This turquoise-colored book, with its tropical flowers and map of Hawaii on the cover, was displayed prominently in the Smithsonian's gift shop earlier this summer and since I do love Hawaii, I had to add it to my list.
Lost Kingdom is the story of exactly that - how a kingdom, Hawaii, was lost to the Hawaiian people in an audacious and shameful land grab. Primary blame for the theft falls squarely on the shoulders of the over zealous descendants of the missionaries who arrived bearing God's words and man's diseases. Certainly the US government comes in for its share of blame, as Grover Cleveland essentially acknowledged once he was safely out of office: "Hawai'i is ours...as I contemplate the means used to complete the outrage, I am ashamed of the whole affair." (It is true that when opportunities presented themselves to the Hawaiian Queen, Lili'uokalani, to perhaps allow the islands to retain independence, she mishandled them. However, I think its fair to argue that she never should have been in many of the positions into which she was essentially forced.)
I would imagine most people would have a difficult time remaining calm as they read this book. The manifest destiny and imperialism on display here were certainly not the best moments in our nation's history. Julia Flynn Siler puts it perfectly when she writes, toward the end of the book, that as Queen Lili'uokalani rode a train across the U.S., she "couldn't help but wonder, with such vast expanses of arable land, why Americans seemed intent on taking over Hawai'i." Indeed.
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