Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Lehua

A 2003 archaeological survey located and mapped stone platforms and ahu (rock cairns). One site is over 800-years old. Ancient Hawaiians visited Lehua for fishing and feather collecting.

Lehua was one of the first five islands sighted by Captain James Cook in 1778, which he referred to as “Oreehoua”.

Cook first sighted Oʻahu on January 18, 1778. On February 2, 1778 his journal entry named the island group after his patron: “Of what number this newly-discovered Archipelago consists, must be left for future investigation. We saw five of them, whose names, as given by the natives, are Woahoo (Oʻahu,) Atooi (Kauaʻi,) Oneeheow (Niʻihau,) Oreehoua (Lehua) and Tahoora (Kaʻula.) …. I named the whole group the Sandwich Islands, in honour of the Earl of Sandwich.”  (Clement)

Lehua, part of Kauaʻi County, is approximately ¾ -mile north of Niʻihau and about 18-miles west of Kauaʻi.  The largest of Hawaiʻi’s offshore islets, Lehua is about 290-acres in size and 702-feet high at the highest point. It is more than twice the size of Kaʻula.

Several sea caves are present on Lehua, including Anakukaiaiki which is home to Kukaiaiki, son of the shark god Kuhaimoana.  (Kuhaimoana was a deified shark (ʻaumakua) who lived at the island of Kaʻula and had a cave so large that a small schooner could sail through it. “Kuonoono ka lua o Kuhaimoana” means, “He has a cave like Kuhaimoana’s.”)  (OIRC)

The volcanic crater that formed Lehua 4.9-million years ago has been sculpted by marine erosion and is dominated by grasslands and herblands.

It is in the rain shadow of Kauaʻi and is very dry, especially during the heat of summer. Much of the island is bare rock; eroded sediment has collected only in gully bottoms, ledges and small caves.  Vegetation is sparse but many plants have a growth spurt after winter rains.

The south side of the island is characterized by steep sea cliffs notched with sea caves at the water’s edge. The cliffs taper off to low-lying points that border a wide-mouthed bay opening to the north.

Lehua Island was set aside as a Lighthouse site under the control of the US Department of Commerce in a proclamation dated August 10, 1928.  The island is owned by the US Coast Guard and managed by the State DLNR.

The federal government built a lighthouse on Lehua, the highest beacon operating in marine service. It is situated on a narrow ledge along the crest of the  islet.  (Brown, HJH)

The light became operational in April 1931 and was visible for about 15-miles. A modern light is in operation at present and is maintained by US Coast Guard personnel using a helicopter to land on the narrow crest of the island.  (Brown, HJH)

Lehua is one of the largest seabird colonies in the main Hawaiian Islands.  The island is designated as a State Seabird Sanctuary and DLNR-DOFAW is responsible for the management of such Sanctuaries and is a trustee for seabirds and other native plant and wildlife resources on the Sanctuaries.  Lehua is home to at least eleven species of seabirds, as well as monk seals and native coastal plants.  (DLNR)

Lehua is important for the number and diversity of breeding seabirds it supports and for the presence of several seabird species that are rare or have restricted breeding ranges.  (Audubon)

Surveys estimate approximately 50,000-seabirds are on Lehua. Seventeen seabird species are present, including eleven species nesting or attempting to nest on the island.  Some of the bird species found include Laysan and Black-footed Albatross, Red-Footed and Brown Boobies, Red-tailed Tropicbirds, Hawaiian Petrels, Band-rumped Storm Petrels, and Newell’s and Wedge-tailed Shearwaters. Migratory shorebirds also visit the island.  (USFWS)

The Brown Booby colony on Lehua is the largest in the Hawaiian Islands with 521-breeding pairs, and the Red-footed Booby colony is one of the two largest in the Hawaiian Islands, with 1,294-pairs and approximately 4,288-total individuals. The colonies of Laysan Albatross (28 pairs, 93 total individuals) and Black-footed Albatross (16 pairs, 53 total individuals) are small but appear to be growing.  (Audubon)

These species appear to be declining in Hawaiʻi and may be difficult to manage on the larger Hawaiian Islands. Offshore islets such as Lehua may become increasingly important in the conservation of these species because their small size makes it more feasible to eradicate predators and manage other threats.  (Audubon)

When the first biologists visited Lehua in 1931, Polynesian rats and Rabbits had already been introduced.  Rats eat many native species of plants, insect, seabirds and intertidal invertebrates; they are a major threat to island by decimating native plants, allowing alien plants to dominate, and impacting smaller seabird species.

In 2005, resource managers were able to eradicate the feral rabbits (with that, seabirds no longer have to fight for their burrows;) the efforts to eradicate the rats is ongoing.

Landing on Lehua requires permission from the US Coast Guard. Activities on Lehua are also subject to Hawaiʻi Department of Land and Natural Resources regulations for State Seabird Sanctuaries.

Disturbance of seabirds and other wildlife within the sanctuary is forbidden. Federal law also protects seabirds, shorebirds, and threatened or endangered species.

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Kālia

In traditional times, Pi‘inaio Stream was the dominant feature of the western area of Waikīkī.

It entered the ocean as a wide, ribboned kahawai (wide delta,) bringing fresh waters from the mountain valleys and creating an area of abundance. The early-Hawaiians found this plentiful land and marine resources as an excellent place to settle (the early settlers arrived around 600 AD.).

The Stream played a vital role in the geography, and cultural usage, of the ‘ili of Kālia. The meaning of Pi‘inaio is uncertain but it could be an allusion to going inland (pi‘i), to the location of a naio (a sandalwood-like tree – as may have commonly grown in the vicinity.)  (Cultural Surveys)

Waikīkī was famous for its fishponds with one listing citing 45 ponds.  The ten fishponds at Kālia were loko puʻuone (isolated shore fishponds formed by a barrier sand berm) with salt-water lens intrusion and fresh water entering from upland ʻauwai (irrigation canals.)

The shallow relatively-protected reefs of Waikīkī and the availability of the riparian resources of the Pi‘inaio estuary made the back dune ponds easily adaptable into fish ponds.

The inland ponds may have formed along the coast where existing depressions in the sand were chosen to make the loko puʻuone, and brush was cleared out. During traditional times, the ponds were used to farm fish, usually for the Hawaiian Ali‘i (royalty). The ʻamaʻama (mullet) and the awa (milkfish) were the two types of fish traditionally raised in the ponds.

Kālia was once renowned for the fragrant limu līpoa, as well as several other varieties of seaweed such as manauea, wāwaeʻiole, ʻeleʻele, kala and some kohu.

Limu kala was harvested to make lei for offerings.  The lei limu kala was and is still offered at the kūʻula [stone god used to attract fish] by fishermen or anyone who wishes to be favored by or is grateful to the sea.

John Papa ʻĪʻī relates an account from the early-1800s of a catch at a Kālia fishpond: “so large that a great heap of fish lay spoiling upon the bank of the pond.” (The waste was disapproved of.) This abundance of fishponds may have required significant maintenance and would have provided a potentially huge source of food for distribution at chiefly discretion.

The name of the area “Kālia” translated as “waited for” has a sense of “waiting”, “loitering” or “hesitating.” While the nuance is uncertain, one could imagine that the mouth of the Pi‘inaio Stream would be a logical place for travelers to pause.

An ʻōlelo noʻeau (Hawaiian proverb/saying) speaks of the pleasant portion of the coast of Kālia in Waikīkī:  Ke kai wawalo leo leʻa o Kālia, The pleasing, echoing sea of Kālia.  (Pukui)

Kālia is also mentioned in a story about a woman who left her husband and children on Kīpahulu, Maui, to go away with a man of O‘ahu. Her husband missed her and went to see a kahuna (priest) who was skilled in hana aloha (prayer to evoke love) sorcery.

The kahuna told the man to find a container with a lid and then speak into it of his love for his wife. The kahuna then uttered an incantation into the container, closed it, and threw it into the sea. The wife was fishing one morning at Kālia, O‘ahu, and saw the container. She opened the lid, and was possessed by a great longing to return to her husband. She walked until she found a canoe to take her home (Pukui): Ka makani kāʻili aloha o Kīpahulu; The love-snatching wind of Kīpahulu (Cultural Surveys)

In Fragments of Hawaiian History John Papa ʻĪʻī described “Honolulu trails of about 1810,” including the trail from Honolulu to Waikiki. He said that: Kawaiahaʻo which led to lower Waikiki went along Kaʻananiau, into the coconut grove at Pawaʻa, the coconut grove of Kuakuaka, then down to Piʻinaio; along the upper side of Kahanaumaikai‘s coconut grove, along the border of Kaihikapu pond, into Kawehewehe; then through the center of Helumoa of Puaʻaliʻiliʻi, down to the mouth of the Āpuakēhau Stream.

Based on ʻĪʻī‘s description, the trail from Honolulu to Waikiki in 1810 coursed through the makai side of the present Fort DeRussy grounds in the vicinity of Kālia Road. It is likely that this trail was a long-established traditional route through Waikiki.

Toward the beginning of the 1900s, downtown Honolulu was the destination for Hawaiian visitors, who numbered only about 3,000. While Honolulu had numerous hotels, there were few places to stay in Waikiki.

In 1891, at Kālia, the ‘Old Waikiki’ opened as a bathhouse, one of the first places in Waikiki to offer rooms for overnight guests. It was later redeveloped in 1928 as the Niumalu Hotel; the site eventually became the Hilton Hawaiian Village.

In 1911, the Army acquired 70-acres for the construction of Fort DeRussy and started filling in the fishponds which covered most of the Fort – pumping fill from the ocean continuously for nearly a year in order to build up an area on which permanent structures could be built.

Then, as part of the government’s Waikīkī Land Reclamation project, the Waikīkī landscape was further transformed with the construction of the Ala Wai Drainage Canal – begun in 1921 and completed in 1928 – resulted in the draining and filling in of the ponds and irrigated fields of Waikīkī.

Dredging for the project was performed by Hawaiian Dredging Company, owned by Walter F. Dillingham, who then sold the dredged sediments to Waikīkī developers. The dredge produced fill for the reclamation of over 600-acres of land in the Waikīkī vicinity.

The ʻili of Kālia runs from the ʻEwa end of today’s Ala Moana Center (near Piʻikoi Street) to the vicinity of the Halekūlani Hotel (makai of Kalākaua Avenue.)  (Lots of information here from Cultural Surveys.)

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Pāhoa

Early settlement patterns in the Islands put people on the windward sides of the islands, typically along the shoreline.  However, in Puna on the Island of Hawaiʻi, much of the district’s coastal areas have thin soils and there are no good deep water harbors. The ocean along the Puna coast is often rough and windblown.

As a result, settlement patterns in Puna tend to be dispersed and without major population centers. Villages in Puna tended to be spread out over larger areas and often are inland, and away from the coast, where the soil is better for agriculture.  (Escott)

This was confirmed on William Ellis’ travel around the island in the early 1800s, “Hitherto we had travelled close to the sea-shore, in order to visit the most populous villages in the districts through which we had passed. But here receiving information that we should find more inhabitants a few miles inland, than nearer the sea, we thought it best to direct our course towards the mountains.”  (Ellis, 1823)

An historic trail once ran from the modern day Lili‘uokalani Gardens area in Hilo to Hāʻena along the Puna coast. The trail is often referred to as the old Puna Trail and/or Puna Road. There is an historic trail/cart road that is also called the Puna Trail (Ala Hele Puna) and/or the Old Government Road.

This path was essentially the main thoroughfare through the Puna district before the late-1800s.  Pāhoa was oʻioʻina (a resting place) on the trail.  (Papakilo)  Then it grew to become the principal town of lower Puna.

The evolving trail (first by foot, then by horse, cart and buggy, and finally by automobile) likely incorporated segments of the traditional Hawaiian trail system often referred to as the ala loa or ala hele.  (Rechtman)

The full length of the Puna Trail, or Old Government Road, might have been constructed or improved just before 1840. The alignment was mapped by the Wilkes Expedition of 1804-41.  (Escott)

People who traditionally had lived along the Puna coast were moving toward Hilo and into the more fertile upland areas of Puna in order to find paid work and to produce cash crops for local markets and for export.

The focus began to shift to the center of the Puna District and the developing sugar and related industries near ʻŌlaʻa, Hilo and the volcano region.

Before the turn of the century, railroad operations began – with lines running into Hilo. A main railroad line and several feeder lines were constructed in the early-1900s from Keaʻau to locations in lower Puna District.

The major line ran from Hilo through Keaʻau to the Kapoho area.  A branch line ran from the ʻŌlaʻa Sugar Mill up past present day Glenwood. A second branch line ran to Pāhoa town.

Some suggest this is how Pāhoa received its name.  “Then the train was put in from Hilo to Puna. One spur went up into Pāhoa; it was like a dagger into the forest. I‘m told this is how Pāhoa got its name. (Pāhoa means dagger.)”  (Edwards; Cultural Surveys)

People began to work in the inland areas to grow sugarcane. The new road, the Pāhoa branch of the railroad, sugarcane agriculture and a logging venture all combined to create Pāhoa as a population center in the region.  (Rechtman)

Macadamia nuts and papaya were introduced in 1881 and 1919; at the turn of the century, large-scale coffee cultivation was attempted.  Over 6,000-acres of coffee trees were owned by approximately 200-independent coffee planters.

This fledgling industry couldn‘t compete with more successful ventures located in other districts, and after a few decades the coffee industry in Puna was abandoned.  (Cultural Surveys, Rechtman)

By 1901, sugar dominated the island’s industry and landscape, and Hilo was the epicenter of production and export. Railroads connected sugar mills and sugar plantations in Hilo, the Hāmākua and Puna. The railroad also connected the mills to the wharves at Hilo Bay.

Early on, one of the major export items transported by the railroad was timber.  Starting in 1907, the Hawaiian Mahogany Company began cutting trees to clear land for sugarcane. The logs were brought to Pāhoa Town to be milled, then sent to Hilo Harbor and eventually shipped to the US Mainland as railroad ties for the Santa Fe Railroad.

The lumber mill facilities and the railroad line that served them were located near the center of town where the Akebono Theater is located.

In 1909, the company was renamed Pāhoa Lumber Company. In 1913, the main mill facilities were lost in a fire; it was rebuilt that year the company was renamed the Hawaiian Hardwood Company.

The company closed down in 1916 when the Santa Fe Railroad ended its contract to buy lumber. The defunct company then leased its mill facilities, buildings and railroad tracks to the expanding ʻŌlaʻa Sugar Company.  (Rechtman)

Today, Pāhoa Town has a main street – the former highway route before the construction of the by-pass road – that still retains much of the original street-wall of plantation-era structures, as well as some significant stand-alone buildings.

Most of the uses are commercial or civic.  The County has acquired a large tract of land within Pāhoa Town, which presents a significant opportunity for community revitalization and a possible catalyst for economic activity.  (Puna CDP)

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Ko‘olau Railway

As Hawai‘i’s most populous island, O‘ahu has probably the most expansive railway history, other than perhaps arguably the Big Island. The island was home to plantation railroads and military railroads.

Benjamin Franklin (Frank) Dillingham, the same father of the Hilo Railroad, conceived the Oahu Railway & Land Company in an effort to improve transportation on the island.

Beginning service in 1889 between Honolulu and Aiea, the railroad only continued to grow. By 1898, the mainline extended to Kahuku.

It was proposed, although never seriously considered to circumnavigate the island in a circle. Rather, numerous branch lines were constructed.

The development of sugar plantations in the Ko‘olauloa District began at Lā‘ie around 1868, when the first mill in the region was built.

In 1890, the Kahuku Plantation Company was organized, and shortly thereafter took on the processing of both the Lā‘ie and Kahuku crops.

By 1903 a railway between Lā‘ie and Kahuku Mill had been laid out, and James B Castle, partner in the corporation, was also planning his own plantation venture under the Koolau Agricultural Company and Koolau Railway Company, Limited. (Maly)

On July 5, 1905 Castle and others formed an association and filed with the Treasurer of the Territory of Hawaii a petition to incorporate under the name of Koolau Railway Company Ltd. for a term of fifty years.

The line was initially planned to run from the end of the Oahu Railway and Land Company’s track at Kahuku to Heeia, a distance of 25-miles.

By 1905, Castle’s Koolau Agricultural Company and Koolau Railway Company were initiating plans for the laying out of fields and planting sugar, and development of the railway system and support facilities in Kaluanui (‘Sacred Falls’) and other lands between Kahuku and Kahana Valley. (Livingston)

In 1906, Castle also secured a lease from Bishop Estate for more than 125 acres of kula lands in Kaluanui, for the term of 50 years, bringing to a close the tenure of the Hui Hoolimalima Aina o Kaluanui (Bishop Estate Lease No. 1219).

(The total acreage planted in Kaluanui was around 160 acres; and by 1922, cement-lined irrigation channels and flumes were developed to transport water from the Kaluanui-Kaliuwa‘a Stream to the fields – including those of neighboring ahupua‘a.)

The first 10 miles of the rail line to Kahana were completed in 1907 where construction stopped even though surveys were completed all the way to Honolulu.  By late-1908, the Koolau Railway Company, Limited, system was in service between Kahuku and Kahana.

Construction never resumed, probably due to the extremely high cost to build along the windward side of Oahu and a decided lack of traffic.

Joseph F Smith, a missionary whose first Mormon mission to Hawai‘i was in 1854, visited Lā‘ie in 1915, and remarked on the great changes made by the missionaries since his first visit …

“Besides the almost omnipresent automobile, a railroad nearly circumscribes this Island, with vast networks or rails permeating the sugar-cane fields. The old grass-thatched huts have given place to comfortable and pleasant homes and grounds beautified with evergreens and flowers.”

“Modern furniture, comforts, and conveniences of homes have supplanted the gourds, calabashes and pandanus-leaf mats, on which the natives slept, and the native kapa, which furnished their clothing and the covering of their beds. To a great extent the ancient and dim light of the kukui-nut and the oil lamp has given place to the brilliant illumination of modern electric lights.”

In 1916, the Kahuku Plantation leased some of its land for pineapple cultivation to one large grower (C Okayama) and other individual growers on small pieces of land.

The growers were obligated to sell their crop to the Hawaiian Pineapple Company, Libby, McNeill & Libby of Honolulu, and the California Packing Corporation (which later became the Del Monte Corporation).

The Kahuku Plantation remained relatively small, with less than 4,000 acres under cultivation until the early 1900s, when it expanded to the southeast as far as Hau‘ula.

The Kahuku Plantation Company expanded by buying or incorporating other sugar plantation lands. In 1924, it bought the fields of the Koolau Agricultural Company as far south as Kahana Bay.

In 1931, the Laie Plantation Corporation was dissolved and their sugar lands, totally 2,700 acres, were purchased and added to the Kahuku Plantation.

Under the caption of “Laie Purchase,” the 1931 Kahuku Plantation Manager’s report for the year comments as follows: “Your company acquired the lease of Zion Securities agricultural lands and the transfer of leases previously held by them through Laie Plantation for a period of 25 years, dating from July 1, 1931.”

“Koolau Railway Company Ltd. was also bought from the Zion Securities Corporation. This railroad will be disincorporated as soon as possible and become purely a plantation railroad.”

The end for the cane hauling railroad at the Kahuku Plantation came in 1972, when this notice in the Honolulu Advertiser appeared: “The company had been losing money on the plantation for the last few years.”

“In 1968, A&B announced the closing of the plantation and the mill. The last crop was harvested in 1968, the last cane was ground at the mill on November 25, 1971, and the final paperwork was completed on February 1972, when the mill was locked to prevent vandalism.”

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Kāneʻohe Pineapple

Sugarcane was introduced to Koʻolaupoko in 1865, when the Kingdom’s minister of finance and foreign affairs, Charles Coffin Harris, partnered with Queen Kalama to begin an operation known as the Kāneʻohe Sugar Company.  (History of Koʻolaupoko)

By 1865, four plantations were in production, at Kualoa, Kaʻalaea, Waiheʻe and Kāneʻohe, and in the early 1880s, four more at Heʻeia, Kāneʻohe, Kahaluʻu and Ahuimanu, with a total of over 1,000-acres in cultivation in 1880.  (Coles)

After almost four decades of a thriving sugar industry in Koʻolaupoko, the tide eventually turned bad and saw the closures of all five sugar plantations by 1903. The closures were due to poor soil, uneven lands and the start-up of sugar plantations in ʻEwa, which were seeing much higher yields.

As sugar was on its way out in Koʻolaupoko, rice crops began to emerge as the next thriving industry.  (History of Koʻolaupoko)  In 1880 the first Chinese rice company started in the nearby Waiheʻe area. Abandoned systems of loʻi kalo were modified into rice paddies. The Kāneʻohe Rice Mill was built around 1892-1893 in nearby Waikalua.

By 1880, there were five sugar plantations in Kāneʻohe and a plantation and mill in Heʻeia. In the 1890s, the Heʻeia mill had its own railroad. By 1903 the growing of rice took over the production of sugar which had declined in Koʻolaupoko. Rice was grown in the Heʻeia wetland until the early 1920s. (Camvel)

Pineapples are typically grown in large fairly flat tracts of well-drained inter-mountain land that is composed of what is affectionately termed Hawaiian red dirt (the red color is due to the presence of the oxides of Fe). (Rubin, SOEST)

From 1901 to 1925 lands previously unused for agriculture were being covered up with pineapple fields, especially the hillsides and upslopes.  It was estimated that approximately 2500 acres of land throughout the Ko‘olaupoko region was converted to pineapple cultivation. (History of Koʻolaupoko)

The plantation was established in the windward side of O‘ahu around 1900 by the Hawaiian Development Company and became known as Koolau Fruit Company.

JB Castle and Walter MacFarlane were the key promoters of this early pineapple venture. In 1909, the Hawaiian Cannery Co began operating a small cannery at Kahalu‘u.  And by 1910, Castle was in possession of a thousand acres in Ahuimanu which were suitable for pineapple.

The following year, the Hawaiian Pineapple Co, which James D Dole had founded in 1901, bought out Castle’s Koolau Fruit Co., Ltd and sold it five years later to Libby, McNeil & Libby.

Libby, McNeil & Libby, with control of the Kahalu‘u land, built a large-scale cannery on the site; the cannery had an annual capacity of 250,000-cans.  (Thompson, Kahaluu)

Ten years later, the cannery represented a quarter of a million-dollar investment with a maximum of 750 regular employees, plus an additional 125 at the height of the harvesting season.

The company used a narrow-gauge railway to move the canned fruit to a wharf at the Waikāne Landing, from there sampans took the product to Honolulu for transshipment to other ports. (Conde, Light Railways)

The pineapple cannery along with numerous old-style plantation houses popped up and became known as “Libbyville” (named after its owners, Libby, McNeill, and Libby). (St John’s by the Sea now occupies the site.)

At its peak, 2,500 acres were under pineapple cultivation on Windward O‘ahu, and of this a large percentage was in the Kāne‘ohe Bay region.

The change in landscape to the Windward side by 1914 is reflected in the following sentences: “At last we reached the foot of the Pali … Joe and I looked over the surrounding hills, but looked in vain for the great areas of guava through which but a few months ago we had fought and cut our way.”

“As far as the eye could reach pineapple plantations had taken the place of the forest of wild guava.” (Cultural Surveys)  Libby’s pineapple covered the southern portion of Kāneʻohe, what is now the Pali Golf Course, Hawaiian Memorial Park and the surrounding area.

While Libby managed the operation of large tracts of land, it was noted that, “… much of the pineapple production was carried out by individual growers on small areas of five to 10 acres.”

“A man, a mule, a huli plow and a hoe provided most of the power and the equipment for these smaller operations. This was the typical pineapple production pattern in the area of Waikāne, Waiāhole, Kahaluʻu and ‘Ahuimanu.”

By 1923, it was evident that pineapple cultivation on the Windward area could not keep up with that in other O‘ahu areas. Crops on the Windward side were not yielding tonnages as compared with the Leeward side, fields were smaller, with wilt more prevalent, and growing costs considerably higher. Plantings were therefore reduced.

By this time, the condition of the Pali Road had been improved, and trucks with solid tires were available, so that the struggling pineapple operation found it more economical to haul the fresh pineapple to a central Libby Cannery in Honolulu.

The relatively inefficient, high production costs of operating many small, scattered fields resulted in a decision to discontinue pineapple growing on the Windward side.

The result was the closure of the cannery in 1923.   After the closure of the cannery, the pineapple fields were left to grow over and was then converted to grazing pasture land for cattle.  (History of Koʻolaupoko)

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