HAWAII: The Land & the People

Hawaii: subtropical archipelago of 20 volcano-born islands (only eight are inhabited), 2,400 miles west of San Francisco, 6,435 sq. mi. in area (size of Rhode Island and Connecticut together), spread over 1,600 mi. of the mid-Pacific. Included in the 50th state: inhabited islands of Hawaii, Oahu, Kahoolawe, Lanai, Maui, Molokai, Kauai, Niihau. Mean temp. 74DEG, annual precipitation ranging from a low of 14 in. on the moonlike volcanic coast of the "Big Island" of Hawaii to the U.S.'s highest of 471 in. on the lush island of Kauai. Agricultural economy ($302 million a year from little more than 300,000 acres): sugar (1,000,000 tons annually; $150 million), pineapple (30 million cases; $115 million), tourist attractions (175,000 visitors a year; $65 million), coffee, oranges, beef, coconuts, 900 species of flowering plants and trees. U.S. military forces (60,000) deployed in complex of airfields, Navy and Army bases (Hickam Air Force Base, Pearl Harbor, Schofield Barracks). Pop. 600,000: Japanese (38%), Caucasian (20%), part-Hawaiian (15%), Filipino (13%), Chinese (7%), pure Hawaiian (3%), Puerto Rican and Korean.

CAPTAIN JAMES COOK dubbed the archipelago the "Sandwich Islands" when he dropped anchor off Kauai in 1778, got a god's welcome from thousands of handsome Polynesians again when he returned the following year, then was killed by natives during a fight over petty thievery. By 1796, the islands were under the firm, beneficent rule of King Kamehameha I. who united the land after ten years of civil war among smaller chieftains, and began turning his domain into a thriving nation. After his death in 1819, his son Liholiho (Kamehameha II) took over, began the systematic abandonment of old taboos and island traditions.

Meanwhile, 5,000 miles away, another young Hawaiian was the accidental agent who evoked new tradition and new standards. He was Opukahaia, taken to New Haven, Conn, by a sea captain in 1809. One day Opukahaia was found weeping on the steps of Yale College, lamenting his ignorance. Sympathetic college students tutored him, and soon he became an ardent Christian; he died of typhus before he could return to the islands. The story of Opukahaia inspired the organization of the Sandwich Islands Mission, and in October 1819 seven New England families, singing When Shall We All Meet Again, set sail for Hawaii in the brig Thaddeus.

Shirts & Sugar. They arrived six months later, and, with the King's reluctant permission, set up Protestant missions, devised a Hawaiian alphabet, soon printed a speller, began teaching eager natives, turned out countless yards of cambric Mother Hubbards, shirts and suits (the King ordered a dozen fancy shirts and a broadcloth jacket), promoted monogamy, introduced the spare, hardy architecture of New England whaling ports. A few years later Kamehameha III signed the "Hawaiian Magna Charta," thus paved the way for parliamentary government.

The missionary work was declared officially completed by 1863, but many of the missionary families stayed on, opened the second great epoch of Hawaii's history, founded families of growing influence. Trade prospered as huge sugar fields spread across the flatlands and mountainsides; captains of trade were the so-called "Big Five"--massive trading, shipping and factoring companies. The economy boomed, while more and more the prosperous agriculturists imported fresh shiploads of Japanese and Chinese labor. The influx, guided by the paternalistic Big Five, began subtly to change the island character as intermarriages produced new breeds of natives, new workers for the fields, new artisans, professional people and politicians.

Svengali & Scandals. Yet, as Hawaii's economy grew, her political structure shook. The French and British poised time and again to annex the islands. (The British actually did, abortively, for five months in 1863, which accounts for the Union Jack influence in the island flag.) Desperately, Kamehameha III appealed to the U.S. for annexation as a state, but failed.

When King Kalakaua--the "Merry Monarch,'' elected by the legislature two years after the end of the Kamehameha dynasty--ratified a reciprocal trade treaty with the U.S. in 1875, Hawaii boomed in earnest. But then, embroiled with a corrupt legislature and a Svengali-like adventurer, Kalakaua lost his grip; scandals raged as the spendthrift King kicked the public debt from $388,000 to $2,600,000 until, in 1887, he was forced to sign a new constitution stripping himself of his near-totalitarian powers.

Hawaii's last monarch was Queen Liliuokalani, the buxom, strong-willed sister of Kalakaua, and, like her brother, a cultivated personage (poet, musician, composer of the famed Aloha Oe). Tough-minded Liliuokalani tried to overthrow the constitution as Hawaii plummeted into the depression that followed President McKinley's punishing tariff law on sugar. Around the rugged Queen grew secret societies such as the Annexation Club, and finally, in 1893, a Committee of Safety took possession of the government office building, formed a republic, applied to the U.S. for annexation. Five years later, to the sound of a 21-gun salute from shore batteries and from the U.S.S. Philadelphia, the Hawaiian Islands became part of the American republic.

Solvency & Syllables. With stability finally assured, Hawaii's vigorous culture sank new roots. In the New Deal days came the rise of unionism and of Red-lining Harry Bridges, who won control of Hawaii's longshoremen, pineapple and sugar workers. Though Hawaiian labor made needed gains, Bridges' ironhanded control of the island economy posed a new threat; it lasts, somewhat diluted, even today, in an uneasy peace between the unions and industry.

Little else disturbs the bustling, multiracial complex of Hawaii today. Even racial tension, in a spot where there are no fewer than 64 crossbreeds of humans, is less worrisome than that in the U.S. South; Hawaii's intensely loyal 185,000 Japanese sent thousands of their sons to war after Pearl Harbor, and they won a proud record. Bolstered by a high literacy rate, steady solvency (U.S. tax revenues for fiscal 1958: $166 million), a dedicated interest in government (average turnout at the polls: 90% v. 60% mainland presidential peak), the fabled land of polysyllabic kings, brown-skinned women and languorous beauty--supercharged with its brilliant mosaic of cultures--has now opened the door on a new epoch for itself.

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