The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-05-26
HAWAII IS THE
PIVOTAL SPOT
Frederic Haskin Tells of Its
Place in the Midst of
Things.
advertiser Correspondence, Copyright
by Frederic j. Easkin.)

tAdVefLlSer correspondence, copyright
by Frederic j. Easkin.l
HONOLULU, T. H., May 10.-Take a
map of the Pacific Ocean and draw
lines across it from principal ports in
both Americas to principal ports in Asia
and the Islands of the Seas. Where
these lines cross you will find Hawaii
the Crossroads of the Pacific. And,
incidentally, you viii: have made a |
homemade map of the very kind that
every visitor to Honolulu is confronted
with every time he meets an agent of
the Promotion Committee, which is to
say every time he meets anybody at all. !
The United States as a whole may not
yet realize how rare and precious is this
chain of jewels of the sea that has
shaken off the old name OF Sandwich
Islands, but the islanders realize it to
the full. They know that the value of
Hawaii is not to be calculated by square
miles of territory. They don't discuss
area. But when it comes to strategic |
maps and applied geography the Ha- |
walian is on the job.
Honolulu, which is the great port of |
the Hawaiian Islands, is a little more |
than 2000 miles from anywhere that |
anybody ever hears about or goes to. |
To the unthinking that fact may mean |!
a disadvantage, but Hawaii knows the /
contrary. Ships sail by island ports
which are close to the mainland, but /
they are glad to stop ins good harbor |
when two or three thousand miles out |
on a six or ten thousand mile voyage. |
Being a place for ships to stop made |
Honolulu in the old days of the whaling |
industry, and it did not suffer from the |
overthrow of the sperm candle by the |
oil lamp, for it found great profit in
dropping humps of sugar into the
world s coffee cup. But that was
business which concerned only Hawaii,
for the world doesn t ask whether it's
morning sugar lump comes from Hawaii
or Cuba or Java.
Things are beginning to change now,
and Honolulu knows that it will not be
long before the whole United States will
wake up to the fact that the Territory
of Hawaii is right in the middle of the /
game. This same United States is
spending some untold millions to cut a
ditch across the Panama Canal Why2
To facilitate trade in the Pacific Ocean.
This same United States is showing the
world that the American trade and
prestige in the Pacific is to be guarded.
No one supposes that the United States
is going to permit any of it's Pacific
prestige to be taken away and every
body ought to know that American
trade in the great ocean will be extend
ed if human means and Yankee wit can
accomplish it.
Where will the American battleships
stop on their way across the Pacific?
Honolulu. Where will the merchant YES
the Orient put in2 Honolulu. Where
will the great stream of traffic that will
burst through from the Atlantic when
the ditch is dug first touch? Honolulu.
Where will be the great American naval
base in the Pacinc9 Pearl Harbor,
which is seven miles from Honolulu.
Where will be the great military out
post which will be the buffer between
rising Oriental ambition and the
of American dominion in
the Pacifc2 Honolulu. Where will be
the great American empire s rendezvous
"a Malta and Gibraltar in ones Homo
lulu.
The Hawaiians have been out here in
the Pacific watching things and they
knew the answer to all these questions
long ago. They urged them upon an I'M
willing American government for years
when they were begging to be annexed.
One bright May morning Uncle Sam
woke up to find a brown baby on his
doorstep. The Philippines came by the
accident of fate, and Congress at last
was persuaded that Hawaii might be
worth while as a stop-Over on the way
ont. Therefore Hawaii was gathered
into the fold by joint resolution and,
by most of the peOnle, promptly forgot.
That was only ten years ago. What
now? There is a storm brewing In the
Orient which will make the little scrap
of 1895 fade into a children's quarrel.
If Hawaii was necessary TO America for
such little affair as the brush with the
Filipinos, how much more valuable will
it be when there is a man s fight accom-
ing9 Ten years ago Europe laughed at
the little American navy. 1t was good
enough to get the best of Spain, all
right, but America woke up to the fact
that it wasn't good for much more.
There wasn't much fuss about it as it
went along, but the United States
turned TO navy building. Now it has
the greatest fleet in the Pacific in the
history of that ocean. it has navy
which ranks second in the world in size
and first in relative efficiency, and there
is a fleet left on the Atlantic seaboard
l l. i