Kāne’s role in the creation and promotion of the "Hōkūle‘a" helped restore pride to the peoples of the Pacific, and his paintings of traditional Hawaiian scenes and historical events have helped restore lost identity and, in the words of the President of School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Tony Jones, “rewritten the history of the Pacific.” Kāne’s colleague, Nainoa Thompson, navigator of the "Hōkūle‘a", says Kāne was "the visionary, the dreamer, and he was the architect and the engineer. He's the one that carried the burden of building, and constructing, and sailing Hōkūle‘a.” Elsewhere, Thompson told an interviewer, “When you look at Herb’s legacy, it is transforming Hawaii’s society because he brought pride and culture and inspiration back, through the canoe….He is the father of the Hawaiian Renaissance.”