Abraham Fornander

Abraham Fornander (November 4, 1812 – November 1, 1887) was a Swedish-born emigrant who became an important Hawaiian journalist, judge, and ethnologist.

Fornander was born in Öland, Sweden on November 4, 1812, to Anders (1778–1828) and Karin Fornander (1788–1872). His education was under his father, a local clergyman, except for two years in 1822 and 1823 when he attended gymnasium in Kalmar, studying Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. His mother's surname was spelled Foenander, so his surname is sometimes spelled that way.

In 1828, Fornander began his university studies at the University of Uppsala where he studied theology, transferring to the University of Lund in 1830. However, in 1831, he abandoned university studies to attend to his family, which had fallen under hard times. While thus providing for his family, he met and fell in love with his mother's youngest sister, who was four years his senior. After a short, torrid affair, Fornander was forced to leave in disgrace, and so made his way to the Swedish port of Malmö, and then to Copenhagen, from where he set out for the new world.

The next years are poorly documented, but he later wrote that circumstances in America forced him to go to sea, and it seems he became a whaler for the following decade. He joined the whaleship Ann Alexander in New Bedford in 1841, which set out for what would prove to be a five-year campaign in the Pacific Ocean. In 1844, Fornander deserted his ship in Honolulu, Hawaii. Fornander was to stay in the Hawaiian Islands for the rest of his life. On January 19, 1847, he became a citizen of the Kingdom of Hawaii as he took an oath of allegiance to Kamehameha III, the Hawaiian king, and married a Hawaiian chiefess from Molokai named Pinao Alanakapu. The couple had three daughter and two sons: Catherine Kaonohiulaokalani (March 31, 1849 – May 18, 1905), Johanna Margaretha Naokalani Kalanipoo (November 30, 1851–c. 1852), Anna Martha Alaikauokoko (September 19, 1853, stillborn), Abraham Kawelolani Kanipahu (August 12, 1855, stillborn), and Charles Theodore Kalililani Kalanimanuia (January 16, 1855 – January 31, 1855). His wife died four days after giving birth to their son Charles on January 20, 1857 of puerperal fever.

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