Waiakea Homestead Commission

Corporate body

Waiakea Homestead Commission

1925-1929

The Homestead Laws of the Territory of Hawaii required the government to survey and lay out unoccupied public lands which 25 or more citizens had filed applications to homestead. Since the required number of applications had been received from persons interested in securing homesteads in Waiakea, Hawaiʻi, the Waiakea Mill Company lease was allowed to expire in 1918. The highly profitable sugar-producing land was divided into 216 cane and 231 house lots. Drawings were held on February 17, 1919, and February 3, 1921, to determine which of the 3,000 applicants would receive these lots. Because of the shortage of sugar, which led to the Wartime Agreements extending the Waiakea Mill Company's control over future crops, the first group of homesteaders weren't able to take possession of their lots until the end of March, 1919.
A majority of the homesteaders formed a "League" and appointed trustees to represent them. These trustees signed a contract on May 6, 1919, with the Hawaii Mill Company, which was shortly replaced by the League or 60/40 contract with the Waiakea Mill Company on June 27, 1919. High labor costs, lack of capital, and difficulties in cultivating crops and transporting cane were some of the problems that faced the homesteaders from the very beginning. Also, disagreements and contractual misunderstandings with the mill company and the unexpectedly low price and production of sugar resulted in many homesteaders going into debt and filing suits in the local courts from 1920 on. Things came to such a point that Governor Charles McCarthy appointed Territorial Sugar Expert Albert Horner and Public Land Commissioner Charles Bailey to investigate the situation. They presented their report to him dated March 31, 1922. Personal knowledge of the situation, confirmed by this report, prompted the Governor to bring about the preparation of the 16-Year Agreement of May 1, 1922, which was signed by individual homesteaders and the mill company as a substitute for the League contract. However, homesteaders continued to suffer financially and expressed their dissatisfaction with the terms of this new contract by appealing to the Governor and sending petitions to the legislature asking it to investigate their plight and grant them relief. Legislative hearings were held in 1924 and 1925 with different resolutions, bills and amendments introduced in the legislature. Finally on April 25, 1925, Governor Wallace Rider Farrington approved Act 88, Session Laws of Hawaii 1925, which created a three-member Waiakea Homestead Commission to investigate the situation, bring suits if proper to do so
in the name of the government, make recommendations and report to him the results of its work when completed. Four days later on April 29, he appointed William Goodale, Edgar Henriques and L. Thornton Lyman to the commission. They in turn elected William Goodale chairman at their first meeting on May 4, and appointed B. C. Stewart permanent secretary on June 1.

Territory of Hawaiʻi

Investigate the situation, bring suits if proper to do so in the name of the government, make recommendations and report to him the results of its work when completed.

Act 88, Session Laws of Hawaii 1925,