This reader-friendly Hawaiian history tells the islands’ story from the arrival of the very first Polynesian settlers in the 300s to the most recent strivings for native Hawaiian sovereignty. The harsh regime of Hawaii’s chiefs, the landing and death of Captain Cook, Kamehameha’s bloody conquests, the profound influence of American missionaries, the wild whaling days, French and British interventions, the sugar barons, the arrival of different ethnic groups to work the plantations, the coup d’etat, the demise of the native monarchy, the coming of US political control, the territorial years, World War I, Pearl Harbor and World War II, the striving for statehood, and the post-war tourist avalanche and economic doldrums—all are part of this history.

Hawaii features special sections on the birth and death of the islands, descriptions by famous writers such as Mark Twain, accounts of tsunamis, the great volcanoes, Jaws the wave, hula, Hawaiian cowboys, and the revival of ocean voyaging.