Uncle Jack Gushiken
This article has been updated upon Uncle Jackโs passing on March 18, 2022.
Uncle Jack was a valued member of our team, and we are honored to have had the opportunity to work with him over the years as our Irrigation Systems expert. In September 2021, we celebrated Uncle Jackโs retirement and his 60+ years of managing the water resources and irrigation systems of the area in various capacitiesโ from Kilauea Sugar Plantation to Guava Kai to Common Ground.Share it ย
Born and raised on the north shore of Kauaสปi, โUncle Jackโ Gushiken is intimately familiar with Kฤซlauea, Kalihiwai, Kalihi Kai, and the surrounding areas.
I was lucky to grow up in an era when most of our food was found in the natural environment. The rivers, ocean, and mountains provide most of the food to support all of our community. What we could not get from our natural resources, we grew.
For more than 60 years, he has been managing the water resources and irrigation systems for the area where the Common Ground campus is currently located. There are few people today who hold deep historical knowledge of the various environmental patterns, cycles, and behaviors of this area.
Before it was the Common Ground Campus, the land was home to the Guava Kai Plantation and before that, the Kฤซlauea Sugar Plantation, and Jack was there, managing the irrigation systems. When Kฤซlauea Sugar closed in 1971, C. Brewer & Co, owners of the plantation, offered Jack a new position installing and overseeing irrigation systems, posted in Iraq. He took the job and left his home of Hawaiสปi for the first time. Jack returned in 1975 and began irrigation work for the Guava Kai Plantation. During this period, he also patented his own variety of guava: โGushiken Sweet.โ
The Kฤซlauea that Jack remembers from the plantation days is not the same Kฤซlauea of today. So many were employed to work the plantations during their operation height that there were many structures, systems, and a strong sense of community that no longer exists in the same way. Jack remembers celebrating holidays with the whole community at the Kฤซlauea Gym, fishing in the reservoir and upstream for สปoสปopu, the abundance of mokihana and maile in the mountains up Kalihiwai Valley, and swimming in the clean water of the irrigation ditches and Kฤซlaueaโs various waterfalls and rivers.
The Plantation-era is a significant part of the history of Kauaสปi. While Kฤซlauea town continues to evolve and grow, the community will have to do the same. Common Ground strives to be part of the strengthening of regenerative communities within Hawaiสปi.
ย ย ย ย There is so much to be learned from Jackโs observations, experiences, and understanding of the Kฤซlauea area. In addition to his work managing irrigation systems around the world, Jack was also a Kฤซlauea historian and record-holding fisherman.
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