Editing History of Tuvalu (section)

==Trading firms & traders==
[[File:Tv-map.png|thumb|250px|A map of Tuvalu.]]
John (also known as Jack) O'Brien was the first European to settle in Tuvalu, he became a trader on [[Funafuti]] in the 1850s. He married Salai, the daughter of the paramount chief of Funafuti. The Sydney firms of [[Robert Towns|Robert Towns and Company]], J. C. Malcolm and Company, and Macdonald, Smith and Company, pioneered the coconut-oil trade in Tuvalu.<ref name="Doug Munro 1987">Doug Munro, ''The Lives and Times of Resident Traders in Tuvalu: An Exercise in History from Below'', (1987) 10(2) Pacific Studies 73</ref> The German firm of [[Johann Cesar VI. Godeffroy|J.C. Godeffroy und Sohn]] of Hamburg<ref name="SM">{{cite web| last = Masterman| first = Sylvia |title= The Origins of International Rivalry in Samoa: 1845–1884, Chapter ii. The Godeffroy Firm|publisher= George Allen and Unwin Ltd, London [[NZETC]] |page=63|year =1934|url= http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-MasOrig-t1-body1-d4-d2.html| access-date=15 April 2013}}</ref> established operations in [[Apia]], [[Samoa]]. In 1865 a trading captain acting on behalf of J.C. Godeffroy und Sohn obtained a 25-year lease to the eastern islet of [[Niuoko]] of [[Nukulaelae]] atoll.<ref name="GP">{{cite book |author1=Suamalie N.T. Iosefa |author2=Doug Munro |author3=Niko Besnier |title=Tala O Niuoku, Te: the German Plantation on Nukulaelae Atoll 1865–1890 | year= 1991 | publisher= Institute of Pacific Studies |isbn=9820200733}}</ref>

For many years the islanders and the Germans argued over the lease, including its terms and the importation of labourers, however the Germans remained until the lease expired in 1890.<ref name="GP"/> By the 1870s J. C. Godeffroy und Sohn began to dominate the Tuvalu [[copra]] trade, which company was in 1879 taken over by Handels-und Plantagen-Gesellschaft der Südsee-Inseln zu Hamburg (DHPG). Competition came from Ruge, Hedemann & Co, established in 1875,<ref name="SM"/> which was succeeded by H. M. Ruge and Company, and from [[Thomas Henderson (New Zealand politician)|Henderson and Macfarlane]] of Auckland, New Zealand.<ref name="Flude">[http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~tonyf/CSL/ ''The Circular Saw Shipping Line.''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110609213056/http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~tonyf/CSL/ |date=9 June 2011 }} Anthony G. Flude. 1993. (Chapter 7)</ref>

These trading companies engaged [[palagi]] traders who lived on the islands, some islands would have competing traders with dryer islands only have a single trader. [[George Lewis Becke|Louis Becke]], who later found success as a writer, was a trader on [[Nanumanga]], working with the Liverpool firm of John S. de Wolf and Co., from April 1880 until the trading-station was destroyed later that year in a [[cyclone]]. He then became a trader on [[Nukufetau]].<ref name="SON">{{cite web|first= Sally|last= O'Neill |title = Becke, George Lewis (Louis) (1855–1913)| year=1980|url= http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/becke-george-lewis-louis-5177/text8699|publisher= Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University |access-date=23 March 2013}}</ref><ref name="M&D">{{cite book |author1=James A. Mitchener |author2=A. Grove Day |title= Rascals in Paradise |year=1957 |publisher= Secker & Warburg |chapter= Louis Beck, Adventurer and Writer }}</ref> George Westbrook and [[Alfred Restieaux]] operated trade stores on Funafuti, which were destroyed in a cyclone that struck in 1883.<ref name="H83">{{cite book |last1=Resture|first1= Jane |title= Hurricane 1883 |url= http://www.janeresture.com/hurribebe/hurricanebebe2.htm |publisher= Tuvalu and the Hurricanes: 'Gods Who Die' by Julian Dana as told by George Westbrook}}</ref>

H. M. Ruge and Company, a German trading firm that operated from Apia, Samoa, caused controversy when it threatened to seize the entire island of [[Vaitupu]] unless a debt of $13,000 was repaid.<ref name="DMTM">{{cite book |author1=Doug Munro |author2=Teloma Munro |title= The Rise and Fall of the Vaitupu Company: An Episode in the Commercial History of Tuvalu |year=1985|publisher= 20 (4) Journal of Pacific History 174-90}}</ref> The debt was the result of the failed operations of the Vaitupu Company, which had been established by Thomas William Williams, with part of the debt relating to the attempts to operate the trading schooner ''Vaitupulemele''.<ref name="NZH">{{cite news |work =[[New Zealand Herald]] |volume=XVI |issue=5545 |date= 25 August 1879 |page=4 |url= http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=NZH18790825.2.9&l=mi&e=-------10--1----0tararua+campbell-- |title=Shipping News}}</ref> The Vaitupuans continue to celebrate Te Aso Fiafia (Happy Day) on 25 November of each year. Te Aso Fiafia commemorates 25 November 1887 which was the date on which the final instalment of the debt of $13,000 was repaid.<ref name="TP">{{cite web|last=Panapa |first=Tufoua |title=Ethnographic Research on Meanings and Practices of Health in Tuvalu: A Community Report |publisher=Report to the Tuvaluan Ministries of Health and Education: PhD Candidate Centre for Development Studies – "Transnational Pacific Health through the Lens of Tuberculosis" Research Group. Department of Anthropology, The University of Auckland, N.Z. |year=2012 |url=http://www.arts.auckland.ac.nz/webdav/site/arts/shared/Departments/anthropology/documents-publications/Tufoua%20Ethnographic%20Research%20on%20Meanings%20and%20Practices%20of%20Health%20in%20Tuvalu%20final.pdf |access-date=5 April 2017}}</ref>

[[File:Martin Kleis family.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Martin Kleis (1850–1908) with Kotalo Kleis and their son Hans Martin Kleis.]]
From the late 1880s changes occurred with steamships replacing sailing vessels. Over time the number of competing trading companies diminished, beginning with Ruge's bankruptcy in 1888 followed by the withdrawal of the DHPG from trading in Tuvalu in 1889/90. In 1892 Captain [[Edward H. M. Davis|Edward Davis]] of {{HMS|Royalist|1883|6}}, reported on trading activities and traders on each of the islands visited. Captain Davis identified the following traders in the Ellice Group: Edmund Duffy ([[Nanumea]]); [[Jack Buckland]] ([[Niutao]]); Harry Nitz ([[Vaitupu]]); John (also known as Jack) O'Brien (Funafuti); [[Alfred Restieaux]] and Emile Fenisot ([[Nukufetau]]); and [[Christian Martin Kleis|Martin Kleis]] ([[Nui (atoll)|Nui]]).<ref name="JRdd">{{cite book|first= |last= |title = The proceedings of H.M.S. "Royalist", Captain E.H.M. Davis, R.N., May-August, 1892, in the Gilbert, Ellice and Marshall Islands}}</ref> The 1880s was the time at which the greatest number of [[palagi]] traders lived on the atolls.<ref name="Doug Munro 1987"/> In 1892 the traders either acted as agent for [[Thomas Henderson (New Zealand politician)|Henderson and Macfarlane]], or traded on their own account.<ref>{{cite web|first= Jane|last= Resture|title = ''TUVALU HISTORY'' – 'The Davis Diaries' (''H.M.S. Royalist'', ''1892 visit to Ellice Islands under Captain Davis'')|url= http://www.janeresture.com/tuvalu_davis/index.htm|access-date=20 September 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110830021646/http://www.janeresture.com/tuvalu_davis/index.htm |archive-date=30 August 2011}}</ref>

From around 1900, Henderson and Macfarlane operating their vessel SS ''Archer'' in the South Pacific with a trading route to [[Fiji]] and the [[Gilbert and Ellice Islands]].<ref name="Doug Munro 1987"/><ref name="Archer">{{cite web|title = SS Archer (1883–1946)|url= http://www.wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?50490 |access-date= 5 December 2013}}</ref> New competition came from [[Burns Philp]], operating from what is now [[Kiribati]], with competition from [[Levers Pacific Plantations]] starting in 1903. Captain Ernest Frederick Hughes Allen of the Samoa Shipping and Trading Company competed for [[copra]] in the Ellice Islands, and the sale of goods to the islanders, when he built a trading store on Funafuti in 1911. In June 1914 he made Funafuti the operational base of the company, until the company was liquidated in 1925.<ref name="EFHA">{{cite book| last = Laracy  | first =Hugh |title= Ernest Frederick Hughes Allen (1867–1924): South Seas trader|publisher= Further Pacific Islands Portraits (Watriama and Co) |page=127-140|year =2013| doi =10.22459/WC.10.2013 | doi-access =free | isbn =978-1-921666-33-9 |url= https://press.anu.edu.au/publications/watriama-and-co | accessdate=22 March 2024}}</ref> [[Burns Philp]] continued to operate in the Ellice Islands, the company transferred the wooden auxiliary [[schooner]] ''Murua'' (253 tons) to the [[Tarawa]] - Ellice Islands run, until the vessel was wrecked at [[Nanumea]] in April 1921.<ref name="Doug Munro 1987">Doug Munro, ''The Lives and Times of Resident Traders in Tuvalu: An Exercise in History from Below'', (1987) 10(2) Pacific Studies 73</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1= |first1= |title= Schooner Wrecked - |url= https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/page/1243743|access-date=20 February 2024 |work= The Sydney Morning Herald, Page 12|date=27 August 1921}}</ref>

After the high point in the 1880s, the numbers of palagi traders in Tuvalu declined.<ref name="Doug Munro 1987"/> In the 1890s, structural changes occurred in the operation of the Pacific trading companies; they moved from a practice of having traders resident on each island to instead becoming a business operation where the [[supercargo]] (the cargo manager of a trading ship) would deal directly with the islanders when a ship visited an island.<ref name="Doug Munro 1987"/> By 1909 there were no resident palagi traders representing the trading firms.<ref>Doug Munro, ''The Lives and Times of Resident Traders in Tuvalu: An Exercise in History from Below'', (1987) 10(2) Pacific Studies 73, citing, Mahaffy, Arthur 1909 "Report ... on the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Protectorates." CO 225/86/26804; Wallin, F. 1910 "Report of 30 January 1910 on the Gilbert, Ellice and Marshall Islands", BPh</ref><ref name="AM1909">{{cite book |last1= Mahaffy |first1= Arthur |title= Report by Mr. Arthur Mahaffy on a visit to the Gilbert and Ellice Islands |year=1910|publisher= Great Britain, Colonial Office, High Commission for Western Pacific Islands (London: His Majesty's Stationery Office)|chapter=(CO 225/86/26804)|chapter-url=http://www.wdl.org/en/item/2367/ }}</ref> The last of the traders were [[Christian Martin Kleis|Martin Kleis]] on Nui,<ref name="AM1909"/><ref name="TPB12">{{cite web|title = Christian Martin Kleis|url= http://stampsoftuvalu.com/newsletter/2012-02.pdf|year=2012 |publisher= TPB 02/2012 Tuvalu Philatelic Bureau  |access-date=  19 November 2018}}</ref> [[Fred Whibley]] on [[Niutao]] and Alfred Restieaux on Nukufetau;<ref name="AR1">{{cite book|first= Alfred |last= Restieaux |title = Recollections of a South Seas Trader – Reminiscences of Alfred Restieaux |publisher= National Library of New Zealand, MS 7022-2}}</ref><ref name="AR2">{{cite book|first= Alfred |last= Restieaux |title = Reminiscences - Alfred Restieaux Part 2 (Pacific Islands) |publisher= National Library of New Zealand, MS-Papers-0061-079A}}</ref> who remained in the islands until their deaths.

Tuvaluans became responsible for operating trading stores on each island.<ref name="Doug Munro 1987"/> In 1926, [[Donald Gilbert Kennedy]] was the headmaster of Elisefou (New Ellice) on [[Vaitupu]]. He was instrumental in establishing the first co-operative store (''fusi'') on Vaitupu, which became a model for the bulk purchasing and selling cooperative stores established in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony to replace the stores operated by [[Palangi]] traders.<ref name="LH1">{{cite book |author1= Laracy, Hugh |title= Watriama and Co: Further Pacific Islands Portraits |year= 2013 |publisher= Australian National University Press |isbn=9781921666322|chapter=Chapter 11 - Donald Gilbert Kennedy (1897-1967) An outsider in the Colonial Service |chapter-url= http://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p260041/pdf/ch113.pdf }}</ref>