Hawaiian heritage sites affected by the 2023 wildfires are getting more on-the-ground help. The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded a grant of $19,605.79 to the Foundation for Advancement in Conservation (FAIC) to deploy two of its National Heritage Responders (NHR) to the island of Maui. Malia Van Heukelem and Liane Naʻauao, volunteer experts in cultural-heritage conservation and preservation, will help institutions damaged by the fires—starting with the Lahaina Jodo Mission, a historic Buddhist temple.
Wildfires last August destroyed much of the historic town of Lahaina—the first capital of the Hawaiian Kingdom—on the northwest coast of Maui, killing more than 100 people. Many museums and heritage sites were critically damaged or destroyed, including all but one of the 14 historic sites owned or managed by the Lahaina Restoration Foundation.
Van Heukelem and Naʻauao, conservators based on the neighbouring island of Oahu, have been working remotely since last year to mitigate the situation in Lahaina through consultation sessions and webinars. Starting in July and continuing through spring 2025, they will travel to Lahaina six times to help affected institutions and historic sites, advising on best practices for storage of salvaged objects and their safe handling.
“As a National Heritage Responder for more than a decade and as a collections manager whose career began with emergency response, deploying to Lahaina is a meaningful opportunity to collaborate with the community to safeguard sites, artefacts and traditions,” Van Heukelem said in a statement.
“This collaboration is not only about preserving objects, but also ensuring that the next generation will get the chance to appreciate Lahaina’s extraordinary history and culture,” Lissa Rosenthal-Yoffe, executive director of FAIC, said in a statement.
The NHR programme started in part as a reaction to the damage caused by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita to New Orleans in 2005. Since then, teams of volunteers have worked on the ground in areas affected by floods, hurricanes and tropical storms across the US and in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake. There are currently 90 conservators, curators, librarians, archivists and other collections professionals actively serving as NHR volunteers—with an additional 35 on reserve.