The war for independence against the British on the American continent closed the colonial trade routes within the British empire. A market was established in China. China took nothing that the US produced; hence Boston traders, in order to obtain the wherewithal to purchase teas and silks at Canton, spent months or more of each China voyage collecting a cargo of sea-otter and other skins out of the northwest side of the American continent, highly esteemed by the Chinese.
Years before the westward land movement gathered momentum, the energies of seafaring New Englanders found their natural outlet, along their traditional pathway, in the Pacific Ocean. Sandalwood, geography and fresh provisions made the Islands a vital link in a closely articulated trade route between Boston, the Northwest Coast and Canton, China. The central location of the Hawaiian Islands between America and Orient brought many ships to the Islands.
They needed food and water, and the islands supplied this need from its fertile lands. At that time, whale products were in high demand; whale oil was used for heating, lamps and in industrial machinery; whale bone was used in corsets, skirt hoops, umbrellas and buggy whips. Although Lahaina did not have a well-protected harbor like Honolulu, Lahaina Roads had good holding and became a busy anchorage. In , more than whaling ships anchored off Lahaina, and 30 years later it rose to ships per year.
Lahaina was the nexus of the prosperity of whaling and the seat of government of the king. Brothels, taverns and inns sprung up along Front Street. The sailors were quite pleased with that arrangement, but the Christian missionaries were not. Just as the whalers came from New England, so did the missionaries of Maui.
Presbyterian and Congregationalist missionaries arrived in Lahaina in the early s. These early missionaries frowned upon the practice of sailors taking Hawaiian women back to their ships for their pleasure. But the sailors chafed at the intervention of these pious Christians, so the whalers attempted to demolish the house of a reverend and even shelled the town with their cannon in retaliation.
In response to the cannon fire, a fort was built along the waterfront of Lahaina, and the reconstructed ruins of its walls are an attraction to this day. Eventually, the whalers and missionaries learned to live with each other.
That included inventing a written version of the Hawaiian language, which had been learned by word of mouth. The oral traditions of the Hawaiian culture could now be put on paper and passed on to future generations. Since much of the Hawaiian culture involved a religion of Polynesian gods and mythology, it was difficult for the Protestant faith to take hold. Through perseverance though, there were 13 churches on Maui by , and all of them had Hawaiian pastors. By the s, the whaling industry on Maui was gone.
The Confederate navy and its raiders destroyed many of the Yankee whalers during the Civil War. Sugar cane and pineapples and the plantation system used to grow those crops soon provided enormous profits to the descendants of the original missionaries. Today, whaling in Lahaina is limited to whale watching during the December -to- May season.
Visitors still continue to come to Lahaina by sea. At this time, whale oil was used for heating, lamps and in industrial machinery; whale bone actually the baleen strips suspended from the whale's upper jaw was used in corsets, skirt hoops, umbrellas and buggy whips.
Whaling ships visiting hunting grounds in the Japan Sea, the South Pacific and later the Arctic, usually punctuated their forays twice a year with stops to restock provisions, replenish their crews and transship their whale oil cargoes. For Hawaiian ports, especially Honolulu and Lahaina, the whaling fleet was the crux of the economy for 20 years or more. More than ships stopped in Hawaiian ports in Over the next two decades, the Pacific whaling fleet nearly quadrupled in size and in the record year of , whaling ships arrived in Hawai'i.
Whalers' aversion to the traditional Hawaiian diet of fish and poi spurred new trends in farming and ranching. Hawaiians began growing potatoes and a wider variety of vegetables to supply the ships. Paniolo cowboys coralled and slaughtered herds of wild cattle descended from Vancouver's original gift cows to provide beef for hungry crews. Other businesses sprang up to service the ships, including sailmakers, blacksmiths, carpenters, laundries, bakeries, shops and boarding houses.
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