Ben Finney: Voyaging Anthropologist Dies
Around 1991, a wizened heavily tanned New Zealander found his way to my dermatology office on Kauai. He had a few skin cancers and no insurance. I removed them gratis and in the process got to know David Lewis, a physician who left medical practice to learn the ancient navigational skills that were still practiced by a handful of men in the Marshall Islands.
Lewis, among others, worked with the anthropologist scholar and adventurer Ben Finney when the Hokulea made her early voyages from Hawaii to Tahiti. Ben Finney died on May 23, 2017 in Honolulu. His obituary in the NY Times is inspirational reading.
Finney, Mau Piailaug, Nainoa Thompson, David Lewis and the Pacific Voyaging Society were important players in the rediscovered of Polynesian migration and the recognition of Polynesians as the world's preeminent navigators.