The Prince of Penpainters

High on a hill overlooking Hilo Bay on the island of Hawaii lies the remains of Titus Coan of Killingworth. Coan died at Hilo 129 years ago on Dec. 1, 1881, at age 80.

Born and raised in Killingworth, the Rev. Titus Coan left Boston for Hawaii 186 years ago on Dec. 5, 1834, to do Christian missionary work in what were then called the Sandwich Islands. He returned to his native country briefly in 1870 before once again going back to Hilo, where he died in 1881.

But besides his well-earned reputation as an effective missionary — he once baptized more than 1,700 converts on one Sunday in the waters of Hilo Bay — Coan additionally provided  valuable scientific information on volcanic eruptions.

In fact, his descriptions of volcanic activity over four decades were so vivid that the American Journal of Arts and Sciences referred to him as the "prince of penpainters." Coan's description of an eruption at Mauna Loa in the fall of 1855 to Professor James D. Dana of Yale University in a letter dated Oct. 15, 1855, proves the point.

"A fiery sword hangs over us. A flood of burning ruin approaches us. Devouring fires are near us. With sure and solemn progress the glowing fusion advances through the dark forest and the dense jungle in our rear, cutting down ancient trees of enormous growth and sweeping away all vegetable life. For sixty-five days, the great summit furnace on Mauna Loa has been in awful blast.

"Floods of burning destruction have swept wildly and widely over the top and down the sides of the mountain. The wrathful stream has overcome every obstacle, winding its fiery way from its high source to the bases of the everlasting hills, spreading in a molten sea over the plains, penetrating the ancient forests, driving the bellowing herds, the wild goats and the affrighted birds before its lurid glare, leaving nothing but ebony blackness and smoldering ruin in its track."

Another noted scientist of the day, Professor W.D. Alexander, said of Coan:

"Although he had not enjoyed any special scientific training and made no pretensions to the character of a professional geologist, he was a good observer … For physical vigor and endurance he had few equals. In addition, he had a natural gift of language and his descriptions are remarkably vivid  and true to nature."

Professor Alexander puts the importance of Titus Coan to the development of 19th-century geology this way.

"To him geology is indebted for a continuous record of the Hawaiian volcanoes for more than forty years … The near view which he had of the sublime lava fountain of 1852 was an experience unparalleled by anything on record. No history of the two volcanoes of Mauna Loa and Kilauea can be written which will not be largely based on Mr. Coan's writings … On one occasion he risked his life in attempting to measure the heat of the liquid lava in the South Lake of Kilauea with a pyrometer furnished by Prof. Dana."

Though the house Coan was born in no longer stands in Killingworth, a marker designates its former location on a road that bears his name. As a 9-year-old boy, he nearly died after falling through thin ice on the way to school one morning. A friend and schoolmate — with a last name ironically appropriate for saving someone who influenced the course of geology so much — saved him: Julius Stone.

Born on land near a dormant volcano — the Killingworth Dome — Titus Coan spent most of his adult life living in proximity to active volcanoes in Hawaii and, without intending to do so, made a huge impact on the course of geology in the 19th century.

Read more about Titus Coan and the Hawaii Center for Volcanology here.