Kona Coffee Living History Farm is located on the Daisaku Uchida Coffee Farm, in the

Kona District Kona is a ''moku'' or district on the Big Island of Hawaii in the State of Hawaii, known for its Kona coffee and the location of the Ironman World Championship Triathlon. In the current system of administration of Hawaii County, the ''moku'' ...

, on the Big Island of

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only state ...

. The historic

Kona coffee Kona coffee is the market name for coffee ('' Coffea arabica'') cultivated on the slopes of Hualalai and Mauna Loa in the North and South Kona Districts of the Big Island of Hawaii. It is one of the most expensive coffees in the world. Only coff ...

farm was established in 1900. The open-air agriculture museum depicts the daily lives of early Japanese immigrants to Hawaii during the period of 1920-1945. It is located at coordinates , the area now known as

Captain Cook James Cook (7 November 1728 Old Style date: 27 October – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the British Royal Navy, famous for his three voyages between 1768 and 1779 in the Pacific Ocean and ...

, but the traditional land division ('' ahupuaa'') known as Kealakekua.

History

The farm was owned by Daisaku Uchida, who came to Hawaii from southern Japan at the age of 19 on September 27, 1906. After a three-year sugar contract at Līhue Plantation on Kauai, Daisaku came to the

. Between 1868 and 1924, more than 140,000 Japanese workers came to Hawaii with labor contracts at sugarcane

plantation A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...

. Many, like Uchida, decided to leave the plantations and start their own family businesses when their contract expired. In 1912, Daisaku married his cousin, Shima Maruo. They moved to the farm in 1913, expanding it and the house in 1925. The land was owned by the Greenwell family. Henry Nicholas Greenwell had been in the coffee trading business in the area since the 1870s. The Uchida family lived here until Shima died at the age of 73 in 1966, and Daisaku in 1986 at the age of 99. Three children were born in the original house, and three in the new one after 1925. The eldest son Masao Uchida also farmed the property until he and his wife Masako retired to Honolulu in 1994.

Preservation

The long-term leashold had finally run out, and the land was scheduled to be redeveloped into a residential subdivision. Since the farm had never been modernized, it was instead donated to the Kona Historical Society by Sherwood Greenwell.

Museum

The

living history museum A living museum, also known as a living history museum, is a type of museum which recreates historical settings to simulate a past time period, providing visitors with an experiential interpretation of history. It is a type of museum that recrea ...

offers self-guided tours, that include the coffee orchard, farmhouse, and coffee mill. A kiosk is open to visitors, and a full tour by costumed interpreters from the Kona Historical Society is available at limited times. A fee is charged. The state registry of historic places listed the farm as site 10-47-7509 on April 16, 1994.Hawaii County Historic Places
on State web site On February 9, 1995 it was added to the

National Register of Historic Places listings on the island of Hawaii This is a list of properties and districts on the island of Hawaii in the U.S. state of Hawaii that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The island is coterminous with Hawaii County, the state's only county that covers exactly ...

as site number 94001621. The original Henry Greenwell Store houses the Historical Society, and is also on the National Register. They are both located on the Mamalahoa Highway, known as the Hawaii Belt Road.

References

External links

Kona Historical Society
{{National Register of Historic Places Living museums in Hawaii Museums in Hawaii County, Hawaii Farm museums in Hawaii Agriculture museums in the United States Agricultural buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in Hawaii Agriculture in Hawaii Coffee production National Register of Historic Places in Hawaii County, Hawaii

History

Preservation

Museum

See also

References

External links