Lloyd Stone (1912 - 1993) was born in California and attended the University of Southern California as a music major, with the intent of becoming a teacher. Instead, he joined a circus bound for Hawaii and remained there for the rest of his life, writing poems and songs. This is his best known work; stanzas 1 and 2 were written in 1934 when Lloyd was 22 years old. Often combined with several additional verses by Georgia Harkness, the poem is typically sung to the tune Finlandia, composed by Jean Sibelius. Lloyd also wrote a musical based on Joyce Kilmer's poem, "Trees," and several books of Hawaii-themed poems. Said one reviewer, "[Stone] does not sing of the palms and the surf, but of the earthy human beauty which is the heritage of the islands."

Georgia Elma Harkness (1891- 1974) was a Methodist theologian with a passion for poetry and the arts, and a dream of global, ecumenical Christianity. Born in Harkness, New York (the town was named after her grandfather), Georgia was a graduate of Cornell and also studied at Yale and Harvard. A trailblazer for generations of women to follow, Georgia was the first female theologist to teach in a seminary. She wrote nearly forty books in the course of her career.