The Marconi Wireless Telegraphy station is a historic structure on

Oʻahu Oahu (, , sometimes written Oahu) is the third-largest and most populated island of the Hawaiian Islands and of the U.S. state of Hawaii. The state capital, Honolulu, is on Oahu's southeast coast. The island of Oahu and the uninhabited Northwe ...

's North Shore between the towns of Kawela Bay and

Kahuku Kahuku () is a census-designated place (CDP) in Honolulu, Hawaii, United States. In the Hawaiian language, ''ka huku'' means "the projection", presumably a reference to Kahuku Point nearby, the northernmost point of land on the island of Oahu. As ...

. It was briefly the world's most powerful

telegraph station Telegraphy is the long-distance transmission of messages where the sender uses symbolic codes, known to the recipient, rather than a physical exchange of an object bearing the message. Thus flag semaphore is a method of telegraphy, whereas pi ...

History

Opened in 1914, at a cost of more than one million dollars, the first message was sent from

Iolani Palace Iolani is a masculine Hawaiian name meaning "royal ''hawk Hawks are birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. They are very widely distributed and are found on all continents, except Antarctica. The subfamily Accipitrinae includes goshaw ...

to Kaimuki. By 1916 messages were being sent to Japan, at a distance of 4,200 miles. A hotel was built to accommodate employees, along with a station master's building and an additional administration building. A library was provided for staff, and the hotel had a full-time Chinese cook. In 1917, the United States took over control of all wireless stations. Following the war's conclusion,

RCA RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded in 1919 as the Radio Corporation of America. It was initially a patent pool, patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Westinghou ...

ended up with ownership of the Kahuku station. The rapid acceleration of radio technology development meant that the station became obsolete much sooner than anticipated. By 1919 the station was already being described as "junk". In 1924 its chimney was removed, as steam was no longer being used to power the station. RCA installed new Alexanderson alternators were installed in 1921, with an output of two hundred kilowatts. In 1931, the original 470 foot tall masts were replaced by 100 foot wooden masts, thanks to advances in short wave technology. During World War Two the site hosted an airfield, but a tsunami destroyed much of the base. Later on, the Turtle Bay Golf Course built over much of one of the runways, and no military structures remain. During the early 2000s, the site was used for

aquaculture Aquaculture (less commonly spelled aquiculture), also known as aquafarming, is the controlled cultivation ("farming") of aquatic organisms such as fish, crustaceans, mollusks, algae and other organisms of value such as aquatic plants (e.g. Nelu ...

and the telegraph station was beginning to deteriorate. In 2005 the station and surrounds were purchased by a businessman, and are currently being redeveloped for tourism. In 2024 the current owners and developers demolished the roof and interior of one the remaining structures without a permit. https://www.civilbeat.org/2024/01/unauthorized-demolition-occurs-at-historic-marconi-telegraph-site-on-north-shore/

References

National Register of Historic Places in Honolulu {{Hawaii-stub