Forbidden Island, U.S.A. | Hacker News Reader

Forbidden Island, U.S.A.

neatorama.com

134 pointsbitops29 comments

A few more details about Ni'ihau that were left out of the article.

- There was actually one other landowner, a native Hawaiian couple that the Robinsons had to buy out to own the entire island. The story goes that they didn't want to sell, but one of the Robinsons kept placing gold coins on a table until they gave in.

- The Hawaiian that is still spoken on Ni'ihau is probably very similar to the one spoken there from the time of Western contact (James Cook in 1778[*]). However, it is a slightly different dialect than that spoken on the other islands that has become "modern" Hawaiian language.

- The article briefly mentions the Japanese aviator who crashed on Ni'ihau after bombing Pearl Harbor. Some say this small side-story to WW2 had some sigificant impact on the decision to intern the Japanese on the US mainland during the war: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niihau_Incident

- There is no electricity on the island, but the department of education has installed a solar PV system to run computers and refrigerators at the school. I imagine that other houses may be replacing kerosene lighting with solar PV as well now that prices have come down.

- I do not think they have landlines or cell-phones, but I think there is a radio for emergencies.

- I think the Helicopter tour runs about $300-$350, someday I may try it.

Having spent a bit of time on Molokai and visiting the Leper Colony late last year, Ni'ihau could be interesting. The diverse history of the islands keeps bringing us back.

For years, we've been spending time in Hilo with an old cattlewoman (recently passed) who introduced us to an amazing array of people who have connections with old Hawaii.

Yes, I've benefited from the tourism (being one), but whenever I hear stories of old Hawaii, I always get Iz's song Hawai'i 78 from the Facing Future album.

Thanks for the added details.

Hawai'i is flat-out fascinating. I'm lucky in that over the last 20 years, my pop has been moving in slow motion to the Big Island, so I spend a lot of time there.

After seeing the article about North Sentinel island, I wondered how long until a similar one about Ni'ihau. It is typically dubbed the "Forbidden Island" in the tourist literature, so it was bound to come up in someone's searches.

BTW, there are 2 significant "forbidden" islands in Hawai'i, and numerous small ones. The other large one is Kaho'olawe (due to unexploded ordinance and nominally belonging to native Hawaiians now). The small ones (around several islands) are bird sanctuaries. In fact another island near Ni'ihau is both a sanctuary and an active bombing range: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ka%CA%BBula

Yes, I find islands fascinating.

I just realized my first comment only applies to the "main" Hawaiian Islands.

In the Northwest Hawaiian Islands, there are lots of different access regulations, and none of them open to the public. On some islands, the scientists with research permits must carry and dress in sterile clothes separate for each island--so as not to spread seeds, insects, and possible pathogens between islands.

OT, but I'd love your thoughts as an island lover. Which do you consider to be the world's largest island?

(I've always said Australia, but it seems many people exclude it and go with Greenland.)

I think it's a rather pointless question because there are so many ways to define an island. If you say "land surrounded by water," then it's the EurAsiaAfrican landmass, if you look at geology (of which I am no expert), then you have a lot more nit-picky defintions such as continents, cratons, crusts, rifts, etc.

I just read a lot on Wikipedia, where island is defined as a "sub-continental land surrounded by water"[1]. But when you look at the definition of sub-continental, the continents are "generally identified by convention rather than any strict criteria"[2].

So it's just convention that large islands like Greenland, Madagascar and New Zealand, which are "pieces" of continents, are not considered continents. Some pieces of continents such as New Caledonia[3] are much smaller than volcanic islands that rose out of the sea. For what it's worth, wikipedia follows the norm and calls Greenland the largest island[4].

And then there's the whole issue of sea level which varies, and as it does, it changes the size, shape, and connection of islands and continents.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_caledonia#Geography [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geology_of_Greenland

May be we should just have islands? Why so many names? it is confusing.

I believe that a monk seal was killed on the island recently, which would be a fairly serious crime.

The whole setup is weird and slightly discomfiting in a pure colonial paternalistic sense, but hey, it's obviously working in some ways.

For anyone looking for a good overview history of Hawai'i, I would recommend Gavan Daws' Shoal Of Time [1]

[1] http://www.uhpress.hawaii.edu/p-195-9780824803247.aspx

There have been monk seal killings on Kauai and Molokai, but I'm not aware of any on Niihau recently.

You're right, I just went back and checked the article in the Times [1]

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/12/magazine/who-would-kill-a-...

I'm curious about the legal status of this land that was acquired prior to Hawaii even being a state. Are the native inhabitants considered US citizens? Does the Sinclair family have to pay property taxes on this land? I would think not. It's kinda of cool to imagine truly owning land that no one else can lay claim to, even historically.

EDIT: The native inhabitants may have originally claimed the land but does any government claim jurisdiction over it?

Ni'ihau is part of the County of Kaua'i, State of Hawaii, USA. Just because the king sold the land doesn't mean the king reliquished sovereingty over it. Then the sovereignty of Hawaii passed to the Republic, then to the Territory and State of Hawaii. So yes, this is incorporated territory of the USA, and the inhabitants are full US citizens--as opposed to the various statuses in unincorporated insular territories[1].

Oddly, I was recently reading about Liechenstein[2] where this was not the case. It was formerly part of the Holy Roman Empire (titular to the Emporer of such), but no one claimed it during the breakup (that's the short version, it's actually more complicated). So the princes of the territory found themselves to be sovereign--and then were able to somehow maintain sovereignty continuing today.

PS: Amazingly, there is still some unclaimed territory[3] in this world, or you could join seasteaders[4] out in international waters[5].

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insular_area [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liechtenstein [3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unclaimed_Territory [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seasteading [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_waters

I really wish I could get into the server and fix all these HTML errors.

The OCD in me is acting up.

Wow, the nihau safaris look amazing -- a bit expensive, but I'd really like to go (with a camera or an 1886 Winchester) for boar, someday. Although I'd rather turn it into kalua pig rather than a trophy.

This article and the previous one on North Sentinel certainly makes Uncle John's 24-Karat Bathroom Reader seem like a pretty interesting book.

It is awesome. I have 6 of them in my bathroom (they release 1 per year)

In this chain of forbidden places is also Gardiner's Island in New York at the end of Long Island. Apparently gifted to the Gardiner family by the Queen before the US existed. Signs surround it warning the public that they're not welcome. I guess it's not forbidden so much as privately owned.

With the traffic on and off the island, I'd imagine the modern native population has a much higher resistance to Asian and European pathogens than even a generation ago.

The article didn't go into details, but there was originally much contact between Ni'ihau and the other islands, though mostly the nearest, which is Kaua'i. During the period of initial contact with Westerners, many Hawaiians on all islands did die of Western diseases, but their population did survive. It's only in the past hundred years that Ni'ihau has been mostly cut off--though the owners and residents do come and go and mingle with the general population on Kaua'i. And nor have they been cut off from Western medicine, so I imagine they are all vaccinated like everyone.

Still, it is an interesting question whether this semi-isolated population has some lingering susceptibility to certain diseases.

why is it forbidden if someone can take a helicopter tour? Looks like its a private island.

Deleted comment

No, it's not. Hence the 'U.S.A.' addition to the title. They are two different islands and stories. The link to this one was probably inspired by reading the first.

Really? King "Kamehameha"?

Am I supposed to believe that a Super Saiyan was once the King of Hawaii?

edit: This article is crazy interesting.

History, read it. Note: this is probably the dumbest comment I've ever posted to HN.

Hah! Yeah I realize it was idiotic, it was partly satire. Incidentally, I am also aware of the Dragon Ball series of anime to use weird words for character names. I think Goku and Gohan mean something in Japanese (as in, they're not normal names), and I always heard Vegeta meant "vegetable" but I'm not sure if that's true or not. By "always heard" I mean "read on GeoCities". :)

Gohan is "rice" in Japanese. Can't remember what Goku is, but might just be a wordplay on the original Chinese "Sun Wukong" character in the very famous tale that inspired Toryiama.

s/posted/replied/ - there fixed that for you.

Even the Dragon Ball wiki mentions the origin of the name: http://dragonball.wikia.com/wiki/Kamehameha. Given that the Japanese often vacation in Hawaii, the connection is not surprising.

i thought it was funny.

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