Statewide County HI Archives Biographies.....Robinson, Aubrey October 17, 1853 - 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
J. Orr jessicanorr@gmail.com December 21, 2011, 3:14 pm

Source: The Story of Hawaii and Its Builders, Honolulu Star Bulletin, Ltd. Territory of Hawaii, 1925
Author: Edited by George F. Nellist

AUBREY ROBINSON, Sugar Planter and Rancher. Aubrey Robinson was born in 
Canterbury, New Zealand, on Oct. 17, 1853, the son of Charles Barrington and 
Helen Sinclair Robinson, and came to the Hawaiian Islands in 1863. His early 
education was received at home. Later he attended the Boston University Law 
School, being admitted to practise in 1875. Afterwards for several years he 
travelled extensively in Europe and the Orient.
  On returning to Hawaii, he commenced the cultivation of sugar cane and 
formed the copartnership of Gay & Robinson with Francis Gay, his cousin. This 
copartnership operates the lands of Makaweli, on the island of Kauai, together 
with adjoining properties. Subsequently, in 1889, with Sir William Renny 
Watson of Scotland, Mr. Robinson organized the present Makaweli plantation. By 
this arrangement the Hawaiian Sugar Co. cultivates in the neighborhood of six 
thousand acres under lease from Gay & Robinson, which, with about two thousand 
acres cultivated by Gay & Robinson, forms the Makaweli sugar plantation. On 
the extensive pasture lands lying above the sugar plantation, Gay & Robinson 
operate a ranch, maintain about one thousand head of Devon cattle. The 
organization of the Makaweli plantation necessitated the construction of 
ditches conveying irrigation water from the Olokele and Koula valleys in the 
Gay & Robinson mountain lands, the construction of these ditches being among 
the greatest engineering feats ever accomplished in Hawaii.
  Mr. Robinson also owns the island of Niihau, which is devoted mainly to the 
raising of purebred sheep and cattle from some of the finest strains of Merino 
sheep and Shorthorn cattle from the American mainland, Australia and New 
Zealand. The first purebred Arabian horses brought to the Hawaiian Islands 
were imported by Mr. Robinson from Arabia in 1884. The descendants of these 
horses are still raised at Makaweli and Niihau.
  About this time he also imported a number of game birds, including Mongolian 
and other pheasant, quail, etc. Many of these birds are now plentiful on the 
western side of Kauai. Trout and bass were also brought by him and placed in 
the Waimea and Makaweli streams.
  Mr. Robinson has taken a great interest in forest planting and conservation 
which have been carried out on a large scale at both Makaweli and Niihau, also 
in the importation and propagation of various improved varieties of tropical 
fruit trees, which have been brought from India, China, Mexico and other 
countries. Among these fruits which are now found growing at Makaweli and 
Niihau are a number of improved varieties of mango, pear, ohelo fruit, 
mangosteen, lichi, sapote, star apple and others. He was also the first to 
import tea plants, which were successfully introduced from Ceylon.
  Mr. Robinson has always taken an active interest in church and missionary 
work, both in Hawaii and abroad.
  He married Alice Gay in June, 1885, and they have five children: Sinclair, 
Aylmer Francis, Selwyn Aubrey, Eleanor and Lester Beauclerk.


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