The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1904-12-13
LOOKING BACKWARD.

! The reader of Mr.. Nordhoff's articles
on Hawaii. first published over thirty
i one years ago, viii find that disbelief
in the agricultural capabilities of this
| group extended at that time to sugar
! cane and coffee. Sugar cane, Mr.. Nord-
hon said. had not entirely failed; yet
when you hear of plantations which
| cost $50, 900 sold by the Sheriff for si5,-
600 or of plantations which cost $780,
600 bought in for $4,000 and hardly pay
ing a profit on even this minor sum,
you will scarcely regard this industry
&C thriving ONE And he added in
quotation: There is scarcely a planta-
ton of sugar which has not ruined the
first and sometimes the second own
ers.'' Already the borer was at work
and cane. Mr.. Nordhoff said, had be-
gun to suffer from worm which eats
out the pith near the ground and thus
destroys the whole cane" Surely the
conditions were very bad and Mr.. Nord- |
hoff felt justified in warning people to
Keep away w hdl - CC1 tc1t14J S7cSAo
he, sis that these islands. aside from ,
their fine climate, have absolutely moth
ing to tempt our own people to live
on them or to invest money in them"
This was in August, 1873. Two years
later 25,Os0.1S2 pounds of sugar We're
produced in Hawaii, valued at S1,216.-
3Ss. Five years after that, in 1880. the
weight of the manufactured product
bad risen to 81, 5S4,S71 pounds and the
value to 1892, III. In 1885 the figures
were 1885, 14 and the value 1886, 061.
I'm 1890 Hawaii yielded 259. 7S9, 462 pounds
Of sugar worth s12. 1855; and so on up
to the crop of 1903, which was 1926
100 pounds, valued at s25,31o,6S4 Cof-
fee in the meantime product for
which Mr.. Nordhon said there was no
1ope-became large and healthy crop.
ne business finally falling off, not be-
;ause of pests, but for reason that the
market price of coffee went suddenly
Town.
Why was there such a failure in the
lire sugar predictions OF 1873? 1t was :
simply because intelligent men took
Iold of the cane industry and applied
cience to it. They demonstrated that :
n spite of the borer, cane could be
,roftably grown; and when the reci-
rocity treaty was signed they enlisted
he best talent they could find to pro-
ect the fields while they went ahead
n cultivating and reapfng them and 7
Milling the crop. The result was to
make Hawaii in the course of few i
ears the richest country per capita
n the face of the globe.
What Mr.. Nordhof said of sugar and 4
Office nearly generation ago was also
aid of most other agricultural prod :
lets except sweet potatoes and taro.
else was doomed, even the 6
orests were perishfng; there was no .
nance for the small or general farmer
he gifted writer even advised against
aising cattle because--and how ia
1iliar it all sounds; like Star editorial
because tneFe is no marker IOr peel 9
nd mutton"
But see how the prophet has been f,
onfounded- General agriculture has +,
one on into sisal bananas, pineap- n
les. fruit, poultry, hogs. honey, graz r
lg and mich cattle and is finding it's ',
Fay toward tobacco, rubber, vanilla, b
line grapes. cocoa and lines; while the
hinese and Japanese are raising nearly u
II the vegetables we eat. Hawaii, de- "
pite the knockers, who still exist; de- n
pite the planters and graziers who n
rant all the land; despite a govern o
lent which has little more faith in di- =
ersifed farming than Nordhoff had in /
lgar-Hawaii is slowly but surely be-
oming country OF varied and profit
bic agriculture. By the time another
iirty-one years passes this paper ex-
ects that the Territory, will not only
led itself and a vastly greater popu- |
,tion, but will export all the commodi-
es commonly raised in this latitude. /