Concrete No. 5

‘Ship traps’ describes a phenomenon where northern and southern swells, strong channel currents, strong consistent trade winds and fringing reefs force unsuspecting vessels into areas of harm – resulting in concentrated shipwrecks.  The north shore of the Island of Lānaʻi, locally referred to as “Shipwreck Beach,” is the best example of this phenomenon.  Here, the channel acts as a funnel, depositing material directly onto Shipwreck Beach.

A constant reminder of Shipwreck Beach is the last one – from the US Navy, YOGN-42.    Contrary to some of the reports on this vessel, it is neither a WWII Liberty ship nor was it even a motorized vessel.  The ship sitting on the reef at Shipwreck Beach is actually a non-self-propelled Navy gasoline barge.  YOGN-42 survived the war, but was stricken from the active register in 1949 and abandoned on Shipwreck Beach sometime after that.

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City of Joseph in the Valley of Ephraim

“This is the place,” and joy seemed to fill all.

Elder Johnson then suggested that it should be called the Valley of Ephraim (a name that President Lewis had suggested to Brigham Young a few weeks before) and that the city be called Joseph. All agreed.  (Britsch)

But we are getting ahead of ourselves, let's step back.

In September 1850, Elder Charles C. Rich, one of the Church's Twelve Apostles (the leading councils of the Church are the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles), visited a group of Mormon gold miners who were working on the American River near Sacramento, California.

Rich suggested to them that it would be well for them to spend the winter, when mining had to stop, on missions to the Sandwich Islands (Hawaiʻi) because expenses were smaller in Honolulu than they were in the gold fields of California.

The next day eight miners were ordained to fill missions to Hawaiʻi, others were added and the whole group sailed for the islands. They arrived on December 12, 1850, the first group of Latter-day Saints missionaries to set foot on that land.  (Britsch)

On October 17th, 1853, a special committee made a trip to Lānaʻi to inspect the ahupua‘a (native land division) of PāIāwai, which belonged to the chief Levi Ha‘alelea. On November 2nd, 1853, the committee reported back to Brigham Young in Utah, that:

“…They found the place well adapted in many respects for this purpose, the soil being good, the situation a central one and having ready intercourse with the two principal markets, Honolulu and Lahaina, and sufficiently isolated to be comparatively free from the surrounding evil influences…” (Maly)

In August 1854, Elder Ephraim Green (1807-1874), a Latter-day Saint missionary to Hawaiʻi, moved to Pālāwai Basin on Lānaʻi with the intention of establishing a new settlement.  Ephraim Green described laying out the city on October 3, 1854 as follows:

“I tuck my cumpas and commenst to lay out a town at the fut of the mountain and laid out one stret runing south to the sea three mildes to a fine litle harbour whare we land out boats hear we intendt to build a (storehouse) to leave our produse. I then laid out three more streats thruing (turning) the town in to blocks fore acres each with the streats fore rods wide. This is a butiful location for a town.”

“This valley is supposed to be of sufficient altitude to admit the growth of wheat, corn, sweet potatoes; with many of the tropical fruits, and we hope that it will prove sufficiently moist to admit of the cultivation of the coffee and grape.”  ((Lewis to Young; Britsch)

“We are situated on this Island, nearly two thousand feet above the level of the sea, in a beautiful valley containing three thousand acres of land.  Here we catch the mountain breeze and the climate is beautiful and healthy. In many places in this country as high and alleviated as this, the rain makes it disagreeable. But here there is no inconvenience felt on that account. Only some times there is a lack for the want of it.”  (Maly)

Over the next year the pioneers planted an amazing variety of seeds, slips, and starts. The list included wheat, oats, barley, grapes, sweet potatoes and Irish potatoes, beans of several kinds, peas, squash, pumpkins, bananas, corn, melons, peaches, plums, quinces, pears, tomatoes, cabbage, and “many kinds of garden seed.”  (Britisch)

But, the weather, particularly the rainfall, had serious consequences – sometimes there was too much, most of the time there was too little.  A spring was about 1-mile from where they lived and farmed.

“… there is not a single stream or spring in this district, and it is with much difficulty that the people manage to get enough drinking water.  Sometimes they have brought water from Lāhainā, and lugged it four miles from the beach to their homes in Pālāwai valley.”  (Gibson)

“The threatenings of war in Utah in 1857 induced every white Mormon Elder to return home. The native church was left to its own guidance.”

“The Utah Elders invariably told the natives that they did not come to establish themselves here, like the missionaries, but simply to teach them what they felt to be the truth, and then go their way to teach others.”  (Gibson, Pacific Commercial Advertiser, October 24, 1861)

Walter Murray Gibson was sent on a mission by Brigham Young to the Far East and came to the Hawaiian Islands in 1861. He subsequently declared himself the “Chief President of the Islands of the Sea and of the Hawaiian Islands, for the Church of the Latter Day Saints.”

The Church sent a group to investigate Gibson’s activities. Upon arrival to the island of Lanai, Joseph F Smith described the situation as follows:

“We found that he had ordained twelve apostles. High priests, seventys, elders, bishops, and “priestesses of temples,” all of whom had to pay a certain sum corresponding to the various degrees of honor bestowed upon them….”

“Gibson had bought the district of Palawai (6,000 acres) by the donation of the Saints, assuring them he was doing it all for them for the Church. He persuaded them to give all they had to the Church and made it a test of fellowship….”

“Brothers Benson and Snow required him to sign the land over to the Church as it was deeded to him and his heirs. This he flatly refused to do informing them he should take his own course.”

Gibson was excommunicated from the Church, although he retained the land which was purchased under the auspices of the Church. (Mormon Sites)

In later years, Pālāwai Basin was planted in pineapple.  In 2004, the Mormon Pacific Historical Society and the Mormon Historic Sites Foundation erected a monument to the Pālāwai Saints paying tribute to those early members who established the first gathering place for Mormons in Hawaiʻi.

The image shows the Mormon memorial, overlooking some of Pālāwai Basin.  In addition, I have included other related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Lānaʻi Airport

Aviation history for Lānaʻi began with the creation of an emergency landing strip, there, in 1919.  Aviation use was on-again, off-again in different areas of the island for the next few decades.

In its 1928 Annual Report, the Territorial Aeronautical Commission reported the excellent cooperation of the Hawaiian Pineapple Company, in making a suitable field available for emergency airplane landings on the Island of Lānaʻi.  The field was at Leinukalahua, Kaʻa.

Things got official in 1928, when Inter-Island Airways (now Hawaiian Airlines) began operations to Lānaʻi with Sikorsky S-38 eight-passenger amphibious planes.  The landing field was owned by the Hawaiian Pineapple Company.

In July 1930, the Territorial Aeronautics Commission wrote to Hawaiian Pineapple Company asking if they wished to apply for a license for their field. There was no response.

During 1935, Inter-Island Airways started to replace its 8-passenger planes with 16-passenger planes, which were later (1941) replaced by 24-passenger Douglas DC-3s.

The Lanai field was not big enough to accommodate this type of aircraft and once the last of the S-38s were put out of service (shortly after the start of World War II,) air service to Lānaʻi came to a halt.

In 1944, the Post War Planning Division of the Territorial Department of Public Works proposed to construct a new 5,000-foot runway and airport 4-miles southwest of Lānaʻi City (Hawaiian Pineapple Company, Ltd was looking to about 220-acres for the new facility.)

“The existing airport is too small for two-engine planes, and the Civil Aeronautics Administration has advised that it is willing to consider an application for a major airport,” the Public Works report stated.

“The dependence of the population upon air service justifies the proposed project.  The part of the Lānaʻi pineapple plantation in the Territory’s economy is very great.  The present airport, although in operation, is unpaved and is in great need of adequate paving to prevent erosion from severe winds and relatively high rainfall.”

A new airport site for Lānaʻi was chosen and on September 18, 1946, Hawaiian Airlines resumed service there using its DC-3s.  The unpaved sod strip field was practically unusable in wet weather and almost untenable due to dust and dirt in dry weather. In view of these conditions, air service was not reliable and it was therefore decided to pave the runway and taxiway.

A Master Plan was prepared (1946) that called for a single 4,200-foot runway.  The Territorial Legislature appropriated one-third of the funds, with the rest matched by Civil Aeronautics Administration funds.  In 1947, Lānaʻi Airport management was put under the Hawaii Aeronautics Commission.

The 3,700 feet long runway and related facilities, the first field constructed by the Hawaiian Aeronautics Commission, was officially dedicated on July 12, 1948.

By 1950, the airport was served regularly by Hawaiian Airlines with twice daily passenger service in two directions and twice weekly freight service.  Air mail service was supplied.

Over the years, additions were made to the facility.  In 1960, the Maui County Board of Supervisors requested both the State and Hawaiian Airlines to use larger more modern aircraft to provide passenger air service to Lānaʻi.  (Hawaiian had changed its fleet from DC-3s to Convairs.)

A new Master Plan called for extension of the runway to a total of 5,000-feet, as wells as new terminal facilities to match the requirements of the newer planes.  The new projects were completed and dedicated on October 16, 1966.

On October 1, 1979, the Civil Aeronautics Board Order 79-10-3, the Bureau of Domestic Aviation, defined essential air service for Lānaʻi as follows: “Lānaʻi: A minimum of two daily round trip flights to Honolulu and Kahului providing a total of at least 80 seats in each direction per day.”

After minor upgrades, the airport went through another expansion phase.  Dedicated April 19, 1994, the new single-story 15,000-square foot terminal was five times larger than the existing and included space for a gift shop and food and beverage concessions and counter space for six airlines.

The Lanai Airport Master Plan Update was published in June 1999.  Phase I of the proposed improvements (2000-2010) called for improvements to the airfield, terminal complex, and design, planning, project management and contingency costs.

Larry Ellison bought about 98 percent of the island of Lānaʻi in June 2012; in February 2013, he purchased Island Air.

Later, Ellison announced plans to build a second, longer runway at Lānaʻi Airport so larger planes could land there, as well as carry Lānaʻi-grown flowers and produce directly to Asia and North America.  (Honolulu)  (Lots of information from hawaii-gov.)

The image shows the Lānaʻi landing field – the early presence of aviation facilities.  In addition, I have included other related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Ka Lanakila O Ka Mālamalama Hoʻomana Naʻauao O Hawaiʻi Church

In ancient times, the windward coast of the island of Lānaʻi was home to many native residents.  Maunalei Valley had the only perennial stream on the island and a system of loʻi kalo (taro pond field terraces) supplied taro to the surrounding community.

Sheltered coves, fronted by a barrier reef, provided the residents with access to important fisheries, and allowed for the development of loko iʻa (fishponds), in which various species of fish were cultivated, and available to native tenants, even when the ocean was too rough for the canoes to venture out to sea.  (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)

There was once a time in the year 1900 when Keōmoku was the island's population center, and over 1,000 workers flocked to the town to work in the area’s fledgling sugar plantation.

The plantation built a large community with houses, stores, an inn, a sugar mill and hospital.  However, with inadequate finances and water shortages, the plantation failed and closed in March 1901.

In 1903, the Hawaiian families of Lānaʻi joined an association of Hawaiian churches and began construction of a wooden church at Keōmoku. Dedicated on October 4, 1903, the full name of the church was “Ka Lanakila o ka Mālamalama Hoʻomana Naʻauao o Hawaii.”

Ka Lanakila services were performed solely in the Hawaiian language, and structured in three distinct Sunday services, Kula Euanelio, Hālāwai Haipule and Kula Sabati. Families arrived at church before 10 am and remained there through 1 pm.

Also in those early days, no work was allowed on Lāpule (Sunday), so families prepared all food the day prior to service, and then returned home for a quiet day of rest and reflection.

By 1930, the population of Keōmoku Village had mostly moved to the uplands with the development of more extensive ranching operations and the Dole Pineapple Plantation, though Ka Lanakila church remained in regular use until 1951, when Reverend Daniel Kaopuiki, Sr. and his wife, Hattie Kaenaokalani Kaopuiki relocated from Keōmoku to Lānaʻi City.

The town faltered with the closing of the plantation, and in the 1950s the town's last resident moved to Lānaʻi City.  The population of Lānaʻi rapidly declined to around 125 individuals.

By 1954, Ka Lanakila was abandoned and decommissioned as a church, and the land was returned to the owner, the Hawaiian Pineapple Co.  In the late 1980s, a restoration project was begun, and large sections of the church wood work were removed and replaced.

Unfortunately, the work was left incomplete, and over the next 20-plus years, siltation buried the footings of the church, and posts and piers below the church rotted. Framing, walls and roofing materials also rotted, and the floors began to sink.

Following lengthy discussions with elder Hawaiians of Lānaʻi - to assess whether Ka Lanakila should be allowed to collapse or if it should be stabilized - it was decided that this historic feature should be cared for.

The Agape Foundation Charitable Trust and Office of Hawaiian Affairs provided major funding for the project, community members and state-wide partners offered support, and Castle & Cooke Resorts, LLC granted a right of entry agreement to the Lāna‘i Culture & Heritage Center to undertake the stabilization work which was begun in October 2010.

While no longer considered a “formal” church by the elder Hawaiian members of Lāna‘i’s community, the building continues to hold a special place in the hearts and minds of the people, who, since its closing in 1951, continued to make visits to Ka Lanakila Church and tried to care for the site.

Several of the Kūpuna (elders) and their ‘ohana (families) hope to once again hold an occasional service at Ka Lanakila, and encourage its respectful use for family gatherings and educational purposes. This historic wooden church is a connection with earlier time in Lāna‘i’s history, and is the last physical structure of what was once the most significant settlement on the island.

The building is 24-feet wide by 40-feet long.  Ka Lanakila Church is the last wooden structure existing in the former Keōmoku Village.

Hoʻomana Naʻauao o Hawaiʻi was the first independent Hawaiian Christian organization in the Islands; it was founded by John Kekipi in 1889.

He named his denomination "Hoʻomana Naʻauao," which non-members translate as meaning "reasonable service."  Its mother church, Ke Alaula oka Mālamalama, is in Honolulu.  (Lots of information here from Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center; Maly.)

The image shows Ka Lanakila O Ka Mālamalama Hoʻomana Naʻauao O Hawaiʻi Church (afar.)  In addition, I have added other images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Lānaʻi - Lāhainā Ferry

In ancient times, the windward coast of the island of Lānaʻi was home to many native residents.  Maunalei Valley had the only perennial stream on the island and a system of loʻi kalo (taro pond field terraces) supplied taro to the surrounding community.

Sheltered coves, fronted by a barrier reef, provided the residents with access to important fisheries, and allowed for the development of loko iʻa (fishponds), in which various species of fish were cultivated, and available to native tenants, even when the ocean was too rough for the canoes to venture out to sea.  (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)

The history of Lānaʻi is rich and diverse, spanning first, some 800 years of native Hawaiian residency and subsistence practices (ca. 1000 - 1800 A.D.). Then following 1800, there was a decline in the native population as foreign influences began to grow.

In 1861, Walter Murray Gibson came to Hawaiʻi after joining the Mormon Church the year before; he was to serve as a missionary and envoy of the Mormon Church to the peoples of the Pacific.

The experience with the Church was relatively short-lived; in 1864, he was excommunicated for selling priesthood offices, defrauding the Hawaiian members and misusing his ecclesiastical authority (in part, he was using church funds to buy land in his name.)

By the 1870s, Gibson focused his interests at Koele, situated in a sheltered valley in the uplands of Kamoku Ahupuaʻa. As the ranch operation was developed, Koele was transformed from an area of traditional residency and sustainable agriculture to the ranch headquarters.  (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)  In 1872, Gibson moved from Lānaʻi to Lāhainā and then to Honolulu.

After Gibson’s death in 1888, the ranch was turned over to his daughter and son-in-law, Talula and Frederick Hayselden.  As early as 1896, the Gibson-Hayselden interests on Lānaʻi, which held nearly all the land on the island in fee-simple or leasehold title, began developing a scheme to plant and grow sugar on Lānaʻi.

They chose the ancient fishing community of Keōmuku for the base of operations.  However, before completing the construction of the mill and associated facilities, and prior to the first harvest being collected for processing, the Maunalei Sugar Company went bankrupt.

In the period between 1899 to the 1920s, Keōmuku served as the hub of residency and commerce. Several motor-driven boats were engaged in providing transportation of people and goods between Lāna‘i and Lāhaina. (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)

Navigating the rough seas and near shore reef waters took exceptional skill. With names like “Akamai” (Smart,) “Naheihei” (The Racer,) “Mikioi” (Skillful,) “Lokahi” (Unity) and “Manukiiwai” (Bird That Fetches Water,) the boats regularly made runs to Lāhainā from Halepalaoa.

The return trip from Lāhainā brought back the mail, various food supplies, along with poi, rice and flour, fresh water in bottles, and passengers – including family members and visitors to the island.

Kupuna, Venus Leinaala Gay Holt, born at Keomoku in 1905 recalled that:
“No matter how rough, Noa Kaopuiki knew how to wait. He would keep the engine running and everything. He’d wait. He knew how to count the waves. And we would all hold right there, see everything. And all the sudden, he’d go! He was gone. Right through the channel, gone. And the big waves are coming right after that. Gone on his way to Lāhaina.”

“Our boats ran twice a week to Lāhainā. They always came back with a barrel of poi, bags of flour, or whatever, whatever, whatever. We had sort of a store room with all the things in it… The boat went over and we bought most of our supplies from Lāhainā."

"We brought in large supplies, by cases. Case of corned beef, case of canned salmon… Every Wednesday and every Saturday, they bought fresh supplies, poi, a whole barrel of poi once a week. We always had rice, and we grew a lot of things down here. We grew a lot of vegetables. We grew sweet potatoes, even down at the beach house. Lots of sweet potatoes were grown for the pigs…” (Venus Leinaala Gay Holt, January 28, 2006; Lānaʻi CHC)

Lānaʻi is still connected with Lāhainā and served by a ferry boat; however, now Expeditions lands at Mānele, rather than Maunalei (Halepalaoa.)  Lāhainā to Mānele: Departs 6:45 am, 9:15 am, 12:45 pm 3:15 pm, 5:45 pm; Mānele to Lāhainā: Departs 8:00 am, 10:30 am, 2:00 pm, 4:30 pm, 6:45 pm.  (Lots of information here from Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center.)

The image shows the former Lānaʻi - Lāhainā ferry boat (Lānaʻi CHC)    In addition, I have included more related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Island Summits

He ‘Ohu Ke Aloha; ‘A‘ohe Kuahiwi Kau ‘Ole
Love is like mist; there is no mountaintop that it does not settle upon

“… as the sun shining in his strength dissipated the clouds, we had a more impressive view of the stupendous pyramidal Mauna Kea, having a base of some thirty miles, and a height of nearly three miles.  Its several terminal peaks rise so near each other, as scarcely to be distinguished at a distance.”

“These, resting on the shoulders of this vast Atlas of the Pacific, prove their great elevation by having their bases environed with ice, and their summits covered with snow, in this tropical region, and heighten the grandeur and beauty of the scene, by exhibiting in miniature, a northern winter, in contrast with the perpetual summer of the temperate and torrid zones below the snow and ice.”

“The shores along this coast appeared very bold, rising almost perpendicularly, several hundred feet, being furrowed with many ravines and streams. From these bluffs, the country rises gradually, for a few miles, presenting a grassy appearance, with a sprinkling of trees and shrubs.”

“Then, midway from the sea to the summit of the mountain, appeared a dark forest, principally of the koa and ʻōhia, forming a sort of belt, some ten miles in breadth-the temperate zone of the mountain.”  (Bingham at first sight of the Islands, 1820)

And when you think about high elevation places in the Hawaiian islands, of course you have to talk about that basic dichotomy between the lower elevation places where people live.

And in old times, the lower elevations would have been called the Wao Kanaka. Wao being a word that means “zone” and “Kanaka” being a person. So the Wao Kanaka is a zone in which people belong.

When you rise above that zone, you enter into a realm in which all of the living things there are not there because of human activity. They flourish as the result of the activity of the gods, or the Akua. And so that zone is called the Wao Akua. And the transition from Wao Kanaka to Wao Akua is not taken lightly.  (Gon)

The Islands’ peaks are considered the piko (summit or center of the land) and are considered sacred.  The places upon which clouds nestle are considered wao akua, the realm of the gods.  Clouds cover the actions of the gods while they walk the earth. The higher the piko, the closer to heaven, and the greater the success of prayers. (Maly)

Let’s look at Hawaiʻi’s peaks, the highest point on each Island as we move down the Island chain.

Niʻihau – Pānīʻau (1,281-feet)

Ni‘ihau was formed from a single shield volcano approximately 4.89-million years ago, making it slightly younger in age than Kaua‘i. It is approximately 70-square miles or 44,800-acres.  It’s about 17-miles west of Kauaʻi.

Pānīʻau, the island’s highest point, is 1,281-feet; approximately 78% of the island is below 500-feet in elevation.   Located inside Kauai’s rain shadow, Ni‘ihau receives only about 20 to 40-inches of rain per year.  Ni‘ihau has no perennial streams.  (DLNR)

Kaua‘i – Kawaikini (5,243-feet)

Geologically, Kauaʻi is the oldest of the main inhabited islands in the chain. It is also the northwestern-most island, with Oʻahu separated by the Kaʻieʻie Channel, which is about 70-miles long. In centuries past, Kauaʻi’s isolation from the other islands kept it safe from outside invasion and unwarranted conflict.

Near the summit (Kawaikini) is Waiʻaleʻale; in 1920 it passed Cherrapunji, a village in the Khasi hills of India, as the wettest spot on Earth (recording a yearly average of 476-inches of rain.)

Oʻahu – Kaʻala (4,025-feet)

The Waiʻanae Mountains, formed by volcanic eruptions nearly four-million years ago, have seen centuries of wind and rain, cutting huge valleys and sharp ridges into the extinct volcano.  Mount Kaʻala, the highest peak on the island of Oʻahu, rises to 4,025-feet.

Today, only a small remnant of the mountain's original flat summit remains, surrounded by cliffs and narrow ridges. It’s often hidden by clouds.

Molokaʻi – Kamakou (4,961-feet)

The island was formed by two volcanoes, East and West, emerging about 1.5-2-million years ago.  The cliffs on the north-eastern part of the island are the result of subsidence and the “Wailua Slump” (a giant submarine landslide – about 25-miles long that tumbled about 120-miles offshore – about 1.4-million years ago.)

Kamakou is part of the extinct East Molokaʻi shield volcano, which comprises the east side of the island.   It and much of the surrounding area is part of the East Maui Watershed partnership and the Kamakou Preserve.  A boardwalk covers part of the rainforest and bog to protect the hundreds of native plants, birds, insects and other species there.

Lānaʻi – Lānaʻihale (3,337-feet)

The island of Lānaʻi was made by a single shield volcano between 1- and 1.5-million years ago, forming a classic example of a Hawaiian shield volcano with a gently sloping profile.  (SOEST)  The island of Lānaʻi is about 13-miles long and 13-miles wide; with an overall land area of approximately 90,000-acres, it is the sixth largest of the eight major Hawaiian Islands.

“At the very summit of the island, which is generally shrouded in mist, we came upon what Gibson (an early (1861) Mormon missionary to the islands) called his lake - a little shallow pond, about the size of a dining table.  In the driest times there was always water here, and one of the regular summer duties of the Chinese cook was to take a pack mule and a couple of kegs and go up to the lake for water.”  (Lydgate, Thrum)

Maui – Haleakalā (10,023-feet)

Haleakalā was thought to have been known to the ancient Hawaiians by any one of five names: “Haleakalā,” “Haleokalā,” “Heleakalā,” “Aheleakalā” and “Halekalā.” (Hawaiʻi National Park Superintendent Monthly Report, December 1939)

Haleakalā is best known in stories related of the demi-god Māui; he is best known for his tricks and supernatural powers. In Hawaiʻi, he is best known for snaring the sun, lifting the sky, discovering the secrets of fire, fishing up the islands and so forth.  (Fredericksen)

Kahoʻolawe – Lua Makika (1,477-feet)

Kahoʻolawe is the smallest of the eight Main Hawaiian Islands, 11-miles long and 7-miles wide (approximately 28,800-acres;) it is seven miles southwest of Maui.  The highest point on Kahoʻolawe is the crater of Lua Makika at the summit of Puʻu Moaulanui, which is about 1,477 feet above sea level.

Located in the “rain shadow” of Maui’s Haleakalā, rainfall has been in short supply on Kahoʻolawe.  However, nineteenth century forestry reports mentioned a “dense forest” at the top of Kahoʻolawe.  Historically, a “cloud bridge” connected the island to the slopes of Haleakalā.  The Naulu winds brought the Naulu rains that are associated with Kahoʻolawe (a heavy mist and shower of fine rain that would cover the island.)

Hawaiʻi – Mauna Kea (13,796-feet)

Nani Wale ʻO Mauna Kea, Kuahiwi Kūhaʻo I Ka Mālie (Beautiful is Mauna Kea, standing alone in the calm) expresses the feeling that Mauna Kea is a source of awe and inspiration for the Hawaiian people. The mountain is a respected elder, a spiritual connection to one’s gods.   (Maly)

A significant pattern archaeologists note in their investigations is the virtual absence of archaeological sites at the very top of the mountain. McCoy states that the “top of the mountain was clearly a sacred precinct that must, moreover, have been under a kapu and accessible to only the highest chiefs or priests.”  (Maly)

ʻĀina mauna, or mountain lands, reflects a term used affectionately by elder Hawaiians to describe the upper regions of all mountain lands surrounding and including Mauna Kea.  (Maly)

The image shows the Islands’ Summits (Google Earth.)  In addition, I have added some other images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Kaumālapaʻu

The total land area of Lānaʻi is 89,305 acres, divided into 13 ahupua‘a (traditional land divisions.)  In the traditional system, respective konohiki served as land managers over each. These konohiki were subject to control by the ruling chiefs.

At the time of the Great Māhele (1848,) lands on Lānaʻi were divided between lands claimed by King Kamehameha III (Kauikeaouli) (40,665 acres,) which were known as the Crown Lands, and the lands to be claimed by the chiefs and people (48,640 acres,) which were called the Government Lands.

By 1907, more than half the island of Lānaʻi was in the hands of native Hawaiians. Just 14 years later, in 1921, only 208.25 acres of land remained in native Hawaiian ownership. By 1875 Walter Gibson had control, either through lease or direct ownership, of nine‐tenths of Lānaʻi’s lands. (Lānaʻi Community Plan)

When James Dole bought Lānaʻi, ranching was a thriving business under the control of George Munro. Shortly after the purchase, Dole got Munro working at removing cattle from potential pineapple lands. As soon as cattle were fattened they were sold. Ranching operations became a secondary priority to pineapple development.

During 1923, the company embarked on making major improvements to the island of Lānaʻi.  At first, Dole wanted to name the town Pine City, but the post office department objected because there were too many "pine" post offices in the mainland United States.  So the plantation town was called Lānaʻi City.

Dole hired Mr. Root, an engineer, to lay out and plan the town. Root arrived at Mānele Bay to begin his work. He designed the central park with a symmetrical grid of residential streets, which remains the configuration of Lānaʻi City today.” (Lānaʻi Community Plan)

Between 1922 and 1992, pineapple plantation operations provided the people of Lānaʻi with a way of life.  James Doles’ Hawaiian Pineapple Company evolved and many of the innovations in cultivation, equipment design, harvesting, irrigation and labor relations developed on the Lānaʻi plantation, and came to be used around the world. (Lānaʻi Culture & Heritage Center)

Mānele Bay was the main port of entry for Lānaʻi; its primary purpose was to ship pineapple off the island. On the eastern side of the island, remnants of Halepalaoa Landing can be seen; this was used primarily to ship cattle. It's also reported that in the late 1800s, a steamer landing was located on the western shore of Lānaʻi Island and served as a docking grounds.

A new harbor was needed.  In 1923 to 1926, Kaumālapaʻu Bay, a natural, sheltered cove on the southwest side of Lānaʻi, was developed into the main shipping harbor from which pineapple and all major supplies for Lānaʻi were shipped and received.

“… we learned that the breakwater is composed of 116,000-tons of rock blasted from the cliffs and dropped into the water.  The Kaumalapau harbor entrance is 65-feet deep, and the minimum depth of the harbor is 27-feet.  The wharf is 400-feet long and the boat landing is 80-feet in length.”  (Lanai “The Pineapple Kingdom, 1926)

Bins filled with pineapple were unloaded from the trucks (steam cranes were still used through the 1960s), and placed on the barges for shipping to the cannery at Iwilei, Honolulu, Oʻahu. Tug boats were used to haul the barges - empty bins and supplies to Lānaʻi, and filled pineapple bins to the cannery.

Because of the demands of work at Kaumālapaʻu, Lānaʻi’s “second city” was developed, and known as “Harbor Camp.” The Harbor Camp included around 20 homes and support buildings, and sat perched on the cliffs above Kaumālapaʻu Bay.  (Lānaʻi Culture & Heritage Center)

Surmising from the vast archaeological features on the cliffs above Kaumālapaʻu Gulch, Kaumālapaʻu Harbor was probably a very important settlement (seasonal and/or permanent) for native Hawaiians. (Social Research Pacific)

Access to fishing, whether by boat or off the shoreline, is easily attained at Kaumālapaʻu.  One of the sites immediately mauka of the harbor is called “Fisherman's Trail.” In the 1862 letter requesting settlement and use of Lānaʻi, even Gibson indicated the importance of fishing as the primary source of subsistence for the island's inhabitants.

The village of Kaunolu, just to the south of Kaumālapaʻu was known as a "fishing village". Given its proximity to Kaumālapaʻu, it is highly likely that neighboring Kaumālapaʻu also offered good fishing grounds to Hawaiians. The Kaumālapaʻu Trail extends from Lānaʻi City down to Kaumālapaʻu.   (Social Research Pacific)

In the Māhele, the ahupuaʻa of Kamoku and Kalulu (which adjoin the existing Kaumālapaʻu Harbor) were retained by the King (Kamehameha III), though the 'ili of Kaumālapaʻu 1 & 2 were given by the King to the Government.

The Kaumālapaʻu Harbor breakwater was in disrepair for many years following several hurricanes and seasonal storms.  Completed in 2007, 40,000-tons of new stone was added to the reshaped breakwater, 800 concrete Core-Locs (each weighing 35 tons) were put in place and a 5-foot- thick concrete cap was cast on top of the breakwater to complete the project.  (Traylor)

Today, as in the early 1920s, Kaumālapaʻu Harbor is the main commercial seaport and Lānaʻi’s lifeline to the outside world, with weekly Young Brothers’ barge and other commercial activity in and out of Lānaʻi.

The image shows initial construction of the Kaumālapaʻu facilities (1924) (Lanai-PineappleKingdom.)  In addition, I have added other related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Penal Colonies

Before 1778, crime and punishment were closely related to the social and political structure of society.  Crimes were judged by their relationship to religion and class.  Crimes against the kapu system were severely punished, often by death. For these crimes involved offenses against the gods or the great chiefs. Such offenses threatened the basis upon which society was organized.  (King)

John B Whitman who was in the Islands from 1813 to 1815 noted, “The word tarboo (kapu) is used to signify certain rites and ceremonies established by ancient custom, the origin of which is forbidden, either to touch, eat, drink, use, or wear ….”

“I have often witnessed with surprise, the strict attention paid to the observance of the tarboos of individuals, the variety of which, obliges them to be extremely careful, and to become well acquainted with those of the Chiefs, and their connections.”

Following the death of Kamehameha I in 1819, King Kamehameha II (Liholiho) declared an end to the kapu system.   “An extraordinary event marked the period of Liholiho’s rule, in the breaking down of the ancient tabus, the doing away with the power of the kahunas to declare tabus and to offer sacrifices”  (Kamakau)

In part needing to fill the void left by the abolition of the kapu, on March 8, 1822, two "Notices” (essentially the first printed laws) were published at Honolulu. The first related to disturbances caused by seamen having liberty on shore and provided that any of them “found riotous or disturbing the peace" should be imprisoned in the fort and detained there until thirty dollars was paid for the release of each offender.”  (Kuykendall)

The second "Notice" read: “His Majesty the King, desirous of preserving the peace and tranquility of his dominions, has ordered that any foreigner residing on his Islands, who shall be guilty of molesting strangers, or in any way disturbing the peace, shall on complaint be confined in the Fort, and thence sent from the Islands by the first conveyance.”  (Kuykendall)

The King, Kuhina Nui and Chiefs decided that exile and banishment from the Kingdom was a way to handle troublesome foreigners. It was not long before they realized that the same principles could be used to control their own people. They began to define new laws and new crimes.  (King)

Missionary William Richards wrote, "The common penalty threatened to those who should break the laws, was banishment to the island of Tahoorawe (Kahoʻolawe) ...."

Describing the imprisonment of the first prisoners sent to the Island, Richards noted, “The chiefs then unanimously expressed their approbation of the sentence that had been passed upon them by the chiefs at Oʻahu, and declared their determination to punish all who should be guilty of like crimes.”

“They then called the governor of Kahurawe (Kahoʻolawe,) to whom they committed the criminals, charging him to keep them safely; at the same time telling him, that if they escaped from the island, he would be called to account for it.”

“Many of the older residents recall the common rumor in their early days here of that barren island having been a convict station, but, like the writer, are at a loss to define either the time of its designation as such, or its date of termination.”  (Thrum)

“In its origin, doubtless the fact that not a few escaped convicts from Botany Bay, who had made their presence felt on these shores in early days had familiarized the king and chiefs with the subject of banishment, was an influence toward its recognition and adoption here as a penalty for crime. While the time and circumstance of its origin is clouded with uncertainty, it appears to have been a working factor at the time of the visit at these islands of Wilkes’ Exploring Expedition, in 1840-41.”  (Thrum)

The account therein given is the only one published by an early writer:  “Kahoʻolawe - is fourteen miles long by five miles wide. It is uninhabited except by a few fishermen, and is used as a place of exile; at this time there was one state prisoner confined on it. Lieut. Budd - set out in search of the town.”

“After wandering over the rugged face of this barren island for many miles he discovered, to his great joy, from the top of a ridge, a cluster of huts near the water, which they soon reached. They proved to be inhabited by Kenemoneha, the exile above spoken of, who for the crime of forgery had been condemned to spend five years in exile upon this island. This was effected in a singular manner, and the punishment of the offender will serve to show the mode in which the laws are carried into execution.”

“The village is a collection of eight huts and an unfurnished adobe church. The chief has three large canoes for his use.  The only article produced on the island is the sweet potato, and but a small quantity of these. All the inhabitants of the island are convicts, and receive their food from Maui; their present number is about fifteen. Besides this cluster of convicts’ huts there are one or two houses on the north end inhabited by old women. Some of the convicts are allowed to visit the other islands, but not to remain.”  (March, 1841)

“It used to be a penal settlement, and no doubt the convicts enjoyed there as much ease and freedom from both surveillance and labor as their hearts could wish. I have heard that the late Kinimaka had a fine time of it. He was a native of some little rank and had his own dependants who used to swim from the shores of Maui and take him what he wanted to make his banishment entirely agreeable.”

But Kahoʻolawe was not the only penal colony.

Kekāuluohi (Kuhina Nui as Kaʻahumanu III) (1839-1845) “made Kahoʻolawe and Lānaʻi penal settlements for law breakers to punish them for such crimes as rebellion, theft, divorce, breaking marriage vows, murder, and prostitution.”  (Kamakau)

Others substantiate it: “Enquiring among Hawaiians upon this subject we have an account from a venerable native writer of this city, formerly of Honuaʻula, Maui who testifies of his own knowledge not only of the existence of the penal settlement of Kahoolawe about the year 1840, but one also at Lae-o-Kaʻena, Lānaʻi; the former island being designated for the men, and the women being banished to the latter place.”

“The women were conveyed across to Lae-o-Kaʻena by the schooner Hoʻoikaika, afterwards the men were sent to Kahoʻolawe, among whom was the Maui chief Kinimaka, who was designated as superintendent of the exiles. The work he assigned to them was the erection of houses of stone and dirt (adobe) at a place called Kaulana, a small bay, where with some residents they numbered 80 or more. After its designation as a convict station the former settlers left and returned to Honuaʻula, whence most of them had come.”

However, some of the men stole some canoes and “went over to Lae-o-Kaʻena, Lanai, and brought all the women to Kahoʻolawe to share their solitude .. (where) they lived peaceably together until in 1843 … (when they put an end to the law)  and sent the exiles to their respective localities to work upon the roads.”

“It is possible, however, that in the “Act of Grace” of Kamehameha III, in commemoration of the restoration of the flag by Admiral Thomas July 31st of that year, whereby “all prisoners of every description” committed for offenses during the period of cession “from Hawaiʻi to Niʻihau be immediately discharged,” royal clemency was extended to include prisoners of earlier conviction, since which time the laws on banishment appear to have been a dead letter long before, dropped from the statutes, apparently without special repeal.”  (Thrum)

The image shows Kahoʻolawe, Lānaʻi and Maui (GoogleEarth.)

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Maunalei Sugar

In ancient times, the windward coast of the island of Lānaʻi was home to many native residents. Maunalei Valley had the only perennial stream on the island and a system of loʻi kalo (taro pond field terraces) supplied taro to the surrounding community.

Sheltered coves, fronted by a barrier reef, provided the residents with access to important fisheries, and allowed for the development of loko iʻa (fishponds), in which various species of fish were cultivated, and available to native tenants, even when the ocean was too rough for the canoes to venture out to sea. (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)

In 1861, Walter Murray Gibson came to Hawaiʻi after joining the Mormon Church the year before; he was to serve as a missionary and envoy of the Mormon Church to the peoples of the Pacific. He landed in Lānaʻi and eventually created the title "Chief President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Islands of the Sea." He more regularly went by the name Kipikona.

The experience with the Church was relatively short-lived; in 1864, he was excommunicated for selling priesthood offices, defrauding the Hawaiian members and misusing his ecclesiastical authority (in part, he was using church funds to buy land in his name.)

By the 1870s, Gibson focused his interests in ranching in the area called Koele, situated in a sheltered valley in the uplands of Kamoku Ahupuaʻa. As the ranch operation was developed, Koele was transformed from an area of traditional residency and sustainable agriculture to the ranch headquarters. (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center) In 1872, Gibson moved from Lānaʻi to Lāhainā and then to Honolulu.

After Gibson’s death in 1888, the ranch was turned over to his daughter and son-in-law, Talula and Frederick Hayselden. As early as 1896, the Gibson-Hayselden interests on Lānaʻi, which held nearly all the land on the island in fee-simple or leasehold title, began developing a scheme to plant and grow sugar on Lānaʻi.

They chose the ancient fishing community of Keōmoku for the base of operations, and in early-1899, the Maunalei Sugar Company was formally incorporated. Gear, Lansing & Co was the largest stockholder (Gear was President, Lansing was Treasurer - W Stodart was the plantation manager)

“The plan is that a sugar company will be incorporated at once with a capital of $1,000,000 and that 1,000 acres will be put into cane without delay. There will be no “wildcat” business in the enterprise and all persons signing for shares will be obliged to put down 10 percent of the amount desired. It is the intention of the promoters to avoid gambling in Lanai stocks as much as possible.” (Gear & Lansing, The Independent, February 28, 1899)

They developed larger support communities along the coast, cleared the lands, developed a narrow gauge railroad between Keōmoku Village and Kahalepalaoa (where the boat landing was situated,) and planted sugar cane, irrigated by water from Maunalei Valley.

“At the landing a very substantial wharf has been built, and a railroad to the camp two miles distant is in operation with a rolling stock of a locomotive and nineteen cars. Including the laborers quarters we have at the plantation fifty buildings, and the new buildings in contemplation are the pumping plants and the mill, a very respectable town and a very busy one.” (Stodart in Evening Bulletin, October 13, 1899)

Work on the plantation was largely done by immigrant Japanese laborers. “We have 400 laborers … and will have 200 more in a few weeks. The first crop will be ready to grind in 1901 and I have no doubt the yield per acre will be entirely satisfactory. The land is proving all that was promised and I have no doubt of the substantial returns to the stockholders." (Stodart in Evening Bulletin, October 13, 1899)

Both men and women were brought from Japan, and a finder’s fee of $27- $36 per male employee, and $23 - $30 per female employee was paid to the immigration companies. Laborers were typically paid around $0.70 to $0.75 per day, with expenses for merchandise and board deducted from pay at the end of the month.

All did not go as planned.

Before completing the construction of the mill and associated facilities, and prior to the first harvest being collected for processing, the Maunalei Sugar Company went bankrupt. Sugar is a thirsty crop and the necessary water resources for the plantation were never realized.

Additional hardships arose following an outbreak of the bubonic plague in Honolulu, which led to a devastating fire and the closure of many Chinatown businesses (many of whom had invested in the Lānaʻi sugar operation.)

But those were not the major shareholders’ only financial concerns. A heading “Business Concern is in Difficulties” called attention to the financial problems of Gear, Lansing & Company; a sub-heading notes, “Failure of Maunalei Sugar Co. a Leading Factor in the Corporation's Trouble Kaimukī and Other Large Real Estate Transactions”. (Honolulu Republican, June 19, 1901)

The story noted, “The corporation has, since its organization a few years ago, dealt heavily in real estate, besides participating largely in the boom of general stocks that two years ago strained the entire financial situation.”

“Gear, Lansing & Co.’s largest real estate deal was the exploitation of the Kaimukī residence tract. They laid out streets and installed a modern water works plant. A large proportion of the lots sold readily, but the hope deferred of rapid transit communication prevented a full measure of, success to the enterprise.”

Plantation records during the three year period of the plantation’s operation, some 70 employees (most of Japanese origin) died and were buried on Lānaʻi. In 1932, members of the Lānaʻi Hongwanji Mission built a memorial for Japanese employees of the sugar plantation near the grave sites.

Some other unfortunate consequences resulted from the Lānaʻi sugar endeavor. A part of the plantation’s work resulted in the introduction of the algarroba (kiawe) tree - the hardwood was to have been used as fuel for the furnaces, and the seeds as feed for the livestock. Left untended, the trees became an invasive pest on the island.

Following the sugar failure, Keōmoku was used as ranchland until 1954. The nearly 3,000 acres of cleared land led to significant erosion and siltation that spread from the uplands to the shore, burying sites and the reef under as much as nine feet of silt. (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)

The image shows a map of Maunalei Sugar (Lanai Culture and Heritage Center.) Here is a link to more images.

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10201606128578359.1073742180.1332665638&type=1&l=07ae007246

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Sorrow Without Hope

Amongst the islands of the Hawaiian group is one named Lānaʻi. Beautiful, fertile and productive, its people are orderly and self-governing, but subject to the crown of Hawaiʻi, and loyal subjects of the Kamehameha. Among the natives of this island linger many traditions of the past, both curious and poetical. (Halcombe, 1867)

There's a small island between Hulopo'e and Mānele off the southern coast.  There is a tradition of how this place, and particularly the little island, came to be called Pu‘upehe, that was first recorded in 1867 by Walter M. Gibson, then owner of large portions of Lānaʻi, who reportedly learned the account from the chief, Pi‘ianai‘a, who was on Lānaʻi with Kamehameha I.

Gibson published the account under the title of “The Tomb of Puʻupehe, A Legend of Lānaʻi,” in the island newspaper, the Hawaiian Gazette of March 3, 1867.

Observed from the overhanging bluff that overlooks Puʻupehe, upon the summit of this block or elevated islet, would be noticed a small platform formed by a low stone wall. This is said to be the last resting-place of a Hawaiian girl whose body was buried there by her lover Makakēhau, a warrior of Lānaʻi.

Puʻupehe was the daughter of Uaua, a petty chief, one of the dependents of the king of Maui, and she was won by young Makakēhau as the joint prize of love and war. These two are described in the Kanikau, or Lamentation, of Puʻupehe, as mutually captive, the one to the other.

The maiden was a sweet flower of Hawaiian beauty. Her glossy brown, spotless body “shone like the clear sun rising out of Haleakala.” Her flowing, curly hair, bound by a wreath of lehua blossoms, streamed forth as she ran “like the surf crests scudding before the wind.” And the starry eyes of the beautiful daughter of Uaua blinded the young warrior, so that he was called Makakēhau, or Misty Eyes.

He feared that the beauty of his dear captive would cause her to be coveted by the chiefs of the land. His soul yearned to keep her all to himself. He said: “Let us go to the clear waters of Kalulu. There we will fish together for the kala and the aku, and there I will spear the turtle. I will hide you, my beloved, forever in the cave of Malauea.”

“Or, we will dwell together in the great ravine of Palawai, where we will eat the young of the uwau birds, and we will bake them in ki leaf with the sweet pala fern root. The ohelo berries of the mountains will refresh my love. We will drink of the cool waters of Maunalei. I will thatch a hut in the thicket of Kaohai for our resting-place, and we shall love on till the stars die.”

Makakēhau left his love one day in the cave of Malauea while he went to the mountain spring to fill the water-gourds with sweet water. This cavern yawns at the base of the overhanging bluff that overtops the rock of Puʻupehe. The sea surges far within, but there is an inner space which the expert swimmer can reach, and where Puʻupehe had often rested and baked the honu or sea turtle, for her absent lover.

This was the season for the kona, the terrific storm that comes up from the equator and hurls the ocean in increased volume upon the southern shores of the Hawaiian Islands. Makakēhau beheld from the rock springs of Pulou the vanguard of a great kona,—scuds of rain and thick mist, rushing with a howling wind, across the valley of Palawai.

He knew the storm would fill the cave with the sea and kill his love. He flung aside his calabashes of water and ran down the steep, then across the great valley and beyond its rim he rushed, through the bufferings of the storm, with an agonized heart, down the hill slope to the shore.

The sea was up indeed. The yeasty foam of mad surging waves whitened the shore. The thundering buffet of the charging billows chorused with the howl of the tempest. Ah! where should Misty Eyes find his love in this blinding storm? A rushing mountain of sea filled the mouth of Malauea, and the pent-up air hurled back the invading torrent with bubbling roar, blowing forth great streams of spray.

This was a war of matter, a battle of the elements to thrill with pleasure the hearts of strong men. But with one’s love in the seething gulf of the whirlpool, what would be to him the sublime cataract? What, to see amid the boiling foam the upturned face, and the dear, tender body of one’s own and only poor dear love, all mangled? You might agonize on the brink; but Makakēhau sprang into the dreadful pool and snatched his murdered bride from the jaws of an ocean grave.

The next day, fishermen heard the lamentation of Makakēhau, and the women of the valley came down and wailed over Puʻupehe. They wrapped her in bright new kapa. They placed upon her garlands of the fragrant na-u (gardenia). They prepared her for burial, and were about to place her in the burial ground of Manele, but Makakēhau  prayed that he might be left alone one night more with his lost love. And he was left as he desired.

The next day no corpse nor weeping lover were to be found, till after some search Makakēhau  was seen at work piling up stones on the top of the lone sea tower.

The wondering people of Lānaʻi looked on from the neighboring bluff, and some sailed around the base of the columnar rock in their canoes, still wondering, because they could see no way for him to ascend, for every face of the rock is perpendicular or overhanging. The old belief was, that some akua, kanekoa, or keawe-mauhili (deities), came at the cry of Makakēhau and helped him with the dead girl to the top.

When Makakēhau had finished his labors of placing his lost love in her grave and placed the last stone upon it, he stretched out his arms and wailed for Puʻupehe, thus:

“Where are you O Puʻupehe?
Are you in the cave of Malauea?
Shall I bring you sweet water,
The water of the mountain?
Shall I bring the uwau,
The pala, and the ohelo?
Are you baking the honu
And the red sweet hala?
Shall I pound the kalo of Maui?
Shall we dip in the gourd together?
The bird and the fish are bitter,
And the mountain water is sour.
I shall drink it no more;
I shall drink with ʻAipuhi,
The great shark of Manele.”

Ceasing his sad wail, Makakēhau leaped from the rock into the boiling surge at its base, where his body was crushed in the breakers. The people who beheld the sad scene secured the mangled corpse and buried it with respect in the kupapau of Mānele. (This piece is from the story printed in the Hawaiian Gazette in 1867; Halcombe noted – The Tomb of Puʻupehe – Sorrow Without Hope.)

Cautionary Note: An easy walk of about 1.5-miles round trip may be made to view Pu‘upehe, from Hulopo‘e Beach Park. The trail is visible, and follows the basic alignment of the coast. The trail does pass over some areas of rough rocks, and should be traveled with good footwear and care. Most importantly, the trail takes you along the edge of cliffs ranging in height from 10 feet to 200 feet. Do not approach the cliff side.  (Note the 6-feet wide, 21-feet long and 3-feet high structure at the top.)

The image shows Puʻupehe In addition, I have added other images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Lānaʻihale

The island of Lānaʻi was made by a single shield volcano between 1- and 1.5-million years ago, forming a classic example of a Hawaiian shield volcano with a gently sloping profile.  (SOEST)

The island of Lānaʻi is about 13-miles long and 13-miles wide; with an overall land area of approximately 90,000-acres, it is the sixth largest of the eight major Hawaiian Islands.

Lānaʻi has thirteen ahupua‘a (native land divisions), three of which are fairly unique in the larger island group, as they cross the entire island from Kona (leeward) to Koʻolau (windward) regions.

The tallest peak on Lānaʻi is Lānaʻihale.

The name of the summit is associated with the traditional story of a young chief, Kauluaʻau, son of Aliʻi nui Kākaʻalaneo, a ruler of Maui during the early-1400s.

Kauluaʻau, because of his misdeeds (pulling up breadfruit plantings) in Lāhainā, was banished to Lānaʻi (then known as Kaulahea.) (Maly)

At that time, Lānaʻi was known for being haunted by ghosts. This summit area is where the ghosts of Lānaʻi would gather. The story recounts Kaululaʻau’s plot to kill the ghosts.

According to the account, Kauluaʻau built a house on the summit of Lānaʻi and held a housewarming party, and invited the ghosts.  When they entered the house, Kauluaʻau killed the ghosts and ridded Lānaʻi of their presence.

This story serves as the basis for the name of the island, Lānaʻi (day of victory, day of conquest,) as well as the name of the summit, Lānaʻihale (house of Lānaʻi.)  (Maly, PBS)

“The land rises with an ascent more or less steep … all around the island, and is at first dry and rocky, with an abundance of thatching pili. A mile or two up it becomes smoother, and patches of brushes appear, and vegetation generally is more luxuriant.”

“Higher up small trees grow, and on the very top of the island, timber is found for good-sized native houses.” (The Polynesian, August 6, 1853; Lānaʻi Culture & Heritage Center)

To get there, you travel on the Munro Trail, a single-lane dirt road (with periodic pull-outs) built in 1955 (generally running north-south and follows a traditional foot trail, later used by island cowboys as a horse trail before improvement as a road.)

It was named after the former ranch manager, George C Munro, who was responsible for planting the numerous Cook Island pines in the summit region.

“At the very summit of the island, which is generally shrouded in mist, we came upon what Gibson (an early (1861) Mormon missionary to the islands) called his lake - a little shallow pond, about the size of a dining table.”

“In the driest times there was always water here, and one of the regular summer duties of the Chinese cook was to take a pack mule and a couple of kegs and go up to the lake for water.”  (Lydgate, Thrum)

Sitting in the rain shadow of Maui, Lānaʻi has always been stressed for want of water.  It was a lone Norfolk Island Pine, planted by Walter M Gibson at Koele in 1878, that in 1911, alerted Munro to the importance of the fog coming off of Lānaʻihale as a producer of valuable water in the form of fog (cloud) drip.

Hearing the constant drip of water on the corrugated roof of the ranch house situated alongside the Norfolk Pine, Munro realized that the pine boughs collected water from the fog and clouds.

As a result, Munro initiated a program of planting pines across the island.  (Lanai Culture & Heritage Center)

Munro ordered seeds for Norfolk Pines (he received Cook Island Pine seeds instead) and by 1913, initiated a tree planting program on Lānaʻihale, and outer slopes of the island.

In 1956, Hawaiian Pineapple Company ran catchment experiments, and found that in a 24 hour period, one pine tree could produce 240 gallons of water from fog-drip.

This upland area contains most of the remaining native dominated forest and is habitat for the ʻuaʻu (Hawaiian petrel,) ʻapapane and rare land snails.  (DLNR)  A large colony of the Hawaiian petrel is known to exist near the summit of Lānaʻihale.

The name of the nearby peak of Haʻalelepaʻakai (salt left behind or discarded) relates to a story of two fishermen who come across from Maui, laden down with their fishing gear and salt.

Early in the morning, they rose up to this second summit and look down into Palawai Basin, and they could see a bed of white “Ae no ka paʻakai” (There’s salt down there.)

So they decided to throw away their salt away at the summit and planned to gather the salt below. They made it down, they found that the salt was gone (what they saw from the summit was mist.) (Maly, PBS)

The image shows Lānaʻi and Lānaʻihale.  In addition, I have included other images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Google+ page.

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Moku

Prior to European contact, each of the major islands or independent chiefdoms in the Hawaiian chain comprised a mokupuni (island.) Over the centuries, as the ancient Hawaiian population grew, land use and resource management also evolved.

The traditional land division of pre-contact Hawaiians was based on the sustainability and self-reliance within ahupuaʻa (community watershed areas) as well as within larger regions (moku) and lastly individual sovereign islands (mokupuni.)

The mokupuni were subdivided into land units of varying sizes, and the largest division was the moku (district - literally: interior island,) administered by high-ranking chiefs.

They were either relatives of the high chief of the island, trusted supporters or high ranking individuals who pledged their support to the high chief but were allowed to remain relatively independent.

Each island was divided into several moku or districts, of which there are six in the island of Hawaiʻi, and the same number in Oʻahu. There is a district called Kona on the lee side and one called Koʻolau on the windward side of almost every island.  (Alexander)

It appears that the six districts on the islands of O‘ahu and Hawai‘i, and the system of developing smaller manageable units of land became formalized in the reigns of Māʻilikūkahi and ʻUmi-a-Līloa, respectively (about the time Columbus was sailing across the Atlantic.)

Māʻilikūkahi is noted for clearly marking and reorganizing land division palena (boundaries) on O‘ahu.  Palena, or possibly an evolved term “palena ʻāina” are place boundaries.  (Beamer)

Defined palena brought greater productivity to the lands; lessened conflict and was a means of settling disputes of future aliʻi who would be in control of the bounded lands; protected the commoners from the chiefs; and brought (for the most part) peace and prosperity.

Fornander writes, "He caused the island to be thoroughly surveyed, and boundaries between differing divisions and lands be definitely and permanently marked out, thus obviating future disputes between neighboring chiefs and landholders."

Kamakau tells a similar story, "When the kingdom passed to Māʻilikūkahi, the land divisions were in a state of confusion; the ahupuaʻa, the ku, the ʻili ʻāina, the moʻo ʻāina, the pauku ʻāina, and the kihapai were not clearly defined.”

“Therefore, Māʻilikūkahi ordered the chiefs, aliʻi, the lesser chiefs, kaukau aliʻi, the warrior chiefs, puʻali aliʻi, and the overseers (luna) to divide all of Oʻahu into moku, ahupuaʻa, ʻili kupono, ʻili ʻāina, and moʻo ʻāina."

Malo gives a detailed description of the kuleana that a kālaimoku aliʻi who divided lands for Mōʻī had to fulfill:  “There are two important aspects in being a kālaimoku, to take care of the aliʻi, and to take care of the makaʻāinana, for these two reasons the kālaimoku guides the aliʻi at his side, with the careful attention to these two things, things were to be done properly.”  (Malo, Beamer)

What is commonly referred to as the “ahupuaʻa system” is a result of the firm establishment of palena (boundaries.)  This system of land divisions and boundaries enabled a konohiki (land/resource manager) to know the limits and productivity of the resources that they managed.

In the late-1400s, through warfare and alliances with other chiefs, ʻUmi gained control of the entire Island of Hawaiʻi. ʻUmi made himself the aliʻi nui, or high chief, for the whole island.

ʻUmi divided his island into separate moku, or districts. These moku were subdivided into smaller sections called ahupuaʻa.

In the time of ʻUmi, son of the great chief Līloa, the Hawaiian islands were divided into political regions. The four mokupuni (larger islands) of Kauaʻi, Oʻahu, Maui, and Hawaiʻi were divided into moku (districts).

The smaller islands of Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi and Kahoʻolawe became moku of Maui, and Niʻihau a moku of Kauaʻi.

Traditionally, the Island of Kaua‘i was divided into five moku (districts): Haleleʻa, Kona, Koʻolau, Nāpali and Puna. However, after the battle of Wahiawa in 1824, the land of Kaua‘i was redistributed and district boundaries changed. The new district names became: Hanalei, Kawaihau, Līhuʻe, Kōloa and Waimea.  (Cultural Surveys)

For ease in collecting annual tribute, the moku were subdivided into ahupuaʻa, land sections that usually extended from the mountain summits down through fertile valleys to the outer edge of the reef in the sea (or if there was not reef, one-mile from shore.)

The size of the ahupuaʻa depended on the resources of the area with poorer agricultural regions split into larger ahupuaʻa to compensate for the relative lack of natural abundance. Each ahupuaʻa was ruled by an aliʻi or local chief and administered by a konohiki.

These natural land divisions were the result of the flow of water over the land (streams or springs.)

From the earliest days, streams were among the most important natural resources sought after by native Hawaiians. Battles were fought and lives sacrificed for the right to use stream water.

The Hawaiians called freshwater wai, and considered it to be sacred. People using wai from streams took only what was absolutely necessary. They were expected to share the wai with others. This was done without greed or selfishness.

Such practices gave Hawaiians their word for law which is kanawai, or the "equal sharing of water." Water was so valuable to Hawaiians that they used the word "wai" to indicate wealth. Thus to signify abundance and prosperity, Hawaiians would say waiwai.

In keeping with this concept of wealth being fresh water, the traditional land tenure system in ancient Hawaii had at its very core the presence of streams, or kahawai. Although of many shapes and sizes, each ahupua'a consisted of three area types: mountain, plain and sea.

The image shows the Moku of Oʻahu (ksbe.) In addition, I have added other related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

Follow Peter T Young on Facebook  Moku

Prior to European contact, each of the major islands or independent chiefdoms in the Hawaiian chain comprised a mokupuni (island.) Over the centuries, as the ancient Hawaiian population grew, land use and resource management also evolved.

The traditional land division of pre-contact Hawaiians was based on the sustainability and self-reliance within ahupuaʻa (community watershed areas) as well as within larger regions (moku) and lastly individual sovereign islands (mokupuni.)

The mokupuni were subdivided into land units of varying sizes, and the largest division was the moku (district - literally: interior island,) administered by high-ranking chiefs.

They were either relatives of the high chief of the island, trusted supporters or high ranking individuals who pledged their support to the high chief but were allowed to remain relatively independent.

Each island was divided into several moku or districts, of which there are six in the island of Hawaiʻi, and the same number in Oʻahu. There is a district called Kona on the lee side and one called Koʻolau on the windward side of almost every island.  (Alexander)

It appears that the six districts on the islands of O‘ahu and Hawai‘i, and the system of developing smaller manageable units of land became formalized in the reigns of Māʻilikūkahi and ʻUmi-a-Līloa, respectively (about the time Columbus was sailing across the Atlantic.)

Māʻilikūkahi is noted for clearly marking and reorganizing land division palena (boundaries) on O‘ahu.  Palena, or possibly an evolved term “palena ʻāina” are place boundaries.  (Beamer)

Defined palena brought greater productivity to the lands; lessened conflict and was a means of settling disputes of future aliʻi who would be in control of the bounded lands; protected the commoners from the chiefs; and brought (for the most part) peace and prosperity.

Fornander writes, "He caused the island to be thoroughly surveyed, and boundaries between differing divisions and lands be definitely and permanently marked out, thus obviating future disputes between neighboring chiefs and landholders."

Kamakau tells a similar story, "When the kingdom passed to Māʻilikūkahi, the land divisions were in a state of confusion; the ahupuaʻa, the ku, the ʻili ʻāina, the moʻo ʻāina, the pauku ʻāina, and the kihapai were not clearly defined.”

“Therefore, Māʻilikūkahi ordered the chiefs, aliʻi, the lesser chiefs, kaukau aliʻi, the warrior chiefs, puʻali aliʻi, and the overseers (luna) to divide all of Oʻahu into moku, ahupuaʻa, ʻili kupono, ʻili ʻāina, and moʻo ʻāina."

Malo gives a detailed description of the kuleana that a kālaimoku aliʻi who divided lands for Mōʻī had to fulfill:  “There are two important aspects in being a kālaimoku, to take care of the aliʻi, and to take care of the makaʻāinana, for these two reasons the kālaimoku guides the aliʻi at his side, with the careful attention to these two things, things were to be done properly.”  (Malo, Beamer)

What is commonly referred to as the “ahupuaʻa system” is a result of the firm establishment of palena (boundaries.)  This system of land divisions and boundaries enabled a konohiki (land/resource manager) to know the limits and productivity of the resources that they managed.

In the late-1400s, through warfare and alliances with other chiefs, ʻUmi gained control of the entire Island of Hawaiʻi. ʻUmi made himself the aliʻi nui, or high chief, for the whole island.

ʻUmi divided his island into separate moku, or districts. These moku were subdivided into smaller sections called ahupuaʻa.

In the time of ʻUmi, son of the great chief Līloa, the Hawaiian islands were divided into political regions. The four mokupuni (larger islands) of Kauaʻi, Oʻahu, Maui, and Hawaiʻi were divided into moku (districts).

The smaller islands of Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi and Kahoʻolawe became moku of Maui, and Niʻihau a moku of Kauaʻi.

Traditionally, the Island of Kaua‘i was divided into five moku (districts): Haleleʻa, Kona, Koʻolau, Nāpali and Puna. However, after the battle of Wahiawa in 1824, the land of Kaua‘i was redistributed and district boundaries changed. The new district names became: Hanalei, Kawaihau, Līhuʻe, Kōloa and Waimea.  (Cultural Surveys)

For ease in collecting annual tribute, the moku were subdivided into ahupuaʻa, land sections that usually extended from the mountain summits down through fertile valleys to the outer edge of the reef in the sea (or if there was not reef, one-mile from shore.)

The size of the ahupuaʻa depended on the resources of the area with poorer agricultural regions split into larger ahupuaʻa to compensate for the relative lack of natural abundance. Each ahupuaʻa was ruled by an aliʻi or local chief and administered by a konohiki.

These natural land divisions were the result of the flow of water over the land (streams or springs.)

From the earliest days, streams were among the most important natural resources sought after by native Hawaiians. Battles were fought and lives sacrificed for the right to use stream water.

The Hawaiians called freshwater wai, and considered it to be sacred. People using wai from streams took only what was absolutely necessary. They were expected to share the wai with others. This was done without greed or selfishness.

Such practices gave Hawaiians their word for law which is kanawai, or the "equal sharing of water." Water was so valuable to Hawaiians that they used the word "wai" to indicate wealth. Thus to signify abundance and prosperity, Hawaiians would say waiwai.

In keeping with this concept of wealth being fresh water, the traditional land tenure system in ancient Hawaii had at its very core the presence of streams, or kahawai. Although of many shapes and sizes, each ahupua'a consisted of three area types: mountain, plain and sea.

The image shows the Moku of Oʻahu (ksbe.) In addition, I have added other related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

Follow Peter T Young on Facebook  

Follow Peter T Young on Google+    

© 2014 Hoʻokuleana LLC

The Mormon Mission

New England Congregationalists first brought Protestant Christianity to the Islands in 1820.  Roman Catholic missionaries came to Hawaiʻi in 1827.  Quakers came in 1835; Methodists came in 1855 and members of the Church of England arrived in 1862.

As early as 1844, missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (popularly called the Mormons or LDS Church) were working among the Polynesians in Tahiti and surrounding islands.

"The Mormons are said to have commenced their mission in 1850. Their converts are scattered over all the islands.   They number about nine per cent of all those who in the census returns have reported their religious affiliations.  This mission owns a small sugar plantation at Laie, on the island of Oʻahu."  (The Friend, December 1902)

The Church traces its beginnings to Joseph Smith, Jr.  On April 6, 1830 in Western New York, Smith and five others incorporated The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Fayette, New York.

In the summer of 1850, in California, elder Charles C Rich called together more elders to establish a mission in the Sandwich Islands.  They arrived December 12, 1850.  Later, more came.

The first gathering place for Mormon missionaries was established in the Palawai Basin on the island of Lānaʻi, in 1854.  By 1855, the church claimed about 4,650 Hawaiian converts with more than 50 organized congregations scattered through several villages in the Islands.

In 1855, a Hawaiian edition of the Book of Mormon was printed through the help of George Q. Cannon, William Farrer and a native Hawaiian named Jonatana H. Napela.  (Mormonism Research Ministry)

In March 1865, Brigham Young (President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1847 until his death in 1877,) in a letter to King Kamehameha V, requested permission to locate an agricultural colony in Lāʻie. The king granted his request.

That year, Mormon missionaries (Francis Asbury Hammond and George Nebeker) purchased 6,000-acres of the ahupuaʻa of Laiewai to Laiemaloʻo (in Koʻolauloa) from Mr. Thomas T Dougherty for the Mormon Church.

One thousand acres were arable the remaining land was used for woodland and pasture for 500-head of cattle, 500-sheep, 200-goats and 25-horses (which were all included in the price ($14,000.))

At the time, sugar production was growing in scale; in addition to farming for food for the mission, the Lāʻie land was considered to have a good potential for growing sugar cane.

In 1867, the first sugar cane was planted; in 1868 a mule-powered mill was installed.  This provided income and financial sustainability.  A new mill was built in 1881 and production increased.  Sugar provided the positive economic impact and gave financial support to the Mormon Church in Hawaiʻi.

The sugar produced at the mill had to be transferred by oxen teams to a landing where it was placed on a small boat carried through the surf and loaded on a steamship for transport to JT Waterhouse Company, agent of the plantation, in Honolulu.

Part of the area of the plantation now serves as the location for the Hawaiʻi Temple, the campus of Brigham Young University-Hawaii and one of the most popular locations in Hawaiʻi for visitors, the Polynesian Culture Center.

On October 16, 1875, the Mormon Church organized Brigham Young Academy at Provo, Utah. It eventually became Brigham Young University.  On September 26, 1955, the Mormons started the two-year "Church College of Hawaiʻi" (CCH) in Lāʻie in war surplus buildings with 153 students and 20 faculty/administrators.

In 1889, several Hawaiian members of the Mormon faith were interested in being closer to the temples and headquarters of the Church in Utah and left Hawaiʻi and established the Iosepa Colony in Tooele County's Skull Valley.

"Iosepa," meaning Joseph in Hawaiian and named for the Mormon prophet Joseph Smith and for Joseph F Smith, who went to the Hawaiian Islands as a missionary in 1854.

Former Queen Liliʻuokalani was baptized a member of the LDS Church on July 7, 1906.

The LDS Temple in Lāʻie - started in 1915 and dedicated on Thanksgiving Day 1919 - was the first such temple to be built outside of continental North America.  The 47,224-square-foot temple’s exterior is concrete made of crushed lava rock from the area and tooled to a white cream finish.  It attracted more islanders from throughout the South Pacific.

Utah’s Iosepa Colony lasted as a community until 1917, at which time the residents returned to Hawaiʻi where the Hawaiian Mormon Temple was under construction.

By the 1920s, LDS Church missionaries had carried their Christian teachings to all the major island groups of Polynesia, by living among the people and speaking their languages.

In 1960, CCH students performed in "The Polynesian Panorama" at the Kaiser Dome in Waikīkī (this program was the forerunner to the performances at Polynesian Cultural Center.) Then in 1963, the Polynesian Cultural Center opened in Lāʻie.  On April 13, 1974, Church College of Hawaiʻi was renamed Brigham Young University-Hawaiʻi Campus.

There are now over 71,000-Mormons living in Hawaiʻi, or about 5 percent of the overall population.  There are 135 congregations, two temples and 25-Family Centers.

Worldwide Church membership today is over 14-million; 52,000-Mormon missionaries are currently serving in 350 missions.

The image shows some of the early Mormon missionaries at Lāʻie (EnvisionLaie.)  In addition, I have included other related images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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Walter Murray Gibson

Walter Murray Gibson was born at sea, the son of English emigrants, en route to the United States (March 6, 1822.)  His early years were spent in New York, New Jersey and South Carolina; and his youthful imagination was kindled into a flame of romantic ambition by tales of the East Indies.  (Kuykendall)

While still a young man, he had been imprisoned by the Dutch in Java for more than a year, found guilty of plotting to stir up a rebellion against their rule. From that time in 1850-51 he had carried a dream of becoming the savior of the island races of Oceania, of gaining power to rescue them from the misrule of their white masters.  (Adler – Kamins)

In 1861, he came to Hawaiʻi after joining the Mormon Church the year before; he was to serve as a missionary and envoy of the Mormon Church to the peoples of the Pacific Ocean.  He landed in Lānaʻi and eventually created the title "Chief President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Islands of the Sea."  He more regularly went by the name Kipikona.

The experience with the Church was relatively short-lived; in 1864, he was excommunicated for selling priesthood offices, defrauding the Hawaiian members and misusing his ecclesiastical authority (in part, he was using church funds to buy land in his name.)

By the 1870s, Gibson focused his interests in ranching in the area called Koele, situated in a sheltered valley in the uplands of Kamoku Ahupuaʻa. As the ranch operation was developed, Koele was transformed from an area of traditional residency and sustainable agriculture to the ranch headquarters.  (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)

Herds of sheep were managed from Koele, and during shipping season, wool and mutton for the meat markets in Honolulu, were shipped from the coastal village of Awalua, at the northern end of the island. (Lānaʻi Culture and Heritage Center)

In 1872, Gibson moved from Lānaʻi to Lāhainā and then to Honolulu.

He established a small bilingual newspaper, Ka Nuhou (News,) and wrote, edited and ran it for 14-months (1873-1874.)   It grew in circulation to about 5,000, double the size of any other Hawaiian language periodical to and for the Hawaiian people.  Its slogan was – Hawaiʻi for the Hawaiians.

Not everyone enjoyed its content.  “The Nuhou is scurrilous and diverting, and appears 'run' with a special object, which I have not as yet succeeded in unraveling from its pungent but not always intelligible pages.”  (Isabella Bird)

He denounced, as enemies of the kingdom, those who favored ceding Pearl Harbor to the US as an inducement to enter into the reciprocity treaty with Hawaiʻi so eagerly sought by the sugar planters to gain access to the American market.  (Adler – Kamins)

He used the newspaper to support, first, Lunalilo, then, King Kalākaua in their election campaigns.

Following that, he ran for political office and served in the House of Representatives, representing Maui (the only haole in the 27-member Legislative Assembly - 1878-1882.)

He made his way to become as Finance Committee Chairman and under his leadership allocations of public funds showed his concern for the national pride of Hawaiians: $500 to Henri Berger, leader of the Hawaiian Band, for composing the music for Hawaii Ponoʻi, the new national anthem; $10,000 for a bronze statue of Kamehameha I; and $50,000 to begin construction of a new ʻIolani Palace, to house King Kalākaua and Queen Kapiʻolani, and all their successors. (Adler – Kamins)

Public service did not stop there.  He was later Member of Privy Council and Board of Health (1880, Health President 1882;) Commissioner of Crown Lands (1882;) Board of Education, President (1883;) Attorney General (1883;) House of Nobles (1882-1886;) Secretary of War & Navy (1886;) Premier and Minister of the Interior (1886) and Minister of Foreign Affairs (1882-1887.)

In his new capacities, Gibson’s first notable accomplishment was his development of a new monetary system for the island nation.  The new money was printed in San Francisco and the bills featured Kalākaua.  This was followed by the creation of a postal system; Gibson himself designed and printed the postage stamps for the Hawaiian kingdom.  (Lowe)

Then, the good times ended.  “A conspiracy against the peace of the Hawaiian Kingdom had been taking shape since early spring.”  (Liliʻuokalani)  In 1887, the struggle for control of Hawaiʻi was at its height as David Kalākaua was elected to the throne. But the businessmen were distrustful of him.

“So the mercantile element, as embodied in the Chamber of Commerce, the sugar planters, and the proprietors of the "missionary" stores, formed a distinct political party, called the "down-town" party, whose purpose was to minimize or entirely subvert other interests, and especially the prerogatives of the crown, which, based upon ancient custom and the authority of the island chiefs, were the sole guaranty of our nationality.”  (Liliʻuokalani)

The Hawaiian League (aka Committee of Thirteen, Committee of Public Safety & Annexation Club) were unhappy with the rule of Kalākaua and used threats to force the king to adopt a new constitution.  The Hawaiian League came into control of the Honolulu Rifles (made of about 200 armed men.)  The Hawaiian League used the Rifles to force King Kalākaua to enact the Bayonet Constitution.  (Kukendall)

On July 1, Kalākaua asked his entire cabinet to resign.  Gibson, a strong and vocal supporter of the King was also an early target.  He was captured by the Honolulu Rifles and almost lynched; instead, he was banished from the Islands.

He left Honolulu on July 12, 1887 on the sugar freighter JD Spreckels and arriving in San Francisco on August 6, 1887.  He spent the following five months in and out of St Mary’s Hospital and died January 21, 1888 of tuberculosis of the lungs.

When his body was returned to Honolulu, he lay in state and thousands lined up to view his remains through a windowed coffin.  “The place has been thronged with visitors, many of whom were natives, who expressed a kindly aloha for the departed Premier.”  (Daily Bulletin, February 18, 1888)

The image shows Walter Murray Gibson.  In addition, I have included other images in a folder of like name in the Photos section on my Facebook and Google+ pages.

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© 2013 Hoʻokuleana LLC