the Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives (on King Street, adjoining Kawaiaha‘o Church.)  (I am honored and proud to have been recently elected to serve on the Mission Houses Board of Trustees.)
I posted a video on YouTube of “Cherilla Lowrey” (1861-1917) founder and first president of the Outdoor Circle (she is portrayed by Hanna Gaffney.)  (There as a little wind and rain – it was recorded on my cellphone.)
Click here to make your reservation:

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Kohala Field System

Throughout the younger islands of the Hawaiian archipelago, dryland agricultural field systems constituted a significant component of the late prehistoric subsistence economy.
The field systems produced large quantities of food to support local farmers and residents, as well as local and district-level chiefly elites.
It is generally thought that the dryland agricultural systems had spread to their maximum extent, nearly reaching the edge of productive lands.
Kohala supported a large and well-developed field system, covering over 15,000-acres with a dense network of field walls and paved trails.  It is one of the largest archaeological sites in Polynesia.
In the Kohala area, Hawaiian farmers found, farmed and intensified production on lands that were poised between being too wet and too dry.
The distribution of intensive rain-fed agricultural systems was constrained on its lower end by conditions that were too arid to support intensive agriculture reliably, while at their upper margin many millennia of leaching had depleted soil fertility to a point where intensive rain-fed agriculture was infeasible.
In essence, Hawaiians were farming the rock in intensive dryland agricultural systems; their field systems extended to the wettest point that still supplied nutrients via basalt weathering.
When the field system is plotted against the rainfall map it falls within the 30-70-in rainfall band.
Archaeological evidence of intensive cultivation of sweet potato and other dryland crops is extensive, including walls, terraces, mounds and other features.
The fields throughout the Kohala system were oriented parallel to the elevation contours and the walls (and perhaps kō (sugar cane) planted on them) would have functioned as windbreaks from the trade winds which sweep down the slopes of the Kohala mountains.
Configured in this way, the walls would also have reduced evapotranspiration and – with heavy mulching – retained essential moisture for the crops.  This alignment of fields also conserved water by retaining and dispersing surface run-off and inhibited wind erosion and soil creep.
The main development of the Kohala field system took place AD 1450-1800.  By the late-1600s the lateral expansion of the field system had been reached, and by AD 1800 the system was highly intensified.
The process of intensification involved shortened fallow periods, and agricultural plots divided into successively smaller units.
The archaeological map of the Kohala field system depicts over 5,400-segments of rock alignments and walls with a total length of nearly 500-miles.
The fields begin near the north tip of the island very close to the coast.  The western margin extends southward at an increasing distance from the coast, with the eastern margin at a higher elevation and also an increasing distance from the coast.
From north to south the field system is more than 12-miles in length.  At its maximum, it is more than 2.5-miles in width.
Scientists speculate that this farming did not just support the local population, but was also used by Kamehameha to feed the thousands of warriors under his command in his conquest of uniting the islands under a single rule in the late-1700s.
Based on experimental plantings, if only half of the Kohala Field System was in production in one year, it could be producing between 20,000 to 120,000-tons of sweet potato in one crop.
The system was abandoned shortly after European contact in the early- or mid-19th century.
The image shows remnants of the Kohala Field System walls in present pastureland.  A special thanks to Peter Vitousek, former Hawai‘i resident and now Professor at Stanford, for background information and images.  In addition, more images/maps of the Kohala Field System are in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook page.

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Hawai‘i As Seen By An Artist In 1816

Louis Choris (1795-1828) was a famous German-Russian painter and explorer.  He was one of the first sketch artists for expedition research. 
He visited the Pacific and the west coast of North America in 1816 on board the Rurick, being attached in the capacity of artist to the Romanoff expedition under the command of Lieutenant Otto von Kotzebue, sent out for the purpose of exploring a northwest passage.
Choris and crew came to Hawai‘i in 1816 and he painted what he saw.
Choris is said to have “painted nature as he found it.  The essence of his art is truth; a fresh, vigorous view of life, and an originality in portrayal.”
The accompanying illustrations may therefore be looked upon as faithfully representing the subjects treated by the artist.  This gives us great insight into what Hawai‘i looked like in 1816.
After the voyage of the Rurick, Choris went to Paris where he issued a portfolio of his drawings in lithographic reproduction.  Choris worked extensively in pastels.
The image captures a meeting with Kamehameha I; additional Choris drawings have been added to a file of like name in my Photos section on my Facebook page.