This is a survey of the

postage stamp A postage stamp is a small piece of paper issued by a post office, postal administration, or other authorized vendors to customers who pay postage (the cost involved in moving, insuring, or registering mail), who then affix the stamp to the fa ...

s and

postal history Postal history is the study of postal systems and how they operate and, or, the study of the use of postage stamps and covers and associated postal artifacts illustrating historical episodes in the development of postal systems. The term is att ...

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 stat ...

. The

Hawaiian Islands The Hawaiian Islands ( haw, Nā Mokupuni o Hawai‘i) are an archipelago of eight major islands, several atolls, and numerous smaller islets in the North Pacific Ocean, extending some from the island of Hawaii in the south to northernmost Kur ...

occupy most of an

archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands, or sometimes a sea containing a small number of scattered islands. Examples of archipelagos include: the Indonesian Archi ...

in the central

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

, southwest of the continental United States. It was governed by the

Kingdom of Hawaii The Hawaiian Kingdom, or Kingdom of Hawaiʻi ( Hawaiian: ''Ko Hawaiʻi Pae ʻĀina''), was a sovereign state located in the Hawaiian Islands. The country was formed in 1795, when the warrior chief Kamehameha the Great, of the independent island ...

until 1893,

Provisional Government of Hawaii The Provisional Government of Hawaii (abbr.: P.G.; Hawaiian: ''Aupuni Kūikawā o Hawaiʻi'') was proclaimed after the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom on January 17, 1893, by the 13-member Committee of Safety under the leadership of its ch ...

through 1894, and

Republic of Hawaii The Republic of Hawaii ( Hawaiian: ''Lepupalika o Hawaii'') was a short-lived one-party state in Hawaii between July 4, 1894, when the Provisional Government of Hawaii had ended, and August 12, 1898, when it became annexed by the United State ...

until 1898. It became the

Territory of Hawaii The Territory of Hawaii or Hawaii Territory ( Hawaiian: ''Panalāʻau o Hawaiʻi'') was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from April 30, 1900, until August 21, 1959, when most of its territory, excluding ...

in 1898 and then US State of

in 1959.

First stamps

The first stamps of Hawaii were the

Hawaiian Missionaries The Hawaiian Missionaries are the first postage stamps of the Kingdom of Hawaii, issued in 1851. They came to be known as the "Missionaries" because they were primarily found on the correspondence of missionaries working in the Hawaiian Islands. ...

issued in 1851 by

Henry Martyn Whitney Henry Martyn Whitney (June 5, 1824 – August 17, 1904) was an early journalist in the Kingdom of Hawaii. Born of early missionaries, he became the first postmaster and founded several long-lasting newspapers. Early life Henry Martyn Whitney was ...

(son of missionaries).

Later issues

Beginning in 1853, the government of Hawaii began issuing stamps engraved with the busts of members of the royal family of the Kingdom of Hawaii.Walter M. Giffard,
Descriptive Catalog of the Postage Stamps of Hawaii
, in Thomas G. Thrum, compiler, ''All about Hawaii: The Recognized Book of Authentic Information on Hawaii'' (1891), p. 102. File:Stamp Hawaii 1853 Kamehameha III Sc6.jpg, Stamp of Hawaii, 1853,

King Kamehameha III Kamehameha III (born Kauikeaouli) (March 17, 1814 – December 15, 1854) was the third king of the Kingdom of Hawaii from 1825 to 1854. His full Hawaiian name is Keaweaweula Kīwalaō Kauikeaouli Kaleiopapa and then lengthened to Keaweaweula Kī ...

. File:Stamp Hawaii 1866 Kamehameha V Sc32.jpg, Stamp of Hawaii, 1866,

King Kamehameha V Kamehameha V (Lota Kapuāiwa Kalanimakua Aliʻiōlani Kalanikupuapaʻīkalaninui; December 11, 1830 – December 11, 1872), reigned as the fifth monarch of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi from 1863 to 1872. His motto was "Onipaʻa": immovable, firm, s ...

. File:Stamp Hawaii 1871 Mataio Kekuanaoa Sc34.jpg, Stamp of Hawaii, 1871, Mataio Kekūanaōʻa. File:Stamp Hawaii 1878 Kamamalu Sc30b.jpg, Stamp of Hawaii, 1878, Princess Kamāmalu. File:Stamp Hawaii 1891 Liliuokalani Sc52.jpg, Stamp of Hawaii, 1891,

Queen Liliʻuokalani Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mothe ...