Authorities on Owyhee have approved the purchase of
most of one of the Sandwich Islands to Oracle CEO Larry Ellison. Of course the archipelago is no longer called The Sandwich Islands or
Owyhee; it is now called Hawaii and the island Larry has bought is
Lanai. It is also known as Pineapple Island because it was once a pineapple plantation: the fruit was introduced by Francisco de Paula Marin, a Spanish adventurer but it is English Captain John Kidwell who founded Hawaii’s pineapple industry (
"importing and testing a number of varieties in the 1800s for commercial crop potential"). Later, Lanai
was transformed into the largest pineapple plantation
in the world "
that supplied more than 75% of the world’s pineapple", by James Drummond Dole. Maybe Larry wants to return the island to it's previous fame and status...or maybe not.
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