Aloha Rodeo: Three Hawaiian Cowboys, the World’s Greatest Rodeo, and a Hidden History of the American West

I was not expecting to enjoy Aloha Rodeo as much as I did, or learn as much as I did from it either. For example, I didn’t know that for much of twentieth-century cattle ranching was a very large industry on the Hawaiian Islands. I also didn’t know that the first bullocks brought to Hawaii were gifts from the British, but Spaniards were actually the first cowboys in North America. This book packs a lot of history but reads like a Western. It weaves together the history of Hawaii, but also of Wyoming, two unique areas unlikely to collide, but collide they did when three native Hawaiian’s came to Cheyenne’s world-famous rodeo days in 1907. I was very impressed by the balance these authors struck: on one hand, the settling of the West and Manifest Destiny gave the United States many great things, but at a terrible cost to other people, including Native Hawaiian’s. They were able to make these facts meet in an event that spans three days but took the main characters several generations to get to. I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the history of Hawaii, the West, or the rodeo.