Isolation Again Grips Tin Can Island Romantic South Sea Isle
Because lonely Niuafoou Island has no profitable amount of copra, trading vessels do not call, and its 1200 inhabitants asain face comolete isolation. With no harbor, mail is rowed to nassino- shins, or a 1
strong swimmer essays the task. Above, loft, is one of the highly prized covers from this island "Tin Can Island"; lower left, the rocky, dangerous landing place. Above, center, a photo of the island.
Below, center, sketch of the way mail is taken to ships. Right, a native.
By Woods Peters
A SPUTTERING radio, dependent on a swiftly
dwindling gasoline supply, is the last contact
for lonely Niuafoou Island in the far South Seas.
One ship, perhaps two ships, may call each year if
the water is utterly smooth as they pass the
island; if not, the islanders may again revert to
the use of the fire sticks that served them as late as
two years ago. They may be forced to eat only the
fish of the sea and the scanty vegetables their tiny
island will produce. Twelve hundred people, includ
ing one white man and a Catholic nun may be
utterly marooned almost in sight of one of the
Pacific's busiest shipping lanes, because the copra
business there does not warrant regular calls of
trading schooners, and the expense of detouring
transpacific liners for occasional souvenir mall is
prohibitive.
Two years ago, if the name "Niuafoou" was men
tioned not one individual in perhaps a million
would have recognized it. Today "Niuafoou" is
familiar in every city and town In the world where
stamp clubs meet. There are more than 30,000
people in America alone who boast letters carrying
its unique postmark, for Niuafoou is the famous
"Tin Can Island" where mail is was swum
through the open sea from ship to land. Today that
service has been stopped, except for the few letters
that travel by casual trading schooners, and phila
telists may never again bo able to receive its post
mark "DISPATCHED BY TIN CAN MAIL"
unless they chance a wait of months or years upon
the erratic wanderings of these casual craft
Have you ever stood at Walklki? If you have
visited that famed American play-beach In Hawaii
and looked down the light-path over the sea just
after the moon had passed the eenith, you have
1
Strange Island of Niuafoou, Ruled by Barefoot Queen, Cut Off From World
"Tin Can" Mail Delivery Suspended As Copra Trade Slumps
looked toward Niuafoou. Lying 2,908 miles west of
south of Honolulu, it is 5,312 miles from San Fran
cisco as steamers ply.
THERE is perhaps no stranger island in all the
world than is Niuafoou. A unit of the only mon
archy left in the Pacific, it is part of the Tongan
kingdom. Distantly ruled by a barefoot queen,
Salote Tubou of Tongatabu, who on state occasions
dons an ermine cloak despite the tropic climate,
Niuafoou's native inhabitants respond to the dic
tates of a much-beaded-and-shelled chieftain with
'unpronounceable name.
The island, itself, could not be classed as a tour
ist resort. There is no harbor, nor even a landing
place worthy of the name. Opposite the little vil
lage of Agaha (pronounced Ahn-gah'-ha) there is
a slightly lower place in the cliff where in calm
weather whale boats may come within a few feet
of the shore. At all other periods he who desires
to go ashore must leap into the surf and swim,
braving tricky currents and marauding sharks, to
be Anally hauled bodily by a line up the face of
the rocks.
Ashore, the visitor finds himself on a volcanic
rock almost 300 miles from the nearest land, half
way between Samoa and Fiji and 380 miles north
of Tonga's capital "city" on Tongatabu.
Niuafoou is unique in that it is a volcanic
"doughnut." Three and one-half miles in diameter,
it holds a roughly circular lake two and one-half
miles in diameter and about 70 feet above the level
of the surrounding ocean. Within this lake there is
another island and on that a smaller fresh-water
lake, so, were you a resident on Niuafoou, you
might take an evening dip "in the lake on the
island in the lake on the island."
To make matters really enjoyable from the visit
or's standpoint, Niuafoou is an active volcano. No
later than 1929 it burst into activity, lava stream
ing down the outer rim toward the sea, wiping out
everything in its path with the exception of the
Catholic church at Fatu, which still stands today,
a white landmark in the desolation of tumbled
brown rock.
THE island first came into world prominence back
in 1930 when parties of scientists visited it to
secure photographs and observations of the solar
eclipse which was best visible from that point.
Prior to that, W. G. Quensell, trading post operator
stationed there, had been mailing a few letters to
certain friends scattered about the world, post
marking them with the "Tin Can Mail" cancella
tion which is now so famous. But the island did
not become known to the general public until some
three years later.
At that date a story "broke" in San Francisco.
The Oceanic liner Mariposa, plying north from
Sydney, Australia, to San Francisco, had been
flagged down in the open sea opposite Niuafoou by
a tiny native canoe. A letter was passed up the
side of the liner that told of the cessation of calls
by trading schooners, due to the drop in the price
of copra, and the breakdown of their radio. "We
are making fire with fire stick," it said. For months
they had been out of commodities that are usually
considered as essentials. "Can you send something
ashore for us?"
Supplies were sent, and during the months that
followed, this liner and her sister ship, the Mon
terey, paused more or less regularly to drop rafts
carrying mail and necessities.
"Is Prince George married yet?" one of the out
coming letters had asked. "Are there any wars
threatening? . . . What is the depression doing to
the rest of the world?"
MAINLAND friends bundled together news
papers and magazines and when weather per
mitted, set them adrift on the rafts. When currents
permitted they were rescued and towed ashore by
the native swimmers. Sometimes they went astray.
Some may never have been seen again; one, how
ever, carried clear through to an isolated island of
the Fiji group and all items came back to the send
ers endorsed in red: "This mail went astray from
Niuafoou and was picked up at Fiji."
Mr. Quensell has been on Niuafoou some 20
years. Other white men, from time to time, have
spent a while there, but these men could almost
be numbered on the fingers of two hands. It
requires a special type of character to enjoy Niua
foou. There must be a streak of fatalism else the
presence of the volcano would be a constant worry.
There must be a sufficiency within oneself, or the
lack of occupation and diversion would be unbear
able. On the distant horizon a ship is sometimes
seen ; that is Niuafoou's contact with the world. At
long intervals a letter may come from some "out
side" friend. That is an epochal day, one to bring
copra harvesting to a stop, while the missive is
read and re-read, and dreaming eyes envision in
the Tongan sunset far places where the world
moves at a truly fearful pace, and steel horses
called "trains" thunder louder than does Pelee in
her tantrums.
Old Tacoma Tunnel Recalls
Colorful Days In Northwest
Was Used By Smugglers
BOISTEROUS days of the old West when men
often went unwillingly down to the sea in ships,
through the agency of crimps, and when Chinese
Coolie laborers were smuggled into the raw coun
try of the Pacific Northwest to work the railroads,
were recalled with the recent uncovering of a nar
row tunnel beneath the main business district of
Tacoma, Wash.
The dark, narrow tunnel, prosaically enough,
was discovered by a crew of workmen making
excavations prearatory to laying city light con
duit. It was located within a block of the public
safety building that houws Tacoma's police de
partment. To many old-timers the "find" brought back
vivid recol lections of the days when the crimps
and Chinese smugglers plied thoir nefarious
trades. The passageway was about three feet In
width and arched to B height of about five feet.
The destination of the passageway is still a mys
tery. Indications are that it ran to what formerly
may have boon an oiening somewhere along the
waterfront.
Such a tunnel, the aid-timers recalled, would
have been Ideal for shanghaiing drunken men from
the rear of some of the notorious saloons that
stood in this part of Tacoma a half century ago.
In those days, hundreds of sailing vessels from all
parts of the world crowded Tacoma's waterfront.
Similar tunnels, believed to have been used by
the Chinese smugglers, have been found elsewhere
In the city.
But whatever the original purpose of the tunnel
may have been, there seems little likelihood that
it ever will be fully explained, for the city light
department, anxious to get its conduit in place,
has sealed the owning with concrete.
PAGE TWO
Quit Job to Build Sailboat Now He's Off to See World i
"Crazy" Bennett To Sail On
Adventurous Voyage To Far
Lands Alone In 34-Foot Boat
THEY called him "Crazy" Bennett. All the long
years that he puttered on the ribs of his boat in
Los Angeles Harbor, they thought him queer. Now
they know better.
For "Crazy" Bennett, William P. Bennett, who
used to be a life insurance salesman, has thrown
away 38 years of his life to resume, at 53, an
around-the-world voyage which he abandoned in
18H7 at Galveston, Texas.
Since he was a youngster in knee breeches, Ben
nett has dreamed of a voyage to the far romantic
spots of the globe not the places frequented by
tourists, but the remote still primitive places. To
him strange horizons call Zamboanga, Sandakan,
Noumea! Mixed in with a good percentage of prac
ticality is much of the dreamer in Bennett's make
up. Adventure and romance have been beckoning
to him in the last few years, and at last he has ,
heeded the call of the "blue road."
"It's no use talking about those 38 years," he
said, the other day, while his hard knuckles gripped
the tiller of his 34-foot sailboat. Island Belle. The
wind, fresh off the Pacific, blew his graying hair
back from a seamed and leathery face. The two
sails swelled and tugged, the water sang under the
bows, and between millionaires' yachts the Island
Belle slipped out toward the Inlet of Balboa Bay.
Bennett is no millionaire far from it He sailed,
when he was 19, on the bark Guy C. Goss from
Santa Monica to San Francisco and around the
Horn to New York. Sick as a pup, he had to leave
the ship at Galveston, Texas, and his seagoing
days ended almost forever.
"1 sold insurance and real estate in Colorado and
California, but I never forgot the soa," he said,
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llllam P. Bennett, who waa called "Crary" Bennett for quitting a safe and comfortable career juit to resume an
oiu iuvtniun, 11 mown ners ii mt mier 01 nil nai, ii ana Bene, wmcn took him tlx yean to build He will
follow the tea trallt of famed Captain Harry Pigeon, hit friend. The -Itland Belle" it shown catching a light breexa.
while the Island Belle set her broad beam smashing
through the surf of the inlet
"There were troubles in those days that I'm going
to forget if I can but no matter. Eight years ago
I woke up. I gave up the selling game. Two years
later. I laid the keel of this boat, and it took me
six hard years to build her, because money was
hard to get. Now she's done; she'll outsail any
thing her size. In a week, two weeks at most, we'll
be gone. In three or four years, maybe, we'll be
back.
And if all goes as the courageous ex-salesman
hope the staunch Island BrUc will have carried
him alone to Hawaii. Samoa, the Fijis, the Solomon
Islands and Australia. Veteran seamen, who know
him, believe he will succeed. Those who don't know
his story are still calling him "Crazy" Bennett
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