Remembering the golden age of Dole Cannery when pineapple was king

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) - The sign outside still says “The Dole Cannery,” but other than the historic exterior of the once incredibly busy facility, there are no signs of the canning of pineapple.

Operations shut down for good in the early 1990s. Now, it’s the home of a food court, a few retail outlets, and a multiplex theater.

The only tie to the past is photos, a few artifacts, and a whole lot of memories.

“I can still smell Dole Cannery when I come in. It brings back memories, good memories to me,” said Meldan Lamoya, who worked at the cannery in his high school years for three years.

He remembers having to get to Iwilei in time for his afternoon shift.

“I caught the bus from Waipahu, from Pearl City,” he said. “Started at $3.30 for four hours, 7 o’clock, 8 o’clock is lunch. Then my mom would get up at 12. So she would take us, me and my cousin, home.”

Local businesswoman Wendy Loh also remembers Dole Cannery very well. She says it seems like just yesterday she was a little girl looking for the big pineapple water tower in the sky as they drove into town from Maili.

“So the memories really pop when I come here because I can see all the photos, and it just reminds me of us dropping off my sister, dropping her off, and she walking in,” Loh said. “I see those ladies walking in the line. When I saw that, I started tearing up because we did that every day.”

So many teenagers really depended on the cannery for jobs, whether it be to help their parents out or just to earn some extra cash.

“It was good because it was summertime. I mean, I could surf in the morning and then, you know, go to work in the afternoon. So my summer wasn’t totally blown out, but I got to enjoy my summer,” said Lamoya. “And of course, I was making money to go to my, you know, my commencement, winter ball and all that. I had money to do that. Not putting any obligation on my parents.”

“The mana in this building, I mean, every time I walk in here, I can feel it. I see the pipes. I see the photos. I just feel it. I smell it. I know what transpired here, and this is a history of Hawaii and what made Hawaii so great,” added Loh.

Another thing that made it great: Lamoya said the food at the cannery cafeteria was sum ono!

“You talking about a home cook. Hamburger steak. It was hamburger steak. You could taste the difference there. Cut into the hamburger. It gets cut right through. Not a lot of rubbery or anything like that. They had adobo, chicken adobo and all that. It was all authentic,” Lamoya said.

While there are no tours of the cannery anymore, it is still open to the public if you want to get a glimpse of Hawaii past.

“I tell people they should all come here and look at these photos because the nostalgia, the memories of the history just brings back such good feelings,” said Loh.