The Snapshots in Time Collection

Smoke from a Controlled Sugar Cane Field Burn, Hawaii Plantation, c. 1940s

Smoke from a Controlled Sugar Cane Field Burn, Hawaii Plantation, c. 1940s

Smoke billows from a controlled burn in a Hawaiian sugar cane field, a standard pre-harvest practice used to strip away dry leaves before the stalks were cut and hauled to the mill. Photographs like this, taken during the Second World War, capture the agricultural rhythms that continued on the islands even as military activity intensified around them. Project: 218628