{{short description|American environmentalist who is the co-owner of Niʻihau, Hawaiian island}} {{other people||Keith Robinson (disambiguation){{!}}Keith Robinson}} {{Resume-like|date=July 2025}} {{Infobox person | name = Keith Robinson | image = | birth_date = {{birth based on age as of date|58|1999|5|14}}<ref name="star99" /> | caption = | known_for = Co-owner of Niʻihau | relatives = Aubrey Robinson (grandfather) | alma_mater = University of California, Davis }} '''Keith Robinson''' is an American environmentalist who is the co-owner of Niʻihau,<ref>{{Cite web|last=Soboleski|first=Hank|date=July 4, 2021|title=Island History: Aylmer Robinson, legendary owner of the 'Forbidden Island'|url=https://www.thegardenisland.com/2021/07/04/lifestyles/aylmer-robinson-legendary-owner-of-the-forbidden-island/|access-date=December 9, 2021|website=The Garden Island|language=en-US}}</ref> the second-smallest of the eight principal Hawaiian Islands.
==Early life== {{expand section|date=May 2023|small=no}}
Keith Robinson was born c. 1941 to Lester Beauclerk Robinson (1901–1969) and Helen Matthew Robinson (1910–2002).<ref name="star99">{{cite news |title= The Robinson family and native Hawaiians are turning to the military and tourism for income |author= Anthony Sommer |date= May 14, 1999 |newspaper= Honolulu Star-Bulletin |url= http://archives.starbulletin.com/1999/05/14/news/story1.html |accessdate= October 25, 2010 }}</ref> He has a brother, Bruce Robinson.<ref name="messynessychic">{{Cite web |date=September 3, 2021 |title=Hawaii's Forbidden Island and the Real-Life Swiss Family Robinson who Controls it |url=https://www.messynessychic.com/2021/08/25/hawaiis-forbidden-island-and-the-real-life-swiss-family-robinson-who-controls-it/ |access-date=November 11, 2024 |website=Messy Nessy Chic |language=en-US}}</ref><ref name="Star-Bulletin">{{cite news |last=Kekoa Enomoto |first=Catherine |date=July 14, 1997 |title= Nurturing 'natives': Keith Robinson, the family's 'black sheep,' is of a breed as rare as the Hawaiian plants he raises|url=https://archives.starbulletin.com/1997/07/14/features/story4.html |location=Honolulu |publisher=Honolulu Star-Bulletin |access-date=January 18, 2025}}</ref>
He attended the University of California, Davis, graduating with a degree in agronomy and ranch management.<ref name="Star-Bulletin" />
==Career and land ownership== After college, Keith served in the US Army. Subsequently, he returned to Hawaii, where he initially worked at the Ko’olau Ranch on Oahu seven years and then operated a commercial fishing vessel on Kauaʻi for another seven years.
Robinson and his brother Bruce own the approximately {{convert|70|sqmi|km2|adj=on}} island of Niʻihau in the Hawaiian island chain, which has been in the private possession of their family since their great-great-grandmother Elizabeth McHutcheson Sinclair (1800–1892) purchased it from King Kamehameha V for US$10,000 in gold.<ref name= "Paul 2021">{{cite web |last= Paul |first=Cecile |title=Hawaii's Forbidden Island and the Real-Life Swiss Family Robinson who Controls it |website=Messy Nessy Chic |date= August 25, 2021|url= https://www.messynessychic.com/2021/08/25/hawaiis-forbidden-island-and-the-real-life-swiss-family-robinson-who-controls-it/ |access-date=December 27, 2022}}</ref> He is also the manager of a private botanical garden on the Hawaiian island of Kauaʻi.<ref name= "star97">{{cite news|title=Niihau: Other Views |author=Keith Robinson |date= July 26, 1997 |newspaper=Honolulu Star-Bulletin |url= http://www.cocoisle.com/maps/niihau8.htm |accessdate=October 25, 2010 |url-status=dead |archiveurl= https://web.archive.org/web/20110708172045/http://www.cocoisle.com/maps/niihau8.htm |archivedate=July 8, 2011 }}</ref>
===Conservation work on Niʻihau=== Robinson has been credited for keeping numerous Hawaiian plants from becoming extinct,<ref name= "greenie">{{cite web |title= Hawaii Plantsman Confounds Greenies; Keith Robinson has a green thumb with endangered plants and a belief that the 'green' tactics used by the environmental establishment are a total waste of time |date= February 18, 2003 |author= Eric P. Olsen |work= Inisght on the News blog |publisher= CBS Interactive Business Network |url= http://www.propertyrightsresearch.org/hawaii_plantsman_confounds_green.htm |accessdate= August 23, 2012 |archive-date= April 25, 2017 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20170425183228/http://www.propertyrightsresearch.org/hawaii_plantsman_confounds_green.htm |url-status= dead }}</ref> including ''Cyanea pinnatifida'', which is considered extinct in the wild.
{{Blockquote|I've spent eighteen years and more than $250,000 doing this work, and I estimate it would cost the government or environmental groups $10–20 million to create a comparable reserve. I've done all phases of it myself; scouting, seed collecting, seed germination, planting, transplanting, watering, growing, fencing, fertilizing, and insecticide spraying. In most environmental groups or botanical gardens, the work is highly compartmentalized. You get your plant scouts, your seed collectors, your nurserymen, and people on the grounds. They all have different duties, and their duties never change, so none of them has a broad overview of what's going on. They don't know what specific problems there are at various stages where you're trying to produce the plants.<ref>{{cite news |title= Hawaii's rare breeds: after decades of solitary effort to save Hawaii's rarest plants, one man halts his efforts in response to government-environmentalist attacks private property rights |author= Margaret A. Haapoja |work= The New American |date= August 22, 2005 |url= http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Hawaii's+rare+breeds:+after+decades+of+solitary+effort+to+save...-a0135579374 |accessdate= December 6, 2010 }}</ref>}}
==Contemporary activities==
{{update inline|date=June 2025}} Robinson has repeatedly expressed his desire to keep Niʻihau privately owned so as to preserve the environment and traditions of its 150 to 200 native Hawaiian inhabitants, and has occasionally taken large financial losses to do so. {{citation needed | date=September 2025}} Robinson's grandfather, Aubrey, largely closed Niʻihau to outside visitors in 1915. His grandsons have maintained this practice, though a few hunters and other tourists are admitted each year—but with limited or no contact with the islanders. The Robinsons continue to ban radios, televisions and mobile phones on the island, in an effort to preserve as much of the indigenous island culture as possible. In 1997, Robinson estimated that between $8–9 million was spent to keep people employed, not counting the free housing and free meat provided to the 150–200 Niʻihau islanders.<ref name="star97"/> After 135 years of operation, the ranch on the island shut down{{why|date=June 2025}} in 1999, rendering all its inhabitants unemployed.<ref name="star99"/>
In 1998, Robinson expressed concerns about his family's ability to continue to maintain their ownership of Niʻihau, due to pressure from the federal and state governments and environmental groups. Taxes on the island had taken much of the profits from the Robinsons' interests in agricultural companies.<ref name="islandbreath">{{cite news |last=Moore |first=Trish |date=April 17, 1998 |title=Robinson Family may sell Niihau, Leave Hawaii |url=http://www.islandbreath.org/2005Year/a05-19-farming/0519-03robinsonlegacy.html |publisher=Honolulu Star-Bulletin |access-date=January 18, 2025}}</ref>
In 2005 a documentary entitled ''Robinson Crusader'' was released about Robinson's conservation work and ownership of Ni{{okina}}ihau.<ref name="robinsoncrusader">{{cite AV media|title=Robinson Crusader|date=2005|publisher=Snag Films|url=https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/robinson-crusader|access-date=July 21, 2025}}</ref>
==Family tree== {{Sinclair-Robinson family tree}}
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== * {{cite AV media|title=Robinson Crusader|date=2005|publisher=Snag Films|url=https://www.kanopy.com/en/product/robinson-crusader|access-date=July 21, 2025}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, Keith}} Category:1940s births Category:Living people Category:American environmentalists Category:20th-century American landowners Category:Niihau Category:People from Niihau Category:University of California, Davis alumni Category:Year of birth missing (living people) Category:20th-century United States Army personnel