The Lihue Sugar Mill

Kauai and the other Hawaiian islands used to be major producers of sugar. There are irrigation canals (like the one we swam at) all over the island to provide water for sugar fields and electricity at several mill sites. The Lihue Sugar Mill on Kauai began, incredibly, in the mid 1800's, and continued to produce sugar until it was shut down in 2001.

The following history is from The International Directory of Company Histories, by Gale:

"In 1849 a German ship captain named Heinrich Hackfeld docked his 156-ton boat Wilhelmine in Hawaii after a 238-day journey from Bremen, Germany. After deciding to become a permanent resident, Hackfeld opened a general store which became very popular with the imported laborers who worked on the islands' isolated plantations. Hackfeld's small venture quickly expanded into other lines of business, including boardinghouses and real estate. Hackfeld later opened a trading house, exporting Hawaii's primary agricultural product, sugar, and importing building materials. Hackfeld's company became one of the largest in Hawaii, operating retail stores and hotels, trading a wider variety of products, and purchasing thousands of acres of property. Several years later Hackfeld died and ownership of the company passed to his family."

This area near the front of the main building looked like a shop.

"In July 1918, soon after the United States became involved in World War I, the American Alien Property Custodian confiscated H. Hackfeld & Company on the grounds that it was owned by "enemy aliens." All of the company's assets were taken over by a group of competitors, including Castle & Cooke, Alexander & Baldwin, and C. Brewer. The company was incorporated and its name was changed to American Factors (a factor is a commissioned agent), and its chain of B.F. Ehlers retailing outlets was renamed "Liberty House." Under the new management American Factors became more involved in sugar production. Demand for sugar remained high during the Great Depression and World War II, which kept American Factors profitable and allowed it to continue paying dividends to stockholders."

These things must have had conveyor builts on them originally. There were sugar cane husks lying all over the bottom of the machinery.

"Although it continued to diversify during the 1950s, American Factors remained primarily involved with the production of sugar. However, in 1959, the same year Hawaii was made a state, airline companies acquired long-range passenger jetliners which made Hawaii suddenly more accessible to the American vacationer. Just as suddenly, demand for hotel space and land began to increase. As a major landowne, American Factors recognized this as an opportunity to exploit its hotel and lodging interests. Many of its existing properties were improved, additional facilities were constructed, and several parcels of undeveloped land were sold to developers at a sizable profit."

On one of the highest floors were large empty foundations of machinery or tanks that had been removed.

You can continue to read the history of the company up the the present day here, but what happened was that due to changing political and economic environments, and debts, the company entered a long decline (for 30 years), and eventually got out of it's sugar production operations. What was of interest to me, was that the company at one point bought a hotel company called Fred Harvey. I used to work for Fred Harvey when they operated the hotels on the rim of the Grand Canyon, so it was a big surprise to find i had a connection to the company that built the Sugar Mills in Kauai.

These looked like boilers to me. There were a lot of electronic panels up here, and this is where the homeless camp was too.

The Mill is impossible to miss any time you drive by Lihue. There is a large conveyor belt covered with impenetrable plants and vines, that goes right over the road. Eventually we couldn't resist and decided to take a look at it one day. It's a huge operation, with the main factory being 5 or 6 stories high, and numerous other buildings nearby.

The floor was not safe here. In the distance roots from plants were stretching all the way from the roof down to the ground.

Outside was an enclosed open air area that was far more decayed, and overgrown by plants. These may have been an older kind of boiler or oven. Underneath they had fire kilns.

On one of the upper floors we discovered that the factory is occupied by homeless people. We found a camp of sorts with beds, a cooking area, books, even drawings. It was all rather filthy, and the people who occupied it foolishly threw all their garbage down a caged (as in open air) elevator shaft, leaving it to rot and seriously stink up that whole area of the building, right next to where they slept.

This office looked like it was very recently occupied.

There were, what looked like child's drawings inside this first aid room.

Maree was sure the homeless people were going to come back and kill us, so she made me stop taking pictures long before we'd seen everything. A few striking things about the interior were that in the "husking and crushing" area there were still husks of sugar cane lying all over the machinery. There was also an interesting sub-floor area that had water flowing through canals in pitch black darkness, in some places making very strange noises. Below are some pictures Maree took.