'Last Hawaiian princess' leaves $100 million to Native Hawaiian causes
'Last Hawaiian princess' leaves $100 million to Native Hawaiian causes
Abigail Kawānanakoa was a descendant of the royal family that once ruled the Hawaiian Islands. But she was also the great-granddaughter of a sugar baron and inherited wealth thanks to Westerners who upended traditional ways of life.
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But she was also the great-granddaughter of a sugar baron and inherited vast wealth thanks to Westerners who upended traditional ways of life through the introduction of private property and the diversion of water for industrial plantations.
Settlements have also been reached with about a dozen other people who had claims, including someone described in court documents as her “hanai” son, referring to an informal adoption in Hawaiian culture.
She inherited her wealth as the great-granddaughter of James Campbell, an Irish businessman who made his fortune as a sugar plantation owner and one of Hawaii’s largest landowners.
She held no formal title but was a living reminder of Hawaii’s monarchy and a symbol of Hawaiian national identity that endured after the kingdom was overthrown by American businessmen in 1893.
According to documents establishing her foundation in 2001, Kawānanakoa wanted it to “maintain, support, preserve and foster the traditional Hawaiian culture in existence prior to 1778” — the year the first European explorer, Capt.
Andrade recently visited Kawānanakoa’s crypt at Mauna ʻAla, also known as the Royal Mausoleum State Monument, which is the burial place of Hawaiian royalty.
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