Millions of years ago fiery basalt rock erupted through a crack in the floor of the Pacific Ocean. Gradually the lava cooled and formed great undersea mountains whose summits protruded from the ocean. Over the centuries the action of wind, water, fire, and ice on the chain of volcanic peaks created the islands that became the state of Hawaii--a land of exotic flowers, shining beaches, and majestic mountains. The first inhabitants of Hawaii were Polynesian seafarers who came to the islands in sturdy outrigger canoes more than 1,500 years ago. When the British sea captain James Cook discovered the islands in 1778, he found a preliterate but thriving people who bred fish for a better catch and irrigated their taro fields.
Today Hawaii has a population more varied than that of any other state: its inhabitants include descendants of the original Polynesian population, of 19th-century sailors and traders, of the New England missionaries who brought Western ways to the native people, and of the Asians and Portuguese who came as field hands to work on the islands' sugar and pineapple plantations--mixed with the service personnel from the United States mainland who arm the great Hawaii-based naval and air fleets. Military expenditures are one of the island state's most important sources of income. The production of sugarcane and pineapples, long the mainstay of its agriculture, has become highly mechanized. Since the islands' annexation by the United States, Hawaiian agriculture has been diversified by a variety of tropical crops. World War II, which brought greater unity and widespread unionization, spurred Hawaii's industrialization. The more fast-paced economy has not detracted from the charm of the Aloha State. Its mushrooming tourist business--since 1972, the state's largest industry--is a challenge to Hawaiian ingenuity, and the general harmony of its multiracial culture sets a positive pattern for the world.
In many ways the 50th and last state in the Union is the most unusual one. It lies almost entirely in the tropics. It has the world's largest active and inactive volcanoes. Separated from the United States mainland by the world's biggest ocean, the Pacific, it is the only state that does not fall within the continent of North America. It is the only state that was once an independent kingdom and the only one with a royal palace. It is the only state that is composed entirely of islands. And it is the only state not dominated by Americans of European ancestry.
The nickname of the Aloha State comes from a late 19th-century Hawaiian word for love that is used as a greeting and to say farewell. Another nickname is the Paradise of the Pacific. Mark Twain characterized Hawaii as the loveliest fleet of islands that lies anchored in any ocean. The name of the state may have derived from Hawaiki, the former name of one of the Society Islands, home of some Polynesians. According to an island legend, Hawaii Loa was the name of the man who discovered the paradise.
The state of Hawaii is a chain of rugged islands, coral reefs, and rocky shoals located in the North Pacific Ocean. It occupies all except for the 2 square miles (5 square kilometers) of the Midway Islands. The Hawaiian Archipelago is crossed near its northwestern end by the Tropic of Cancer. It is some 2,400 miles (3,860 kilometers) away from the West coast of the United States mainland. There are about 132 named islands and islets in the chain, which curves 1,523 miles (2,451 kilometers) southeast to northwest. Hawaii's land area of 6,425 square miles (16,641 square kilometers) is less than that of any other state except Connecticut, Delaware, and Rhode Island. The islands of Hawaii are the worn tops of great volcanoes. They were raised from the bottom of the ocean by tremendous upheavals millions of years ago. Because of their volcanic origin, the islands do not have the variety of physiographic regions usually found in the other 49 states.
