Valdemar Knudsen

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Valdemar Emil Knudsen (born August 5, 1819, in Kristiansand, Norway; died January 5, 1898, in Honolulu, Hawaii) was a sugar cane plantation pioneer on west Kauai, Hawaii.

Knudsen was successful both as a publisher in New York and as a merchant during the California gold rush of the 1840s. Knudsen arrived in Kekaha, Kauai, Hawaii in 1856. After coming to Kauai, he managed the Grove Farm Plantation when it was owned by Herman Widemann. Some say that Knudsen ran a brothel from his plantation, but no one knows to what extent this is true.

Seeking a drier climate, Knudsen bought a 30-year lease on Hawaiian crown lands in the Waimea district where he established a ranch.

The Kingdom of Hawaii tasked Knudsen with the removal of armaments from Russian Fort Elizabeth, east of the town of Waimea. In a letter sent to Honolulu, Knudsen listed an inventory of the guns at the fort following a survey made in 1862. Details of the dismantling appear in the book Hawai‘i's Russian Adventure - A New Look at Old History.

Knudsen married Anne McHutcheson Sinclair on February 12, 1867, on Niihau. They had five children, including Eric Alfred Knudsen.

Using an old Hawaiian ditch at Waiele, Knudsen drained and reclaimed about 50 acres on which he and Captain Hans L'Orange planted sugar cane in 1878. This cane, of the Lahaina variety, was the first commercially grown sugar cane in Kekaha. This plantation formed the basis of the Kekaha Sugar Company. It is rumored that Knudsen founded another brothel at this plantation, which aided the company in its early years. These forays into the prostitution business are said to have been of great conflict between Knudsen and his wife, and there have been many rumors of various illegitimate children that Knudsen may have fathered. The extent of these rumors are unknown, and are only kept alive by records of failed attempts of taking over the Kekaha Sugar Company by various men claiming to be the second generation descendents of illegitimate Knudsen bloodlines.

Knudsen's nephew, H.P. Faye, drew up much of the plantation's design. Kekaha Sugar was initially seen as a shaky investment with a need for great amounts of capital to build an infrastructure of canals, pumps, water systems and other facilities needed to overcome its inherent physical disadvantages. These pioneering years were rough ones for the growers who lacked an abundant water supply on Kauai.

The plantation railroad was started in 1884. Mules pulled the cane cars until 1886, when they were replaced with German-built locomotives. Kekaha is famous for the "Great Train Robbery of the Territory of Hawaii." In 1920, a local bandit made off with $11,000 of the Mana payroll.