News from the Pitcairn Islands Study Center, California, USA

MEMORIAL PLAQUE
We have recently put up a Memorial Plaque in the Pitcairn Islands Study Center that will name, friends; friends of Pitcairn; friends of Pitcairners, and also Pitcairners themselves to be honored and remembered on a permanent basis.  The plaque is being displayed in the most heavily traveled part of the Study Center, so all who come to study or visit will see these whose lives and memories are held dear.  Barbara Kuchau, the list mum of Friends of Pitcairn, has taken the first memorial tab on the plaque to honor her late husband.

Both the name of the honored one, and of the one giving the honor will appear on each memorial tab.  The Memorial Plaque is a sponsored one with each sponsorship being U.S.$100.00.  This covers the initial production of the plaque itself, of the engraving of the memorial tab, and the remainder amount going to the Endowment Fund which the Study Center is currently engaged in.

PHOTOGRAPHIC LOG
We are now doing a photographic log as it were of every sea-going vessel calling at Pitcairn (save the time-and-again calls of Claymore II, the island’s supply vessel.  Pitcairner Brian Young is unlimbering his camera at each calling vessel and providing these photographs to us.  They appear under our “Transportation” pages, and we give as much information about the call as we can quickly put together to go with the photograph.
http://library.puc.edu/pitcairn/studycenter/cruiseship.shtml

SOUVENIRS
In the Pitcairn store we are going to be adding several items soon:  The first new items will be Pitcairn tapa for sale.  This throwback to earlier Pitcairn life (among the Polynesian women and their more or less immediate descendants) is provided to us by Meralda Warren, and her young disciples she is teaching this long and laborious work with the bark of the mulberry tree.  A second new offering of the Study Center store will be T-shirts showing the Center’s name and various Pitcairn-Bounty related illustrations.  These are being supplied to us by one of my former students here at Pacific Union College, who currently owns/operates a large sign company in the U.S. state of Idaho.  Soon we’ll be adding the sale of Pitcairn honey, and Pitcairn crafts may follow if we can work out a fairly guaranteed supply line for them.  So the Study Center store grows.

Continuing work towards Pitcairn’s marine reserve

Many members will recall the presentation at our AGM in 2012 from Elisabeth Whitebread of the Pew Charitable Trusts, who are working with the National Geographic Society and the Pitcairn Island Council on the creation of the world’s largest marine reserve in Pitcairn’s waters. The Pitcairn community voted unanimously in favour of the marine reserve in September 2012, but in order for the reserve to go ahead the Governor and the UK Foreign Office have to give the go ahead.

In January this year the British government were sent the joint formal proposal, and they have since come back with some questions about enforcement, tourism and science. These have now been answered in four detailed reports – all peer reviewed by experts – that were sent to the Governor and the Foreign Office in June.

In May Elisabeth was back on Pitcairn (her third trip to the island!) with colleague Heather Bradner. They visited each household to discuss the reports with them, and answer any questions people had about the reserve and the government’s decision-making process. This time they were also on island with Blue Ventures (www.blueventures.org), an award-winning UK-based ecotourism organisation that is interested in partnering with Pitcairn on voluntourism opportunities.

Studies show that because Pitcairn’s waters lie in an area of the Pacific that is low in nutrients, they lack the conditions necessary to support commercially significant fish stocks.  Therefore large-scale commercial fishing is not economically viable and would not be sustainable (although the marine reserve would of course allow for continued fishing by Pitcairners around the island).

However, as last year’s National Geographic and Pew expedition uncovered, Pitcairn’s waters are the clearest ever recorded, and harbour the deepest tropical coral reef known to man. If managed properly, Pitcairn’s marine environment could unlock the key to an environmentally and economically sustainable future for Pitcairn, and offer a beacon of hope for the world’s threatened seas.

If you’d like more information about the marine reserve proposal, please email Elisabeth Whitebread on ewhitebread@pewtrusts.org or visit www.protectpitcairn.org or www.facebook.com/ProtectPitcairn

Maurice Allward's collection

The following note from Herb Ford appeared on Friends of Pitcairn on 13th March, 2013:


"It is with joyful heart but tearful eye that I tell you we have just received here at the Pitcairn Islands Study Center six large boxes containing the last part of the wonderful Bounty/Pitcairn Collection of the late Maurice Allward.  The gift of Maurice’s collection to the Study Center comes from Joy Allward, Maurice’s beloved wife.

"There are many rarities among the many items received, but two are especially noteworthy:  One is several  locks of hair, said to be from seven of the Bounty mutineers (and Maurice - once he had obtained this rare find – went to great length to try to authenticate it).  The other is the authenticated  original draft of John Adams’ prayer.

"One of my favorite items in Mrs. Allward’s gift is a scale made of two coconut halves.  It is a scale quite possibly similar to the little scale Bligh used to weigh out rations to the loyalists with him during that long voyage of Bounty’s launch across those thousands of miles of the Pacific Ocean after the mutiny.

"It is my understand that two members of the Pitcairn Islands Study Group, United Kingdom Chapter – John O'Conner and Roger Bedingfield – assisted Mrs. Allward in the careful packing of all the items in the boxes, and it was a careful packing they did too – no major damage of any kind on arrival; I am most grateful to these two gentlemen for their help.

"So the worth, the value of the Pitcairn Islands Study Center to all its future users has increased significantly through this addition of the large, diverse Maurice Allward Bounty/Pitcairn Collection.  For this gift we say a heartfelt “Thank you” to Mrs. Allward, and to the memory of the great good friend of Pitcairn Island, Maurice Allward!  

"An added note may be of interest to some:  On March 21, Dr. Tillman Nechtman of Skidmore College in New York, will address the faculty of Pacific Union College, on the research value he finds in the Pitcairn Islands Study Center, and the need for faculty enrichment through research – personal enrichment, institutional enrichment, and the enrichment of society.  Dr. Nechtman was one of the speakers at the 2012 Bounty-Pitcairn Conference last August, and his bent toward research made him a natural choice to speak at this faculty meeting which will highlight the value of the Pitcairn Islands Study Center to Pacific Union College and to researchers everywhere.

Fair winds to all.
Herb
Pitcairnstudycenter.org"