Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Merci Boxcar J58220

Britain and France entered WWII following the German invasion of Poland in September 1939. In expectation of a German advance westwards, the British Expeditionary Force, which grew to 390,000 men over the winter of 1939–40, deployed alongside the troops of its allies in France and Belgium.

Between May 9 and June 22, 1940, a German assault on north-west Europe, known as the Battle of France, resulted in the capture and overthrow of not only France but three other countries – Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Belgium. (English Heritage)

The D-Day operation of June 6, 1944, brought together the land, air, and sea forces of the allied armies in what became known as the largest amphibious invasion in military history. The operation, given the codename Overlord, delivered five naval assault divisions to the beaches of Normandy, France. The beaches were given the code names Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword.

By June 30, over 850,000 men, 148,000 vehicles, and 570,000 tons of supplies had landed on the Normandy shores. Fighting by the brave soldiers, sailors, and airmen of the allied forces western front, and Russian forces on the eastern front, led to the defeat of German Nazi forces. On May 7, 1945, German General Alfred Jodl signed an unconditional surrender at Reims, France. (Eisenhower Library)

After World War II came to a close, the country of France began the task of rebuilding a nation ravaged by war.  Years of German occupation had left the French people in great need of life’s everyday necessities.

In his daily column, the Merry-go-round, noted Washington newspaperman Drew Pearson suggested that America come to the aid of its European friend.

“So my suggestion to the citizens’ food committee is that this time we take steps to see that the people of Europe evaluate this campaign for exactly what it is – a genuine sacrifice from the heart of America.”

“To that end I make the further suggestion that we arrange for the collection of this food direct from the heart of America in such a way that it can be visualized and dramatized and that the real story will be told the millions of people we are trying to help.”

“Why not dramatize the story of America’s sacrifice by running a ‘friendship train’ straight across the United States, straight through the heart of America, collecting food as it goes …”

“… inspiring the housewives and farmers of the nation to spare a bag of flour or a bushel of wheat and bring it down to the friendship train as their contribution toward friendship with the people of Europe?” (Pearson, Oct 10, 1947)

Inspired by Pearson’s idea of a Friendship Train, newspapers all across the country joined in the effort and supplies were collected to send to France.  Seven hundred boxcars of food, fuel, medicine, and clothing left on a ship from New York City and arrived in France on December 18, 1947. (American Historical Society)

“Every package had this label: ‘All races and creeds make up the vast melting pot of America, and in a democratic and Christian spirit of good will toward men, we, the American people, have worked together to bring this food to your doorsteps, hoping that it will tide you over until your own fields are again rich and abundant with crops.’”

“Also on every label were these words, ‘This gift is sent to you by a tag which had these lines: ‘first and last name and address of donor’. This message was written in Italian and French and printed beside the American flag.” (Friendship Train 1947)  “In the whirlwind seven day drive, Hawaii contributes nickels, dimes and dollars to send two boxcars of sugar to France.” (Star Bulletin, March 10, 1949)

“The American Friendship Train inspired a rail worker and war veteran named Andre Picard to suggest that France reciprocate. His original idea was to present the United States with a decorated train boxcar loaded with gifts representative of his country – wines from Alsace, Bordeau, Burgandy, Champagne and the Loire Valley; white lace headdresses from Paris; clay figures from Provence. A local veterans organization adopted the proposal, and a small committee was established to solicit gifts.”

“As press and radio spread the story, however, the project gained national momentum. The government announced its official approval; the French Academy issued an endorsement; and hundreds of professional, social, and fraternal organizations asked to participate. Clearly a single boxcar would not be enough.” (Hawaiian Railway)

“On Feb 2 [1949] the French freighter Magellan steamed into New York carrying 49 antique, narrow-gauge boxcars in her hold.” (Life, Feb 28, 1949)

The French boxcars were the kind that Americans soldiers were transported to the front on the French rail system during the war. Cramped into narrow gauge boxcars, each stenciled with “40 Hommes/8 Chevaux”, denoting its capacity to hold either 40 men or 8 horses.  (La Société des Quarante Hommes et Huit Chevaux (The Society of Forty Men and Eight Horses))

“These were the cars of the Gratitude Train [‘Merci’ (Thank you) Train], France’s reply to the American Friendship Train which in 1947 toured the US and collected $40million worth of food and clothing for the hard-pressed people of France.”

“Each boxcar was packed with 5 tons of gifts, and each was addressed to a separate state. (The contents of the 49th car will be divided between the District of Columbia and Hawaii.) The gifts were of all varieties and value and they came, as the American gifts had come, from private citizens.” (Life, Feb 28, 1949)

Merci Boxcar J53220 was given to the territory of Hawai‘i and Washington DC. Washington DC unloaded the car and divided the gifts sending half the gifts to Hawaii and the boxcar. The gifts arrived in Hawaii in March 1949 aboard the APL freighter President Cleveland. The boxcar arrived in Hawaii on November 9, 1949 aboard the APL freighter President Monroe. (Hawaiian Railway)

The boxcar was originally given to the American Legion at 612 McCully St. When McCully St. was widened the boxcar was brought to the Hawaiian Railway Society for storage. After a number of years the American Legion donated the car to the HRS.

Plans and actions are underway to restore Merci Boxcar J58220 to its ca. 1949 configuration. During the restoration, every effort will be made to replace missing or broken parts with original parts. (Hawaiian Railway)

The restoration is a Hawaii Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) project.

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Keanakolu

Aia i ka lai o Keanakolu,
Kuu lei mamane lu‘a i ke anu.

There in the calm of Keanakolu,
Is my garland of mamane blossoms that droop in the cold.
(“Ka Pua Mamane” Ka Hoku o Hawaii (November 23, 1938) (Maly)

Keanakolu (‘Three Caves’) is named for a cluster of lava-tube caves nearby that likely provided shelter well before the cattle arrived, when the mountain was roamed by bird-catchers collecting feathers for Hawaii’s dramatic royal cloaks.  (Patel)

“Rockshelters in gulches and lava tubes were regularly used throughout the period of ranching, and one identified cave complex, Keanakolu (literally: the three caves), was likely used in the precontact era as well as throughout the ranching period.” (Peter Mills)

The caves, “one supposed to go Hilo, one Kona, one Hāmākua” (Johnny Ah San; Maly) are located between the 5,300 ft. and 6,400 ft. elevation on the slopes of Mauna Kea near the border of the North Hilo and Hāmākua Districts. (Mills; UH Maunakea Stewardship)

“So the three caves…actually what they call Keanakolu now, is not where the caves are eh?… The caves are above. You know where Douglas Pit? … Yes. … On the…well, we call it the Hāmākua side. There’s a little gulch, then you go up.”

“Oh, so from Douglas Pit, Hāmākua side, there’s a gulch, and you walk up the gulch? … Yes, the old Russian camp [On October 9th, Mr. Ah San reconfirmed that it was his understanding, as told by L. Bryan, that there had been a Russian settlement in the area as well.].” (Exchange between Kepa Maly and Johnny Ah San)

“Well, they tried to build something. That’s why they have stone walls and little shacks like up here. But nobody knows who put this. The Russians or what… It’s all gone now, the building. And there is the stone corral up there.”

“So we’re just a short distance away from the three caves? … Yes, just down the slope [to the north]. … And we’re here by the stone corral and the old stone house? …”

“Yes, the corral. And the house, nobody knew. A shack, nobody knew what it was. Then there are more stone walls, like Robinson Crusoe shelter. Maybe the people built that so the pigs don’t get in. But no more door, so how did the people get in and out? The four corners are all closed.”  (Exchange between Kepa Maly and Johnny Ah San)

Cattle were introduced to Hawai‘i in 1793 by Captain George Vancouver; Kamehameha immediately instituted a kapu on the animals for a period of ten years. The animals became a serious problem, as they survived and reproduced handsomely in the wild

 Ellis (1825) writes that the cattle “resorted to the mountains and became so wild and ferocious that the natives are afraid to go near them.” By the 1820s, cattle hunting was an industry, for salted and barreled beef was a valuable commodity for the growing provisioning trade related to Pacific whaling.

A trade in hides and tallow also developed and by the 1830s was the primary focus of cattle hunting; an article in the July 1, 1843 Friend reported that 10,686 bullock hides were exported from Hawai‘i. (Tomonari-Tuggle)

The trade of bullock hunting began in the early 1800s and by mid-century had developed into formal cattle ranching, with dire results in some areas from overgrazing. (“The forest on this area is doomed ⎯ only a matter of a few years of persistent grazing.”) (Tomonari-Tuggle)

During the early historic period, the upland section of the Laupāhoehoe forests were impacted by herds of wild sheep and bullocks. By 1825, foreign bullock hunters had established camps on the outer edges of the forest, in the region where Laupāhoehoe and neighboring lands are cut off by the ahupua‘a of Humu‘ula. (Maly)

By the 1830s, cattle ranching, as opposed to hunting, was developing in the Waimea area. Much of the initial stock of the cattle herds was the wild cattle, although by mid-century, there was a movement to improve the stock by importing purebred cattle.

By 1859, the wild cattle were hunted almost solely for their hides, which being unbranded brought a higher price than branded tame cattle.

Like cattle, sheep were introduced to Hawai‘i in the closing years of the 18th century and became a serious threat to the health of the forest. In 1856, an informal sheep station was established near Humu‘ula on the Mauna Kea-Mauna Loa saddle to take advantage of the feral sheep population.  (Parker Ranch acquired the sheep station in 1914). (Tomonari-Tuggle)

In Humu‘ula, the Waimea Grazing and Agricultural Company first established ranching stations at Kalai‘ehā, Laumai‘a, and Hopuwai, and possibly also Keanakolu and Lahohinu, where cattle were raised. These stations represent the first significant capital investments in commercial enterprises in the Humu‘ula region. (Peter Mills)

“In 1876, WGAC sold its lease of Humu‘ula to James W. Gay of Honolulu for a 25-year term. Gay established the Humu‘ula Sheep Company, and his headquarters were at Keanakolu.”

“The lease was underwritten by Paul Isenberg, a Hawaiian senator who also served as a manager of the German-run merchant firm, H. Hackfeld & Company.” (Mills)

In the 1930s, there was an estimated 40,000 sheep around the summit of Mauna Kea. A major project of the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was the construction of a stock-proof fence encircling the entire mountain, combined with systematic hunting to reduce the population of wild cattle, sheep, and pigs. (Tomonari-Tuggle)

By the 1880s, the original sheep ranch station at Keanakolu (in the original place of that name, near the Laupāhoehoe-Humu‘ula boundary), was built, and historic photos from 1885 depict ranch buildings made of koa logs.

There remain on the land in the present-day, the ruins of stone shelters, pens, and foundations on the upper Laupāhoehoe-Humu‘ula region. Noted places such as Keanakolu (not the same location of the present-day cabin of that name), Lahohinu, and Keahua-ai (Douglas Pit), are considered significant features of the historical landscape. (Maly)

“There were three, four stations, Keanakolu, Hopuwai, Laumai‘a and Kalai‘eha. And the best pasture was on the Keanakolu side. But when there was good pasture on this side, you would move them out. And we would take those cattle up as old yearlings, I guess you would call them.  We’d wean them from their mother’s, take them to Pā‘auhau, hold ‘em there.”

“These are all heifers, we’re talking about. Then they got to be a certain age, then we’d take ‘em to Keanakolu, and we might take, oh eight, nine hundred, a thousand head at a crack.”

“And we’d time it, so that the Humu‘ula cattle… We’d pick Humu‘ula cattle out that grew up there. And they’d stay there until they grew out, and when they came back they’d either go into the breeding herd, if they were good, or the junk one’s would be sent to market.”

“in the olden days, they never moved cattle from Humu‘ula, that’s Kalai‘eha, what I’m calling Humu‘ula, Kalai‘eha to Waiki‘i. They always used to go around Keanakolu side.”  (Leonard Radcliffe “Rally” Greenwell; Maly)

The Rev. Mr. J. M. Lydgate “visited an abandoned fruit orchard at Keanakolu, which is situated on the southern slope of Mauna Kea on the Island of Hawaii at an elevation of about five thousand feet.”

“This orchard was planted about twenty-five or more years ago close to where the Humu‘ula Sheep Ranch house was then situated. The headquarters at Keanakolu were afterward abandoned and the fruit orchard was left uncared for.”

“Very fortunately, however, a fence strong enough to prevent cattle, wild goats, and other animals from damaging the trees had been erected, and it is because of this that we are enabled to judge of what results might have been obtained in other places had the same condition prevailed.”

“Mr. Lydgate found apple, plum, pear, apricot, cherry, and peach trees, and several varieties of each. He states that the apple trees run mostly to whips, causing a meager crop of fruit, but Mrs. Lydgate claims that those she saw were of excellent quality.”

“The fine crop of Bartlett pears and the cherries and peaches were, at the time of their visit, too green to eat, though the cherries, which were few, are probably ripe by this time. There were but few peaches, but those seen were of good size.”

“The plum and apricot crops had already matured and there was no fruit left by which one might form an opinion, but it is said that the fruits have been gathered by those who have visited the orchard during the past few years, and have been found equal to those grown on the mainland.”

“One peculiarity that Mr. Lydgate could not explain was the ripening of the apricots long before the cherries. The opposite condition prevails in California, apricots coming into market there some weeks after the close of the cherry season.”  (Mesick, Paradise of the Pacific, September 1909)

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Kūnuiākea

“‘The Kuakoa publicly affirmed,’ says the Elele, ‘that A. K. Kūnuiākea is the illegitimate child of Kamehameha III, while Kaeo and Lahilahi were his legal parents.’”

“This is a very important matter, and should not concealed. There are many witnesses to it; it has been universally talked of; Kamehameha made no secret of the fact that this was his son, and there are an abundance of witnesses to his saying so; there are also tokens such as are wont to be preserved as proofs.”

“This is a strange thing for the present age, but it was considered perfectly proper in the age that is past. That was the nature of the relation between Liloa and Umi, (his illegitimate male son,) Peleiholani and Kaleiopuu, Kahekili and Kamehameha I, and the same was the relation between Kauikeaouli and this chief (Kūnuiākea).”

“Undoubtedly it is an offence in this age, but what is the best course, to utter a falsehood or to speak out the truth? We prefer to tell the truth.”

“A child resulting from this kind of relation between aliis of high rank was much prized in old times, and was greatly esteemed by those who were jealous of their chiefly rank. …”

“The history of children begotten after this (illegitimate) fashion by parents of this sort is well-known. These histories merely show what has been done secretly; the features of the parents are seen in their children and this is a shame.”  (Elele Poakolu, Saturday press, April 28, 1883)

Kūnuiākea “was born June 19, 1851 at the premises known as ‘Kuaihelani,’ now the present site of the central Union church.” (Independent, March 11, 1903) [Now part of the Capitol grounds.]

“The Honorable Kūnuiākea was baptized in the Anglican faith, by the Lord Bishop of Honolulu, at the Church at Peleula, and his name he was baptized with is Albert Fredrick Kūnuiākea Oiwiaulani Koenaokalani.”

“Present was his hanai mother, the dowager Queen K. Hakaleleponi, and the Honorable Col. Peter Young Kekuaokalani, and Col. D. Kalakaua.” (Kuokoa, 11/22/1862)

“Kauikeaouli (Kamehameha III let the whole world know that Lahilahi Young’s twin sons were his when he gave them their names.”

“Kiwalao was the name which he gave the boy he and Kalama took home. Kūnuiākea Ke-Kukailimoku was the name he gave the boy kept by Lahilahi and her husband, Joshua Kaeo”.

“Kiwalao had been the name of Kauikeaouli’s grandfather, the unfortunate successor to Kalaniopuu whom Kamehameha the Great had killed in his first successful battle.”

“Kiwalao means ‘the shining aura of the kapus, seen from head to foot of the sacred person.’ Kūnuiākea was an ancient name, which means Ku, the founder. Ke Kukailimoku was the name of Kamehameha’s war god. … Fate, or the curse which hung over lolanl palace, again thwarted Kauikeaouli’s happiness in his sons. Kiwalao, their child, died before reaching his first birthday.” (Clarice Taylor)

“As a hānai of Queen Kalama (Kauikeaouli’s wife), [Kunuikea] had been raised in the household of his biological father. Although a son of the mōʻī (king), he was not eligible to succeed his father because the constitution stated that succession was limited to legally begotten children or named heirs.”

“As Kaiukeaouli was discouraged from naming his biological son his heir, his hānai son Alexander Liholiho became Kamehameha IV.”  (Iolani Palace)

Kūnuiākea “was better known as Prince Albert, called ‘Prince’ only by courtesy for from childhood he was brought up by being a ‘hanai’ child by adoption of King Kamehameha III and his consort Hazeleleponi Kapakuhaili, better known as Queen Kalama, also a High Chiefess and the child was a favorite figure in and about grounds during those days.”

“Even at the death of his reputed father he remained with Queen Kalama up to the time of her death with the exception of the days he attended school at Ahuimanu under the tuition of the Roman Catholic Mission with Father Walsh as tutor.”

“He was a man of words and that loudly to His people called him pupulo (not crazy but nutty to use a slang phrase on account of being talkative in an indiscreet manner).  It is said of him that thus trait befell him when he was yet In his infancy and it came about in this wise:  …”

“The King his reputed father visited the child in disguise as he was wont to do at times when going out among his people and found the child in his cradle asleep unbeknown to the nurse kahu who was away washing and awaking him took him up and nestled him on his lap, he being very fond of him knowing him to be of his own flesh.”

“When the nurse returned (who died a few years ago) and saw the King with the child she rebuked him saying: ‘You have ruined my charge.’ And from that time so it is said by those who pretend to know began this trait in him, remaining with him to the end as a punishment of the gods upon the faultless child who was unaware of his fate.”

“The reason for this was the reverence and awe in which the King was held, his rank being such that he was considered sacred kapu next to that of a god and deemed likely to be worshipped by the other chiefs of lower rank and by the people.”

“The first Liholiho (King Kamehameha II), the High Chiefess Nahienaena, the King’s sister was held in the same respect they being considered alii kapu (sacred chiefs) for they were the children of first cousins (being of the first blood almost a brother and sister), Kamehameha I and the High Chiefess Keopuolani.”

“But apart from all of these traits in his character he was generous to others not of his people or retainers and a steadfast friend. On account of certain traits in him their loyal friends and retainers did not stay around him although when called upon they always responded and respected him.”

“It is true that he might have been King but it was not so decided his character being too well known and he was feared by the people for they mistrusted him.”

“His first fiancee in his young days was the late Princess Likelike their betrothal being much desired by those in authority as well as the other chiefs.”

“But through some reason or other the engagement was broken she later becoming Mrs A S Cleghorn.  In 1878 he was married to Mary Poli the widow of the Rev Z Poli who now survives him a widow for the second time.”

“After being released from a spendthrift guardianship under which he had been placed by those who cared for his welfare, the people of this city, to show some confidence in him elected him as a Representative of the Legislature of 1882.”

“But he was never again reelected till under the Provisional Government he was elected as a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1895.” (Independent, March 11, 1903)

“When the bells of the Fort St Cathedral tolled a requim for Prince Albert Kekukailimoku Kūnuiākea they tolled the passing of the last of the royal family of the Great Kamehameha.”

“Prince Kūnuiākea died at the age of 52 on March 10, 1903 at his beach road home. … The prince as not the last descendant by any means.  Other children of Kamehameha who were not recognized as members of the royal family have descendants living today.” (Clarice Taylor)

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Crossing the Bog

Hawaiian bogs occur primarily in montane zones as isolated small patches on flat or gently sloping topography in high rainfall areas in cloud forests and other wet forests on all of the high islands between 3,500-5,500 feet elevation.

These bogs also occur in the subalpine zone at 7,446 feet elevation on Maui, and as a low-elevation bog at 2,120 fee) on Kauai. Soils remain saturated on a shallow to deep layer of peat, underlain by an impervious basal clay layer that impedes drainage.

Two bogs are believed to have formed in former small lakes, one along the Wailuku River, Hawai‘i (Treeless bog), the other the subalpine bog on East Maui (Flat Top bog). The low-elevation bog on Kauai occurs on shallow, poorly drained acidic peat. (NatureServe Explorer)

The Treeless Bog was a large, open bog that lacked woody vegetation. Annual precipitation in this part of the island ranges from approximately 100-200 inches per year, but we had no rainfall data for the individual sites. (Wakeley, 1994)

All of the following is a description crossing the bog by Wm E. Oleson (with D Howard Hitchcock), October 20, 1884, as noted in the Guest Book from Pua Akala, typed by June Humme …

I left Hilo for the purpose of exploring the bed of the Wailuku, and for a tramp for health reasons.

Rode on ‘Grit’ from Hilo to Fuka Maui falls, sending the horse back to Hilo, and starting from that point on foot with four strong school boys, Kapewa from Waipio, Aina from Kohala, Haalilio from Waimanu, and Sidney Smith from Kaawaloa.

We packed our food and clothing on our backs. At noon we struck a trail into the woods above the point where the ‘56 lava stream came into the river, and after walking an hour or more, came to what I suppose was the Honolii stream.

We worked up-stream with great difficulty, water very deep, banks very high, and the land on both sides quite swampy.

At last we left the stream and followed my pocket compass in a southerly direction right through the swamp. Night came on with us when in the boggiest place and we camped under the lee of a fallen tree.

It had rained all the afternoon and we hadn’t a dry thing in the company. After vainly trying to light a fire, using up all but three matches, we crouched down in the rain and cold with a vivid realization that we were out on a tramp.

Next morning early we kept on through the swamp and in half an hour came to the Wailuku. If I were an Englishman I would say that the swamp is the ‘nastiest’ place on Hawaii.

It is like a jungle, and one feels that it takes about a minute a step to get through the tangle of ie ie and to pull one’s feet out of the bog.

If one wants to find out what a victory of mind over matter is, he can find no better proof at the adage is true and in what sense it is true, than by an hour’s pull through this miserable swamp.

We stripped and partially dried our clothes on the rocks of the Wailuku, and at about eight oclock started up river with new courage and an emphatic purpose not to leave the stream to follow the most inviting trail.

At night we made a fern hut and then took our three matches and stood around to see what the result would be of their lighting. No, 1 lighted but burned out before igniting the dry fern leaves. No. 2 wouldn’t light at all. No. 3 made a sickly sputter, and then went out.

We turned in, with wet clothes again, but with the mountain wind blowing right at us, so that this second night was not exactly like unto the first! To cap the climax it poured torrents all night long, and we huddled up like frogs, each in his own pool, and waited for the day.

In the morning we wrung about a bucket of water out of each blanket, and something less from each garment, and shivering and rheumatic we started again for the source of the river. We did some famous climbing, hanging by finger-nails over undesirable places, and ’chinning’ it in one especially difficult place.

Garments failed to stand the strain of so much soaking, and stretching, and gradually separated, so that on finally reaching the edge of the woods, and the source of the river, we felt quite unpresentable.

Three of us went to work on a hut for the night’s camping, getting wood for our fire and grass for our bedding, while the other two went on to Puakala for matches and a supply of edibles, ours having suffered from being too much diluted.

It was not long before Mr. Edw. Hitchcock with extra mules came over and took our entire party to Puakala, for the first time in three days showing us a bright fire and giving us the luxury of dry clothes.

There are occasions when a man doesn’t care whether his clothes and slippers were made for another man, and this was such an occasion.

I am profoundly thankful that inasmuch as there is a Wailuku river and an adjoining swamp, there is also such a hospitable home as Puakala, and such good Samaritans as the Hitchcocks. The original Samaritan just happened across the needy man in the parable, but this Hitchcock Samaritan came out with horses to search for the needy ones.

One thing I want to caution all hapless travelers through the swamp against, and that is, don’t let the host roast you out with his rousing fires, when once you reach Puakala.

The contrast is too overcoming, and after such an experience one needs to get used to fires, as the starving man does to food before he can get back to his normal condition of enduring ordinary supplies of each.

My impressions are that there is such a thing as the Wailuku River, and that it has one source about a mile to the southwest of Puakala, that it has some three or four other sources to the south extending as far as Hale Aloha …

…  but that I shall probably never trace any of the other sources unless I get a government appointment and can afford to do the job by proxy. (Wm E. Oleson with D Howard Hitchcock, October 20, 1884, as noted in the Guest Book from Pua Akala, typed by June Humme)

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by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Commercial Fishing in Hawai‘i

In traditional times in Hawai‘i, most of the makaʻāinana (‘common people’) were farmers, a few were fishermen.  Tenants cultivated smaller crops for family consumption, to supply the needs of chiefs and provide tributes.

“The land area with which the Polynesian migrant first became familiar was of necessity that along shore, wherever his voyaging canoe made its landfall.”

“This area he termed ko kaha kai (place [land] by the sea). This might comprise a broad sandy beach and the flats above it, or the more rugged shore of cove or harbor with its rocky terrain-in fact many and varied descriptions might fit, according to locale.” (Handys & Pukui)

“The people had ample cultivable land in the moist upland from two to four miles inland at altitudes of one thousand to twenty-five hundred feet. … The soil is most fertile, being formed from the decay of recent lava flows.”

The food plants of Hawaiʻi can be divided into three groups: those known as staple foods (the principal starchy foods – kalo (taro,) ʻuala (sweet potato,) ʻulu (breadfruit,) etc;) those of less importance (to add nutrients and variety to the diet;) and those known as famine foods.  (Krauss)

“For every fisherman’s house along the coasts there were hundreds of homesteads of planters in the valleys and on the slopes and plains between the shore and forest.”

“The Hawaiians, more than any of the other Polynesians, were a people whose means of livelihood, whose work and interests, were centered in the cultivation of the soil. The planter and his life furnish us with the key to his culture.” (Handys & Pukui)

“Fishermen and their families living around the bays and the beaches, or at isolated localities along the coast where fishing was practicable, led a life that was materially simpler than that of planters who dwelt on the plains.”

“Their life was less diversified. Many fishermen had not even a patch of ‘uala [sweet potato], for their dwelling places were too windy, too dry, too sandy, and too rocky to support even the hardy sweet potato.”

“They did not have access to pandanus for mat making, nor to wauke or other bark for tapa making, therefore their women had no need for sheds for such work.”

“The fishermen, however, did have halau or sheds for their canoes, nets, and other equipment, and undoubtedly put in as much time in working on hooks, lures, lines, and nets as the farmer gave to his plants. The planter, whose only tool was the digging stick, was not a craftsman as was the fisherman.”

“[T]he harvest festival known as the Makahiki … was the time when food, including hogs and sweet potato (the staple in this dry southern area), were laid on altars (ahu) dedicated to Lono, in tribute to the god who returned each year in the form of rain.” (Handys & Pukui)

“Following a strict code of conduct, which was based on ceremonial and ritual observances, the people of the land were generally able to collect all of the natural resources, including fish – and other marine and aquatic resources – for their own sustenance, and with which to pay tribute to the class of chiefs and priests, who oversaw them.”

“Shortly after the arrival of foreigners in the islands, the western concept of property rights began to infiltrate the Hawaiian system.”

“In the transition from a cultural subsistence-based system to the commercial economy, fish and other harvestable marine organisms went from being perceived and valued in a complex way that was embedded in nature and culture – one fostered through long-term stewardship – to fish as primarily being a commodity or simply food items.”

“What evolved in Hawai‘i under western influence … was the development of a ‘commercial’ fishing industry, involving significant trading centers and a market economy.” (Maly)

“Commercial fishing became important in the Hawaiian Islands with the arrival of the British and American whaling fleets during the early nineteenth century. [They] made Hawai‘i their provisioning and trading headquarters.”  (Schug)

“[T]he systematic development of commercial fishing in Hawaii really was started by Japanese immigrants to the Islands.”

“Adapting techniques and vessel design brought from Japan to specific ocean conditions found in Hawaii, the Japanese longline fishermen virtually dominated the industry, as fishermen, auctioneers, and fish dealers, by the beginning of the twentieth century.”

“Gorokichi Nakasuji, often called the ‘father of commercial fishing,’ arrived in Hawaii in 1899. … Nakasuji was responsible for introducing the Japanese sampan to Hawaii waters; it soon became the prototype of Island fishing vessels.”

“Later Nakasuji installed the first gasoline engine in an aku sampan. These developments greatly expanded the ability of Japanese; fishermen to tap the resources of Hawaii’s deep sea fisheries.”

“Marketing of fish catches, however, proved a major impediment to the development of the industry. Because of the difficulties of keeping fish in fresh condition for market, catches were limited not by the amount of fish available, but by the amount a fisherman felt could easily be sold that day.”

“However, as transportation between the islands improved and as marketing advanced, the commercial fishing industry began to expand. In 1917, the MacFarlane Tuna Canning Company later called Hawaiian Tuna Packers opened for business, and canned tuna became a major outlet for surplus fresh catch.”  (Nakayama, Menton)

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