Historical landmark
Diamond Head Lighthouse
3399 Diamond Head Rd, Honolulu, HI 96815, USA
Reinforced concrete beacon on a volcanic headland, still guiding ships past the reef with a light first lit in eighteen ninety-nine.
This guide to the Diamond Head Lighthouse in Honolulu opens at 6:17 on the morning of December 7, 1941, inside the small Coast Guard radio room beneath the tower, where a young Hawaiian serviceman named Melvin Bell is on watch as the attack on Pearl Harbor begins. It traces the tower itself back to 1899, when keeper John Kaukaliu first lit the original iron lighthouse, through the 1917 rebuild in reinforced concrete that still stands today. Bell had joined the Coast Guard as a mess attendant, one of the few roles then open to a Pacific Islander.
Audio guides are written and narrated by AI.