Main Street Hawaii Place Names
Maui History

The island of Maui is the second-largest of the Hawaiian Islands at 727 square miles.  Maui is part of the State of Hawai’i and is the largest island in Maui County; the other islands comprising the county being Lāna’i, Kaho’olawe, and Moloka’i.  The island has a resident population of 139,884 in 2006, which is ranked third within the state behind the islands of Oahu and Hawaii.

Name

Native Hawaiian tradition gives the origin of the island's name in the legend of Hawai’iloa, the Polynesian navigator attributed with discovery of the Hawaiian Islands. 

• Name

• History

• Geology and Topography

The story relates how he named the island of Maui after his son who in turn was named for the demi-god Māui.  According to legend, the demi-god Māui raised all the Hawaiian Islands from the sea.  The Island of Maui is also called the "Valley Isle" for the large fertile isthmus between its two volcanoes.

History

Polynesians, from Tahiti and the Marquesas, were the original peoples to populate Maui.  The Tahitians introduced the kapu system, a strict social order that affected all aspects of life and became the core of Hawaiian culture.  Modern Hawaiian history began in the mid-1700s.  King Kamehameha I took up residence (and later made his capital) in Lāhainā after conquering Maui in the bloody Battle of Kepaniwai in 1790 in the Ī’ao Valley.

On November 26, 1778, Captain James Cook became the first European explorer to discover Maui.  Cook never set foot on the island because he was unable to find a suitable landing.  The first European to visit Maui was the French admiral Jean François de Galaup de La Pérouse, who landed on the shores of what is now known as La Perouse Bay on May 29, 1786.  More Europeans followed: traders, whalers, loggers (e.g., of sandalwood) and missionaries.

The missionaries began to arrive from New England in 1823, choosing Lāhainā because it was the capital.  They clothed the natives, banned them from dancing hula, and greatly altered the culture.  They tried to keep whalers and sailors out of the bawdy houses.  The missionaries taught reading and writing, created the 12-letter Hawaiian alphabet, started a printing press in Lāhainā, and began writing the islands' history, which until then existed only as oral accounts.  Ironically, the work of the missionaries both altered and preserved the native culture.  The religious work altered the culture while the literacy efforts preserved native history and language for posterity.  They started the first school in Lāhainā, which still exists today: Lāhaināluna Mission School.  The Mission school opened in 1831 and was the first secondary school to open west of the Rocky Mountains.

At the height of the whaling era (1840-1865), Lāhainā was a major whaling center with anchorage in Lāhainā Roads; in one season over 400 ships visited Lāhainā and the greatest number of ships berthed at one time was about 100.  A given ship tended to stay months rather than days which explains the drinking and prostitution in the town at that time. Whaling declined steeply at the end of the 19th century as crude oil (petroleum) replaced whale oil.

Kamehameha's descendants reigned in the islands until 1872.  They were followed by rulers from another ancient family of chiefs, including Queen Lili’uokalani who ruled in 1893 when the monarchy was overthrown by a group of American and European businessmen.  One year later, the Republic of Hawai’i was founded.  The island was annexed by the United States in 1898 and made a territory in 1900. Hawai'i became the 50th U.S. state in 1959.

Maui was centrally involved in the Pacific Theatre of World War II as a staging center, training base, and for rest and relaxation.  At the peak in 1943-44, the number of troops stationed on Maui exceeded 100,000.  The main base of the 4th Marines was in Haiku.   Beaches (e.g., in Kīhei) were used for practice landings and training in marine demolition and sabotage.

Geology and Topography

Each volcanic cone in the chain of the Hawaiian Islands is built of dark, iron-rich/quartz-poor rocks which, as highly fluid lava, poured out of thousands of vents over a period of millions of years. Several of the volcanoes were close enough to each other so that lava flows on their flanks overlapped one another, causing several volcanoes to merge into a single island known as a "volcanic doublet".

Maui is such an island, formed from two volcanoes that abut one another to form an isthmus between them. Both are shield volcanoes. The older western volcano has been eroded considerably and is cut by numerous drainages, forming the peaks of the West Maui Mountains (called Mauna Kahalawai by Hawaiians). Pu'u Kukui is the highest of the peaks at 5,788 feet. The larger, younger volcano to the east, Haleakala Volcano (also known as East Maui Volcano), rises to more than 10,000 feet (3,050 m) above sea level, but measures five miles (8 km) from seafloor to summit. The eastern flanks of both volcanoes are cut by deeply incised valleys and steep-sided ravines that run downslope to the rocky, windswept shoreline. The valley-like Isthmus of Maui that separates the two volcanic masses was formed by recent lava flows and erosion of material from the steep slopes of the volcanoes. This prominent topographic feature is the reason why Maui is known as "The Valley Isle".

The last eruption (originating in Haleakala's Southwest Rift Zone) occurred around 1790; two of the resulting lava flows are located (1) at Cape Kina'u between Ahihi Bay and La Perouse Bay on the southwest shore of East Maui, and (2) at Makaluapuna Point on Honokahua Bay on the northwest shore of West Maui. Although considered to be dormant by volcanologists, Haleakala is certainly capable of further eruptions.

Maui is blessed with a wide variety of landscapes, all of which resulted from a unique combination of geology, topography, and climate.