60 years ago, for my first job, I became a sugar engineer with C. Brewer in Naalehu within Kau on the Big Island of Hawaii.   Next door 12 miles away was Pahala, where I found my wife, Pearl.   34 miles further was The Volcanoes National Park. Hilo was another 22 miles ( 66 miles from Naalehu ), and at my arrival in this southernmost point of the U.S., there was no television nor radio reception in these two sugar cities.  Not sure if there was any area in the continental USA where this was possible.  The reason was Mauna Loa, which blocked signals.  At night you could with the right equipment listen to some radio static. About the history of this region, not  much happened in Kau until in 1868 when there was  a 7.9 Richter quake  which produced a tsunami devastating coastal villages, and five days later triggering a Mauna Loa eruption ( yellow spot below ), forming an 18-mile fissure, and fountains of 1000 feet, where lava entered the sea just northwest of South Point ( black flow ) .