James Dole planted his first pineapples on Oahu in 1901. Fifty years later Dole was the largest pineapple company in the world. In the early 1900s, pineapples became Maui’s second big crop. James Dole bought Lana’i to create a vast pineapple plantation and eventually was bought out by Castle & Cook. On Maui the Baldwin family developed a vast pineapple plantation, cannery and then cattle ranch. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, all of Hawaii was placed under martial law. During WW II Maui served as a training ground for troops until V-J day in September 1945.
The U.S. Navy seized Kaho’olawe at the beginning of WW II for bombing practice. Under an Executive Order in 1953, Kaho’olawe was put under control of the Secretary of the Navy to be returned at an indefinite time to Hawaii. After years of protest and “occupations,” Hawaiians were granted access to Kaho’olawe in 1980 for educational, scientific and cultural purposes. In 1993, the Hawaii State Legislature established the Kaho’olawe Island Reserve covering the island and a two-mile radius around it for Native Hawaiian cultural, spiritual, educational and historical purposes. In Washington that year Congress passed the “Apology Resolution” – apologizing to Native Hawaiians for the overthrow of their monarchy in 1893 and the loss of their right to self-determination. Congress also passed a law mandating return of Kaho’olawe and funding for cleanup and environmental restoration.
In 1957, when Hawaii was still a Territory, Amfac unveiled the concept of an all-inclusive resort in Ka’anapali. The visionary plan called for 11 hotels on 100 acres along 650 feet of shoreline southward of Black Rock (Pu'u Keka'a). At the time Hawaiians favored statehood. In 1959 Hawaii did became the 50th U.S. state. Jet service to the mainland and Japan started the flow of tourists. A few years later, in 1962, the Royal Lahaina Beach Hotel opened in Ka’anapali, leading the way for bold resort development along the West and South Shores that would revolutionize tourism expansion on Maui in the remainder of the 20th century.
In 1989 JMB, the nation’s largest syndicator of real estate, bought out Amfac at a time when Japanese Yen were pouring in Maui and Hawaii. The Gulf War and Desert Storm in 1991 hit tourism on Maui like a tsunami and development of Ka’anapali lagged. An ambitious 1500-acre Wailea Resort development also was underway when the Gulf War started. As the story goes, for the opening of the Grand Wailea Spa in December 1991 there were more gardeners than guests. Who could have foreseen, however, that annual visitors to Maui would surpass 2.3 million by the end of the decade and century and that every day more than 40,000 visitors would spend Perfect Days on Maui, many of whom would be repeat visitors