The Dole “pineapple” water tower was one of the distinguishing landmarks on the Honolulu cityscape for more than 60 years. Standing more than a hundred feet tall, including the office building it was attached to, it was one of the tallest structures on Oahu prior to World War II.

Designed and erected in 1927, it held 100,000 gallons of water and weighed 30 tons. It was better known than the “peach” water towers of Clanton, Ala., and Gaffney, S.C.; than the giant Brooks Foods ketchup-bottle water tower of Cillinsville, Ill.; even better known than the Libby Foods ear-of-corn water tower in Rochester, Minn.

Source: Honolulu Star-Bulletin

Dole guides pose beneath the pineapple water tower, a famous Honolulu landmark. More than 100,000 visitors each year tour spick-and-span Dole “kitchen”, the world’s largest fruit cannery. Jim Dole started Hawaii’s pineapple industry in 1901.

I, for one, would follow them anywhere…

Pine-apple Rag (1908): The third theme of this rag has the vocal quality that probably suggested its future use as a song; otherwise a strange choice. It is not particularly distinctive except for a joyful and very ragged second theme but is well enough constructed and substantial.

Source: Scott Joplin and the Ragtime Era

“Not particularly distinctive,” my eye! The mere mention of that most noble of bromeliads in the title elevates the song above all of Mr. Joplin’s other botanically-themed rags: Maple Leaf Rag, Sugar Cane Rag, Sunflower Slow Rag, Palm Leaf Rag, Gladiolus Rag, Rose Leaf Rag, and Fig Leaf Rag.