Talk:Kanton Island
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In 1941 actor and playwrite Sir Noel Coward was traped on the Island for sixteen days and apprently loved every second of it. He was on route to the west coast when a monsoons struck. He said from the air the Island looked like a Cartier bracelet. Two years latter he wrote a book about the Island and the couple that ran the radio station the book is called Mr and Mrs Fleming. The Island is now deserted the hotel and radio station plus a flying clipper are in mothballs wating for us all to rediscover them anyone intrested? regards timhughes@bigpond.com LOOK FARWARD TO HEARING FROM YOU.
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[edit] A small stroke that is "folded"
I have removed the following from the article as it doesn't make sense to me at all. The <small> tags were in the article as well. If someone can make sense of it please reword it and add it back in if it deserves it.
- (it is a small stroke that is "folded", if it was totally right, you have to ride 33 km and you have seen the whole island)
Thryduulf 10:20, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Village - Kanton or "Pyramid Point" or "Tebaronga Village"?
What's the name of the village where the 41 people (census of 2005) live in, and where is it located? The census list of villages only lists "Kanton", perhaps since there is only one village on the island. Some sources talk about "Pyramid Point" at the southeast corner of the atoll (the German wikipedia article [1]), and there is a DX postcard on page [2] that talks about "Tebaronga Village". Are those different names of the same village, or are they historic names of different villages?Ratzer 18:35, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
24.6.112.137 01:05, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Island Used by NASA after 1965
I'm doing some research on a postcard I found in my parents' collection. On July 21, 1975, a friend of the family sent a postcard from Kanton Island. He was there as an ham radio operator, working at the NASA tracking station from where they tracked the Apollo-Soyuz craft. The postcard is postmarked the mentioned date with the Kanton Island seal, and includes two U.S. cancelled stamps commemorating the Apollo-Soyuz mission. So clearly the island was being used by NASA/U.S. after 1965, and American presence there was well after 1968. The postmark is also labeled "USPO", which should prove the U.S. post office was also there through 1975. Groink 23:58, 9 June 2007 (UTC)
I'm pretty sure your friend was most likely a civilian contractor to the USAF. Then it was Canton. Kanton came later on when it became part of Kiribati or what ever.
I was on Canton twice, two years running for about six weeks at a time in 1973 and 1974. It could have been 72 and 73. So you are correct as it was actually occupied by the US for quite a while after the time the article mentions.
I was in the USAF detached to the DMA (Defence Mapping Agency) then. I was there to locate the island using satellite geodesy which was a rather new technology in those days. I suppose you could say it was the predecessor of today's GPS. I situated my trig station down were the old Mercury towers once were. I can't see them on Google Earth now so I guess they are long gone. When I was there the towers were very corroded but still standing.
The island was used then by the US Air Force, SAMSO (Space and Missile Systems Organization) as one of the tracking stations that was then part of the SAMSO Western Missile Test Range. They occasionally shot missiles out of Vandenberg AFB down range in order to test the accuracy of the guidance systems etc. In addition to the radar on Canton, they also had a bore sight antenna and tower on Enderbury.
The Air Force had a charter fight out of Hickam AFB HI to American Samoa once a week with a stop going and coming at Canton. As I recall, in order to leave the air field terminal shelter or otherwise gain entry to the island you had to posses at least a secret clearance.
Most of the personnel were civilian contractors. I have forgotten which company ran the contract but I think it could have been Global something or other. Cooks, janitorial workers etc. were mostly Samoans that the contractor also supplied via a subcontractor. The site commander was a USAF Lt. Colonel and there were some regular USAF weather and a few administrative personnel there too. One oddly enough from my rather small home town in SC. Talk about a small world.
One of the rules there that was very strictly enforced was that there was to be no fighting what so ever. If you got yourself involved in a fight, both participants were shipped off the island on the next available flight and your contract was immediately terminated. It did not matter who began the altercation, both parties were shipped off no questions asked.
Tensions ran somewhat strained there as there were no women at all. Booze cost all of 25 cents for a highball, ergo the no fighting rule. The folks there had plenty of money for the booze too as they had free room and board and paid little to no taxes under the IRS 510 rule. If one got hard up enough for the sight of a female they could go down to the air terminal and maybe catch a glimpse of a rather large Samoan lady or two when the flight came through every week but that was about it for contact with the fairer sex. The contractors spend months on end there so they tended to get a little squirrely and crazy when they hit Hawaii for the occasional leave allowed them under the tax code. They had a lots of cash and what amounted to a full head of steam. You can probably imagine the rest. I can say that they had nothing to learn from any sailor past or present.
I obtained my NAUI scuba certification there and still have a Canton Island Dive Club patch. It had and I'm sure it still does have some of the best coral reef diving in the world. It offers crystal clear water every day of the week. The water is like a bathtub so no wet suit is needed if you keep stay say 60' and above. I wore a pair of cutoffs and a T shirt. The ride in and out of the mouth of the lagoon during the tide changes is a real blast. The entire lagoon fills and drains through the one narrow opening to the open ocean.
There is a very interesting story about the pack of stray dogs left behind by the Pan Am folks that taught themselves to fish cooperatively as a pack. It was written up in National Geographic. It's an amazing but true story, I've seem them do it.
The only naturally occurring land critters that I observed there were hermit craps, thousands upon thousands of them. There were of course lots of fish and bird life. The only plant life beyond scrub brush and a few grasses was some coconut palms but those were mostly on what was then the British side of the island.
When I was there, there was no physical British presence or even structure on the so called British side. 24.6.112.137 01:05, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
[edit] Military Presence Through 1973
My boss said he was stationed on this island in 1972 and 1973, and that there were still people there when he left. Who said that the American presence ended in 1968? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Misopogon (talk • contribs) 15:03, 22 January 2008 (UTC)
[edit] How to get there?
Does someone know how to get there nowadays? Sounds interesting for the article! Belgian man (talk) 10:08, 11 June 2008 (UTC)
