Gifts from the Northwest Coast

...the largest single canoe we had seen amongst these islands, being about sixty feet long and made of one piece of the trunk of a pine tree which had drifted on shore...(Archibald Menzies in 1794)

A fortuitous set of circumstances brought together the needs of the Hawai`iloa Project with a source of timbers. Herb Kane, designer of Hokule`a and NHCAP representative, was also an adopted member of the Alaskan Tlingit Tribe. Since Hawaiian Koa was unavailable, he suggested that logs could be secured from the northwest coast.

The Haida and Tlingit Tribes, together with Sealaska Corporation, offered the Hawaiians a magnificent gift from their forests. The largest of the nine Sitka spruce logs were rare natural treasures, more than 400 years old.
Mechanical Muscle!
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