Referring to ancient Hawaiians here.
I was just thinking today, looking a glove over, Hawaii is so faraway from the United States. It's far from everything; and it's just in the middle of nowhere.
So how did people ever get there to begin with??
I'm talking real ancient, like, Hawaiians that America conquered. Were they the first to be there? If not, what about the people that they conquered? There had to be some sort of migration or first discovery or something. But it was so long ago and there is so much distance! Please lay some knowledge on me!
Some previous answers. One with links to other answers, and another self-contained.
In short, yes, native Hawaiians are the original inhabitants of the islands.
Hawai'ians are Polynesians. They first arrived in Hawai'i c. 800 from Tahiti. They were the first humans on the islands. They brought dogs, pigs, and rats with them, and the cultivation of taro and bananas.
Go back to your globe and look at how long the Hawai'ian Archipelago is, from Kure in the west, past Midway, to the Big Island. Tahitians making contact anywhere along the line would see signs in the sky and weather to guide them to other islands in the chain.
Look up Hokule'a and the Polynesian Voyaging Society for more detail on the long-range double-hulled canoes and traditional navigation techniques. The Hokule'a has been all over the Pacific, starting with a voyage from Hawai'i to Tahiti. With the new Hikianalia, they are off on a circumnavigation of the world.
The original voyagers were looking to get away from political problems, as well as crowding, and were scouting for new land when they found the islands. It is no longer thought to be an accident. The polynesians managed to find Easter Island off South America as their most easterly settlement, and Madagascar off Africa as their most Westerly. They found Madagascr before anyone from Africa settled it!
If you want to know how they did it, the books from the PVS are best.
BTW it is not accurate to say America conquered Hawai'i. There had been coups and attempted ones back and forth for years. Both sides were racially mixed: it wa not Americans vs. Hawaiians. Hell, Queen Liliokulani was married to an American sea captain. The contingent of Marines off one ship had nothing to do with the coup: they went ashore the next morning to protect American businesses in case of violence. The Royal Hawaiian Guard were conspicuous in their absence from the Queen's defense. The new government petitioned the USA for years to get admission as a territory. It's all very messy, but since it was recast in racial/imperialist terms in the later Sixties to make it simple a lot of fact got thrown away.