General | Page 30 | Images of Old Hawaiʻi

October 11, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Hawai‘i Transportation Evolution

The canoe was a principal means of travel in ancient Hawaiʻi, extensive cross-country trail networks. Overland travel was on foot and followed the traditional trails.

Then, in 1803, American ship under Captain William Shaler (with commercial officer Richard Cleveland,) arrived with three horses aboard – gifts for King Kamehameha.

In the 1820s and 1830s, more horses were imported from California, and by the 1840s the use of introduced horses, mules and bullocks for transportation was increasing.

In 1825, Andrew Bloxam (naturalist aboard the HMS Blonde) noted in Honolulu that, “The streets are formed without order or regularity. Some of the huts are surrounded by low fences or wooden stakes … As fires often happen the houses are all built apart from each other. The streets or lanes are far from being clean …” (Clark, HJH)

By the 1830s, King Kamehameha III initiated a program of island-wide improvements on the ala loa, and in 1847, a formal program for development of the alanui aupuni (government roads) was initiated.

Sidewalks were constructed, usually of wood, as early as 1838. The first sidewalk made of brick was laid down in 1857 by watchmaker Samuel Tawson in front of his shop on Merchant Street.

It wasn’t until 1850 that streets received official names. On August 30, 1850, the Privy Council first named Hawaiʻi’s streets; there were 35-streets that received official names that day (29 were in Downtown Honolulu, the others nearby).

At the time, “Broadway” was the main street (we now call it King Street;) it was the widest and longest – about 2-3 miles long from the river (Nuʻuanu River on the west) out to the “plains” (to Mānoa).

It wasn’t until 1852 that the Chinese became the first contract laborers to arrive in the islands. At about that time, Honolulu had approximately 10,000-residents. Foreigners made up about 6% of that (excluding visiting sailors). Laws at the time allowed naturalization of foreigners to become subjects of the King (by about that time, about 440 foreigners exercised that right).

The majority of houses were made of grass (hale pili,) there were about 875 of them; there were also 345 adobe houses, 49 stone houses, 49 wooden houses and 29 combination (adobe below, wood above). In 1847, Washington Place was built by future-Queen Liliʻuokalani’s father-in-law.

The earliest public transit was the Pioneer Omnibus Line, with a horse-pulled vehicle serving parts of Honolulu for a few years beginning in the spring of 1868. (Schmitt)

In the quarter century from 1872 to 1896 the population just about doubled in the kingdom from 57,000 to 109,000; Honolulu doubled from 15,000 to 30,000.

In 1884, the legislature passed a law “granting to William R. Austin and his associates the right to construct and operate a street railroad upon certain streets of the city of Honolulu.” Later amended, the law granted authority the Hawaiian Tramways Company, Limited (from England.) (Kuykendall)

In 1888, the animal-powered tramcar service of Hawaiian Tramways ran track from downtown to Waikīkī. In 1900, the Tramway was taken over by the Honolulu Rapid Transit & Land Co (HRT).

That year, an electric trolley (tram line) was put into operation in Honolulu, and then in 1902, a tram line was built to connect Waikīkī and downtown Honolulu. The electric trolley replaced the horse/mule-driven tram cars.

The first automobiles appeared on the streets of Honolulu on October 8, 1899, the date on which both Henry P Baldwin and Edward D Tenney took possession of their newly arrived vehicles (both described as Wood electrics.) (Schmitt)

By 1900, Honolulu had a population of more than 39,000 and was in the midst of a development boom, creating tremendous need for more housing.

“[T]here were only four automobiles on Oahu in 1901 – you lived downtown because you worked downtown, you couldn’t live in Kaimuki or in Manoa.” (Star Bulletin)

The “first gas-engined automobile complete with steering wheel and tonneau,” acquired by CM Cooke in 1904, and the Honolulu Automobile Club later adopted this date for the “first real automobile” in the Islands. (Schmitt)

Spurring a boom, in 1903, Henry Ford officially opened the Ford Motor Company and five years later released the first Model T. In 1907, Henry Ford announced his goal for the Ford Motor Company: to create “a motor car for the great multitude.” (pbs)

“The automobile owner uses his car six days a week either in direct pursuit of his business or as a means of quickly transporting himself and others to and from that place of business.”

“The fact that he may take his family out on a Sunday is not a pleasure trip, but a necessary recreation in order, to ‘keep fit’ for his work.” (McAlpine, Schuman Carriage, Honolulu Star Bulletin, November 3, 1907)

“The census of 1908 gave 259 cars imported into the islands in that year, thus showing that the automobile is in use pretty generally, as it is now estimated that there are nearly seven hundred cars in the islands, an increase of more than 100 per cent in one year.” (Beringer, Overland Monthly, July 1909)

“The automobile is here to stay. If we had better roads there would be more automobiles sold, naturally.” (Gustav Schuman, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, June 24, 1916)

The first traffic lights in the Islands were installed at the intersection of Nuʻuanu Avenue and Beretania Street, Honolulu; an overhead signal was put into operation February 19, 1936.

On February 24 the overhead lights were “replaced by side bracket lights, flashing the green go and red stop light from a post at each corner.” The new lights were “operated by the flow of traffic itself.” (Schmitt)

In 1938 automobile registration stood at 43,785. In 1945 the number of automobiles on island had grown to 52,527; a dozen years later, in 1957, automobile registration stood at 159,227, a 329.8 percent increase since 1945.

This tremendous influx of automobiles resulted in myriad needs having to be addressed, ranging from the reduction of traffic congestion to improved parking, and enhanced traffic safety measures.

The Territory undertook two other major highway projects, the Mauka and Makai Arterials, to divert traffic off downtown streets. (HHS)

“‘A super highway through Honolulu, 120 feet wide and running mauka of the business district from Kalihi to Kaimuki … would be invaluable in solving Honolulu’s pressing traffic problem,’ engineer John Rush told the City Council in 1939.”

The 1945 Territorial Legislature enacted a liquid fuel tax in order to generate the funds necessary to match the federal funds available for the highway’s construction. This tax was increased to five cents a gallon in 1955 to help offset Hawaii’s match for the increasing federal dollars coming to the islands for highway construction.

From 1952 to 1962, Honolulu officials kept adding to the Mauka Arterial, described as the first road in the state “tailored to the flight patterns of people.”

The Lunalilo Highway project was expanded to become the H-1, a 28 mile roadway running from Palailai at Campbell Industrial Park to Ainakoa Avenue, with the Lunalilo Highway being the section running through Honolulu. (DOT)

A companion Makai Arterial that would have run past Waikiki, down Ala Moana and along an elevated roadway near the Honolulu waterfront never materialized as planned. (DOT)

Instead, the eight lane Makai Arterial, named Nimitz Highway, opened to traffic in November 1952, ten years after construction had commenced at the Pearl Harbor gate. (HHS)

A section of the Federal-Aid to Highways Act of 1959 required that a study be undertaken to consider the eligibility of Hawai‘i and Alaska for interstate highway funding.

As a result of the study, the Hawaii Omnibus Act, which President Eisenhower signed into law on July 12, 1960, removed the language in the Federal-Aid Highway Act which limited the interstate system to the continental US.

It also authorized three interstate highways for Hawaii, H-1, H-2 and H-3 to address national defense concerns, an allowed interstate highway justification which resulted from a 1957 amendment to the original act. (DOT)

An interesting remnant of apparently changed alignment (and probable interconnection of the Mauka and Makai Arterials) is a stub out to nowhere at the on/off ramps at Kapiʻolani Boulevard to H-1. (Lots of information here is from DOT, HHS and Leidemann.)

October 8, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Last House on the Beach

“In the latter post-contact period (ca. post 1850), the area [along Waikiki Beach] has been used for private residences: in the early portion of this period it was the domain of the royal family and the high ali‘i.”

“Foreign born businessmen and the children of missionaries began to acquire property along the beach in the late nineteenth century. They built large beach houses, which were used on weekends and holidays. The Young, Wilder, and Macfarlane families had house lots within and adjacent to the project area by 1897.”

Alexander Young was born in Blackburn, Scotland, December 14, 1833, the son of Robert and Agnes Young. His father was a contractor. When young, he apprenticed in a mechanical engineering and machinist department.

One of his first jobs included sailing around the Horn in 1860 to Vancouver Island with a shipload of machinery and a contract to build and operate a large sawmill at Alberni.

He left Vancouver Island for the distant “Sandwich Islands,” arriving in Honolulu February 5, 1865; he then formed a partnership with William Lidgate to operate a foundry and machine shop at Hilo, Hawaiʻi, continuing in this business for four years.

Moving to Honolulu, Young bought the interest of Thomas Hughes in the Honolulu Iron Works and continued in this business for 32 years. On his retirement from the iron works he invested in sugar plantation enterprises. He became president of the Waiakea Mill Co.

During the monarchy he served in the House of Nobles, 1889, was a member of the advisory council under the provisional Government and was a Minister of the Interior in President Dole’s cabinet.

With the new century he started a new career, when in 1900 he started construction of the Alexander Young Hotel, fronting Bishop Street and extending the full block between King and Hotel streets in downtown Honolulu. The 192-room building was completed in 1903.

In 1905, Young acquired the Moana Hotel and later the Royal Hawaiian Hotel (the ‘old’ Royal Hawaiian in downtown Honolulu that was later (1917) purchased for the Army and Navy YMCA.)

The Honolulu businessman whose downtown hotel that bore his name helped him became known as the father of the hotel industry in Hawaiʻi.

“Even before the Waikīkī coast became a tourist attraction, rich haole businessmen built their own beach houses along the shore. West of the Seaside were three houses, according to the recollections of Elizabeth Kinau Wilder, who grew up in their Waikīkī home in the 1910s. She recalled:”

“‘A narrow driveway, which faced the length of our front yard, led to the Youngs. Mr. Young didn’t have enough room for his carriage to turn around, so S.G. [Samuel Gardner Wilder, Elizabeth’s grandfather] let him use some of his property as a friendly gesture, never dreaming that he would never get it back! And when the Macfarlanes’ house was found to be fifteen feet on our land, S.G gave it to him rather than have the house torn down!’”

A 1914 Fire Insurance map, shows to the west of the Seaside dining room (with a semicircular rotunda), the “Seaside Hotel Rooms” partially over the water, which is the old Hawaiian Annex. Adjacent to this is a series of bathhouses and then a large family residence (labeled with a “D” for dwelling).

“This house is identified in several historic photographs as the ‘Bertha Young’ house. Bertha was a playmate of Elizabeth Wilder, who remembers many pleasant days spent at the adjacent Seaside Hotel.”

“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.”

“The muliwai or lagoonal backwater of ‘Āpuakēhau Stream that reached the sea between the present Royal Hawaiian and Moana Hotels was filled in between 1919 and 1927. The filling in of ‘Āpuakēhau Stream and the excavating of the Ala Wai canal were elements of a plan to urbanize Waikīkī and the surrounding districts:”

“‘The [Honolulu city] planning commission began by submitting street layout plans for a Waikīkī reclamation district. In January 1922 a Waikīkī improvement commission resubmitted these plans to the board of supervisors, which, in turn, approved them a year later.’”

“The Royal Hawaiian Hotel was formally opened on February 1, 1927 and with a maximum height of 150 feet was the tallest privately owned building in the Territory at that time.” (Cultural Surveys).

“At the Ewa end of the Royal was the Bertha Young property. Bertha Young was part of the family who started the Young Hotel. Bertha Young’s place fronted on the ocean right next to the Royal.” (Fred Hemmings Sr. OCC)

The Bertha Young home survived the demolition of the Seaside Hotel in the 1920s and the construction of the Royal Hawaiian Hotel in 1927. (Cultural Surveys) “Miss Young attended Punahou School and was graduated from Oakland High School in California. … During World War II, Miss Young worked with the Red Cross.” (SB, June 12, 1963)

Bertha Young, “who refused to surrender to the concrete jungle of Waikiki,” (SB June 12, 1963) died June 11, 1963. “[S]he lived in the last privately owned beachfront home in Waikiki.” (SB, June 13, 1963)

She built the house in 1927, designed by Dickey & Wood, for $13,400. (SB, Nav 12, 1927) “She lived for more than 50 years on the property given to her by her mother, Ruth.” (SB, June 12, 1963)

The Bertha Young property was sold in 1963 for $600,000 to the Von Hamm-Young Company. (SB, Aug 20, 1963) Her sister was Bernie Von Hamm and brother-in-law was Conrad C Von Hamm.

On February 26, 1969, “a bulldozer jazzed up with the flower leis dug the first spade of earth … for the Sheraton-Waikiki in an era full of memories for many kamaainas.” (SB, Feb 27, 1969)

October 3, 2024 by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Shashin Hanayome

Omiai, the practice of arranged marriages, had been common among Japanese samurai families, as they often needed to arrange unions across long distances to match their social standing. (Koch)

Beginning in the Meiji Period (1868-1912) Omiai spread through all classes of Japanese society. (Koch) During this time, these marriages were an agreement between two families, and children had no right to choose their own spouse. (Ishimura)

Under Japan’s Civil Code of 1898, the government legally defined arranged marriages and the patriarchal household system, which has been practiced by the upper-class warrior clans, the nobility and merchants alike during feudalism, as the authentic and traditional marriage and family system. (Tanaka)

Husbands simply had to enter the names of their brides into their family registries. Thus, men and women became legally betrothed no matter where they resided. (Nakamura)

The practice came to Hawaiʻi, tied back to Japan.

A shortage of laborers to work in the growing (in size and number) sugar plantations became a challenge. The only answer was imported labor.

Starting in the 1850s, when the Hawaiian Legislature passed “An Act for the Governance of Masters and Servants,” a section of which provided the legal basis for contract-labor system, labor shortages were eased by bringing in contract workers from Asia, Europe and North America.

The first to arrive were the Chinese (1852.) The sugar industry grew, so did the Chinese population in Hawaiʻi. Concerned that the Chinese were taking too strong a representation in the labor market, the government passed laws reducing Chinese immigration. Further government regulations, introduced 1886-1892, virtually ended Chinese contract labor immigration.

In March 1881, King Kalākaua visited Japan during which he discussed with Emperor Meiji Hawaiʻi’s desire to encourage Japanese nationals to settle in Hawaiʻi.

Kalākaua’s meeting with Emperor Meiji improved the relationship of the Hawaiian Kingdom with the Japanese government and an economic depression in Japan served as motivation for agricultural workers to move from their homeland. (Nordyke/Matsumoto)

The first 943-government-sponsored, Kanyaku Imin, Japanese immigrants to Hawaiʻi arrived in Honolulu aboard the Pacific Mail Steamship Company ‘City of Tokio’ on February 8, 1885. Subsequent government approval was given for a second set of 930-immigrants who arrived in Hawaii on June 17, 1885.

With the Japanese government satisfied with treatment of the immigrants, a formal immigration treaty was concluded between Hawaiʻi and Japan on January 28, 1886. The treaty stipulated that the Hawaiʻi government would be held responsible for employers’ treatment of Japanese immigrants.

Between 1885 and 1907, thousands of Japanese came to Hawaiʻi in numbers so great that by 1897 Japanese constituted the largest single ethnic group in the Islands. In 1888, there were 6,420 Japanese in Hawaiʻi; in 1890, 12,360; in 1896, 24,407; in 1900, 61,111. By 1900, the Japanese composed nearly 40% of the population in Hawaiʻi. (Ogawa & Grant)

Many decided to stay – but it was men who initially came to work and men outnumbered adult women 2-to-1 in the Territory; in some communities, the sex ratio was even more skewed. The men needed brides.

Letters were written home requesting that their parents contact the matchmakers in the village so that respectable women could be found. Pictures of the men were taken by professional photographers who often used the same worn suit over and over so that these laborers looked a little more distinguished.

Picture brides’ personal backgrounds were varied: While most were daughters of farmers or fishermen, some picture brides came from lower and middle-class family backgrounds – daughters of Christian ministers, teachers, shop owners and entrepreneurs, for example. (Tanaka)

Women did have greater marital opportunities in Hawaiʻi because of the gender disparity within the Japanese community and while some marriages did end in divorce, the majority of men and women accepted the arranged marriage. (Nakamura)

In general, the picture bride practice conformed to traditional marriage customs as parents or relatives in Japan chose wives for single migrant men working in America and Hawai’i. In Japan, heads of households met through an intermediary. (Ogawa & Grant)

These go-betweens arranged meetings between family heads who discussed and negotiated proposed unions with little input from the prospective spouses. An exchange of photographs sometimes occurred in the screening process, with family genealogy, wealth, education and health figuring heavily in the selection criteria. (Nakamura)

Portraits were then tucked into the letters. In time they would receive from Japan the exciting news that a bride had been found and if approved, arrangements would be made to send the young woman across the ocean to this foreign land. Inside the envelope would also be the photograph of the prospective bride.

The wife was entered into the husband’s family registry, making the marriage official under Japanese law. Many of these women then married their husbands immediately upon arrival in Hawaiʻi, in mass marriage ceremonies performed on the wharf. (West & Seal)

Many picture brides were genuinely shocked to see their husbands for the first time at the Immigration Station. Picture brides were often disappointed in the man they came to marry.

Husbands were usually older than wives by ten to fifteen years, and occasionally more. Men often forwarded photographs taken in their youth or touched up ones that concealed their real age. (Nakamura)

The first major waves of Japanese Shashin Hanayome “picture brides” began in 1908 and before all immigration was stopped from Japan in 1924, these tens of thousands of women would reshape the Japanese community in Hawaiʻi.

In addition to being wives and mothers who took care of the home, Japanese women immigrants also worked alongside their husbands in the fields. (Ogawa & Grant)

Between 1907 and 1923, over 14,000 picture brides arrived in Hawaiʻi from Japan; they bolstered the Islands’ female population. A 1927 census of all 43-sugar plantations reported that while the ratio of Japanese men to women was 1.5:1. (Bill)

And, as might be expected, this early period of stabilization of the Japanese family coincided with a high birth rate. The birth of the second generation (nisei,) in effect established the identity of the first generation (issei.) (Ogawa & Grant)

The establishment of families was soon followed by the growth of Buddhist and Christian churches, a variety of language newspapers, and self-help organizations that served the needs of the immigrant community. (Ogawa & Grant)

“According to some historians, the majority of Japanese born in the United States can trace their ancestry to a picture bride.” (LA Times)

Japanese picture brides – on ship

Japanese picture brides – on_ship

Picture Brides on ship

Japanese picture brides – Angel Island immigration station-‘Ellis Island of the West’

Japanese – Groups-PP-46-5-019-00001

Japanese – Groups – Early-PP-46-4-012-00001

Japanese sugar plantation laborers

Japanese Woman_and_Child-PP-46-9-010

Japanese Woman and Child-PP-46-9-011

Japanese – Woman-PP-46-8-036-00001

Japanese – Groups – Early-PP-46-4-005-00001

Arrival of Japanese contract laborers at Honolulu Harbor-HSA

September 30, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Young Brothers Save Prince Kūhiō

On July 10, 1902, Prince Kūhiō left the Home Rule Party and, a few months later, on September 1, 1902, joined the Republican Party; he was nominated as their candidate for Congress and, on November 4, 1902, won the election to serve as Hawai‘i’s delegate to Congress.

“Prince Kūhiō, accompanied by a half dozen personal friends and the quartet club which sang Republican songs during the campaign just closed, left for Lihue, Kauai (November 14) in a special steamer.”

“They will return Sunday morning (November 16) and will at once proceed to Pearl Harbor where the Prince will sail his yacht Princess in the races on that day.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, November 15, 1902)

“Prince Kūhiō arrived at 4 o’clock Sunday morning from Kauai, and after breakfast and dressing at his home started for the harbor.”

“The two young men who make the crew were on hand when Prince Kūhiō and his friend Judge Mahaulu drove to the boathouse. There was little time lost in getting the boat away and with the Prince at the helm it stood out to sea.”

“The Princess is a staunch third-rater, and nothing less than a heavy blow makes the crew which sails the little craft think for a moment of reefing down or running for the harbor.”

“When the trip was arranged for yesterday morning there was nothing to suggest that there was any danger for such a boat and the four sailed out gaily as ever before they inaugurated as cruise.”

“The canvas was full and the crew was keeping a close watch for squalls as the wind was gusty and the prospect that there might be such a blow outside that some reefing would have to be done.”

“The little boat went off to the south east when approaching the outside reef, and was way between the spar buoy and the ball buoy when Prince Cupid saw a squall coming down upon them.”

“He ordered the main sheet slackened and was himself getting ready to bring the boat into the wind, when with lightning rapidity, before anything could be done to prevent it …”

“… the winds hit the little boat and over it went carrying every one of the men in the craft with it. Luckily the crew was in windward and all escaped being fouled in the lines as the boat went broadside into the sea.”

“They made themselves as secure as possible on the topside of the sailer’s hull and clung there while each wave broke over them and threatened to wash them away.”

“The minutes lengthened, and though their halloos might easily have been heard on the (nearby) battleship, the wind setting in that direction, there was no sign given that any one on board had seen the accident or noted the men struggling in the water.”

“For more than an hour … Prince Kūhiō Kalaniana‘ole and the three companions with whom he started to make the sail from the harbor to Pearl River …”

“… battled for their lives in the waves which swept over their heads and threatened each moment to wash them from the hull of the overturned boat, to which they clung. They were without the bell buoy and within three quarters of a mile of the battleship Oregon.”

“It was left for some young men on the galleries of the Myrtle Boat house to see, without a glass, the accident and the position of the sailors, and to rush an order to Young Brothers to send their fastest launch to the rescue.”

“This order was given in such time that the schooner and attending launch were just passing Young’s island when the little boat went out to assist the castaways.”

“When the men were reached they were all in fair shape though they felt the effects of the battering of the waves and were considerably exhausted by the strain upon them.”

“They were taken into the launch and a line passed to the yacht and she was towed to her anchorage off the club house. Last evening all the members of the party were in the best of shape.” (Pacific Commercial Advertiser, November 17, 1902)

“The Delegate elect, Prince Kūhiō, came pretty close to a fatal accident yesterday. Apart from the of a brilliant young Hawaiian, a fatal accident to the Prince have necessitated a fresh election …”

“… and the Territory having passed through one election struggle is not prepared to start out for another. The Prince belongs to the people now and his life and breath are matters of public importance.” (Hawaiian Star, November 17, 1902)

This wasn’t the only rescue of the time by Young Brothers, less than 2-weeks before, “The small island schooner Kauikeaouli … was just putting to sea with a cargo of general merchandise which had been taken from the disabled schooner Concord, which had to return from sea a few days ago after springing a leak.”

“It seems that the schooner had a fair wind and sailed away from the wharf, but would not steer. Her skipper thought this was because of her foul bottom, but a moment later the vessel swung over against the bow of the Alameda and had a small hole punched in her by one of the steamer’s anchors which was hanging half out of the water.”

“One of Young Brothers’ launches got hold of the schooner and took her bark to the wharf, where carpenters found the damage, to be light and easily repaired It during the day.”

“The captain of the schooner says that he had a shipsmith repair his steering gear, and that the wheel was put on in such a way that It steered the vessel in just the opposite direction from what was intended.” (Hawaiian Gazette, November 7, 1902)

The image shows the Young Brothers’ boathouse (center – structure with open house for boats on its left (1910), on what is now about where Piers 1 and 2 are, in the background is what is now Kaka‘ako Makai).

Young_Brothers_Boathouse-center_structure_with_open_house_for_boats_on_its_left-1910

September 29, 2024 by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Pioneer Mill

The early Polynesians brought sugarcane with them to the Islands. Kō (sugarcane) was planted as a subsistence crop – with domestic, medicinal and spiritual uses.

In 1802, processed sugar was first made in the islands on the island of Lānaʻi by a native of China, who came here in one of the vessels trading for sandalwood and brought a stone mill and boilers. After grinding off a small crop and making it into sugar, he went back to China the next year.

It was not until ca. 1823 that several members of the Lāhainā Mission Station began to process sugar from native sugarcanes, for their tables. By the 1840s, efforts were underway in Lāhainā to develop a means for making sugar as a commodity. (Maly)

Sugar was being processed in small quantities in Lāhainā throughout the 1840s and 1850s; in 1849, it was reported that the finest sugar in the islands could be found in Lāhainā. (Maly)

James Campbell, who arrived in Hawaiʻi in 1850 – having served as a carpenter on a whaling ship and then operated a carpentry business in Lāhainā, started a sugar plantation there in 1860. The small mill, together with cane from Campbell’s fields, manufactured sugar on shares for small cane growers in the vicinity.

Soon after the establishment of the new plantation, Henry Turton and James Dunbar joined Campbell. Under the name of Campbell & Turton, the company grew cane and manufactured sugar.

The small sugar mill consisted of three wooden rollers set upright, with mules providing the power to turn the heavy rollers. The cane juice ran into a series of boiling kettles that originally had been used on whaling ships.

When the nearby Lāhainā Sugar Company, a small company founded by H Dickenson in 1861, went bankrupt in 1863, its assets were acquired by Campbell and his partners.

In 1865, the plantation became known as Pioneer Mill Company (that year Dunbar left the company.) By 1874, Campbell and Turton added the West Maui Sugar Company, a venture of Kamehameha V, to the holdings of Pioneer Mill Company.

The Pioneer Mill Company was extremely profitable, enabling Campbell to build a large home in Lāhainā and to acquire parcels of land on Maui and Oʻahu.

Campbell became known by the Hawaiians as “Kimo Ona-Milliona” (James the Millionaire). Despite his success in sugar, his interests turned to other matters, primarily ranching and real estate.

Over the years, Campbell acquired property in Kahuku, Honouliuli, Kahaualea and elsewhere, amassing the holdings that eventually became ‘The Estate of James Campbell.’

In 1877, James Campbell sold his half interest to partner Henry Turton for $500,000 with agents Hackfeld & Company holding a second mortgage of $250,000. The company’s charter was dated in 1882, but by 1885, Mr. Turton declared bankruptcy and sold the property back to James Campbell and to Paul Isenberg, who was associated with Hackfeld & Co. Mr. CF Horner was selected to manage the plantation.

With later acquisitions of additional West Maui lands, Pioneer Mill was incorporated on June 29, 1895. Horner sold his interest to American Factors, formerly Hackfeld & Co., and in 1960, Pioneer Mill Company became a wholly owned subsidiary of Amfac.

Irrigation of Pioneer Mill Company’s fields, an area that eventually extended 14-miles long and 1 1/2-miles wide with altitudes between 10 and 700 feet, was accomplished with water drawn from artesian wells and water transported from the West Maui Mountains. The McCandless brothers drilled the first well on Maui for Pioneer Mill Company in 1883.

Pioneer Mill Company was one of the earliest plantations to use a steam tramway for transporting harvested cane from the fields to the mill. Cane from about 1000-acres was flumed directly to the mill cane carrier with the rest coming to the mill by rail. (The Sugar Cane Train is a remnant of that system.)

In 1937, mechanically harvested cane was bringing so much mud to the factory that Pioneer Mill Company began the development of a cane cleaner.

Between 1948 and 1951, a rock removal program rehabilitated 3,153 acres of Pioneer land to permit mechanical planting, cultivating, and harvesting. In 1952, the railroad was eliminated and a year later new feeder tables were conveying cane directly from cane trucks into the factory.

Lāhainā Light and Power Company, Lāhainā Ice Company, the Lāhainā and Puʻukoliʻi Stores, and the Pioneer Mill Hospital were associated with the plantation, providing services to employees as well to Lahaina residents.

Faced with international competition, Hawaiʻi’s sugar industry, including Pioneer Mill Company, found it increasingly difficult to economically survive.

At the industry’s peak in the 1930s, Hawaiʻi’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. A majority of the plantations closed in the 1990s.

Seeing hard times ahead, Pioneer Mill Company took 2,000-acres out of cane during the 1960s to develop Kāʻanapali as a visitor resort destination.

By 1986, the plantation had reduced its acreage down to 4,000-acre (which at its height had 14,000-acres planted in cane.) After years of losing money, in 1999, Pioneer Mill closed its operations.

The Lāhainā Restoration Foundation and others worked to preserve the Pioneer Mill Smokestack. It remains tall above the Lāhainā Community as a reminder of the legacy of sugar in the West Maui community. (Lots of information here from the UH-Manoa, HSPA Plantation Archives.)

(One of our few locations that survived the Lahaina fire relatively unscathed is the Pioneer Mill Smokestack and Locomotives. (Lahaina Restoration Foundation))