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1920: Pineapples
The drawing above chronicles Honokeana’s role in the development of the pineapple industry on the island of Lana’i. The drawing’s caption reads: Honokeana “The Cave Bay” Cove: In the early 1900s pineapple crowns were taken from the fields at Honolua and hauled to Honokeana Cove. They were then shipped to Lanai and planted to help start the now 16,000 acre pineapple plantation.
In his 1965 book True Stories of the Island of Lanai, Lawrence Kainoahou Gay relates that his father was the first person to grow pineapples on Lana’i under a 1921 contract with the Ha’iku Pineapple Company. The original plants were from Honolua and were supplied by David T. Fleming, the manager of Honolua Ranch. The pineapple tops were collected from the fields at Honolua and then trucked to Honokeana, where the Lana’i boats were anchored. Gay says that he spent many weeks hauling pineapple tops between Honokeana and Manele, Lana’i through rough seas.