Grove Koger
Tracking down the photo of the cacao pod for my 12/24/18 post reminded me of the 2009 visit that Maggie and I paid to the Hawaiian island of Kauaʻi, and especially of the week we spent in a little cottage near Anini Beach on the north shore. The beach itself was ideal—long and sandy—and its warm, shallow waters were enclosed by a coral reef, providing us with hours of lazy swimming. As it turned out, the cottage was also a short drive from the northernmost tip of the island, Kīlauea Point, and its picturesque 52-foot lighthouse.
I’ve learned from a bit of research that the American government purchased the peninsula from the Kīlauea Sugar Plantation for the nominal sum of $1 in 1909 and began construction of the lighthouse three years later. The work was finished in 1913, and the event was celebrated, appropriately enough, with a luau. Thanks to the Point’s 200-foot elevation, the light could be seen from 20 miles at sea.
Illumination from the structure’s incandescent oil vapor lamp was focused by an enormous, 4-ton Fresnel lens floating on a 260-pound bed of mercury and rotated by a system of cables and weights—a complex apparatus that had to be rewound every 3.5 hours! Gas generators made it possible to replace the lamp with a giant bulb in 1930, and a radio beacon was added the same year. The introduction of an electric motor in 1939 eliminated the onerous task of winding, but light’s operations were automated completely only in 1974. Today a stronger beacon mounted on a modest ten-foot pole performs the light’s original task.
The Kīlauea Point Lighthouse was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, and the area became a national wildlife refuge in 1985. The day we visited the Point, we enjoyed a breathtaking view out over the Pacific and watched myriads of albatrosses, tropicbirds and gulls diving and wheeling through the enormous gulf of space that lay at our feet.
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Shortly after our visit, the lighthouse underwent three years of restoration—a project that was completed in time for its centennial celebration. Now known as the Daniel K. Inouye Kīlauea Point Lighthouse in honor of the U.S. senator who helped raise money for its restoration, it is noticeably more attractive than it was in 2009. See kilaueapoint.org/lighthouse/ for details. Should you visit, be sure to pick up a copy of the attractive book you see below, published by the Kīlauea Point Natural History Museum.
And for an explanation of a Fresnel lens, which I had never heard of until I started researching this lighthouse, consult the online version of the Encyclopædia Britannica at britannica.com/technology/Fresnel-lens.
World Enough 