Paramount Chief of Taumako, Koloso K. Kaveia, was born at Kahula area of Taumako, in the S. E. Solomons, sometime around 1912. He was a small boy when over 2000 of the people on Taumako died in the 1918 flu pandemic. He, his father Lata, and 31 other survivors then moved to the other side of Taumako to Jive on the ancient artificial island of Tahua. There they faced the 1920 arrival of a missionary, who was murdered, followed by reprisals and then by soldiers and officials representing the 1922 colonization by Great Britain.

At about eight years old Kaveia was taken by voyaging canoe to live with relatives at Pileni in the Outer Reef Islands. Soon after he joined the crew of a voyaging canoe as a bailout boy. He was precocious at sea, and after just a few years he began to steer the vaka.

When he was about twenty six he went home to Taumako and studied navigation there with his father. He spent several decades at sea on voyaging canoes as well as being mate of a trading schooner that plied the region between the Florida Islands and southern Vanuatu.

In 1936 he sailed to Vanikoro to attend a meeting of the Chiefs of all the Sta. Cruz Islands and Tikopia, in which it was decided that the Polynesian people would adopt the use of British currency for all but the most important cultural purposes - acquiring wives and canoes.

In 1920 there were over 200 tepuke in the Santa Cruz Islands. In 1963 the last tepuke broke up after demonstrating its handling abilities to a Life Magazine photographer near the Outer Reef Islands.

In about 1970 Kaveia built a "tepuke" voyaging canoe to greet the visit of the Duke of Edinborough to the new Provincial capitol of Lata at Sta. Cruz Island. Unknown to Kaveia beforehand, the colonial government gifted his tepuke to the Duke, who shipped it home. In 1979 Kaveia led his community in building a tepuke on demand of the Solomon Islands government, which required them to sail it to Port Moresby, PNG to represent the Solomon Islands in the Pacific Arts Festival of 1980. This tepuke was to be the only fully traditional canoe and the only one navigated using only traditional methods. Unfortunately the provincial and national governments held up Kaveia and his crew in Lata and Honiara for weeks of political grandstanding, and by the time they were allowed to depart for PNG the season was ending. They made it to Vela LaVella before the wind shifted and could not achieve their goal. They were never paid and had to find their own ways home, and Kaveia went blind with cataracts within a few weeks. The tepuke was confiscated by the government, which promised to make a permanent shelter for it, but never did. The seven fathom long tepuke was wrecked in a cyclone. Kaveia waited for his next chance to build and sail a tepuke. He was determined that the next tepuke would be for, and remain with, his people. In 1996 he, aided by anthropologist Mimi George, started the Vaka Taumako Project.

The Return of Lata

P. C. Kaveia tells the story of how his direct ancestor, Lata, who was also born at Kahula, grew up to build and sail the very first voyaging canoe (vaka) of the type called tepuke. This design is a massively outrigged proa, with a radically "delta" or "slender foil" shaped lauhala sail that the Taumako people say is "Lata with his arms curved up over his head." To this day, the smallest allowable length of a tepuke is six fathoms, but even at the smallest size, the tepuke is stabile, powerful, and easy sailing enough to carry many tons of cargo and 5 to 10 people at over 10 knots of speed in light to moderate tradewinds.

In 1996 - 97 P.C. Kaveia led his community in building the "Vaka Taumako" (Vaka for Taumako) for the education of and use by youth of his community - the first "Vaka a Lata" that they built for such a purpose since the 1950's.

In 2002 the Vaka Taumako Project completed construction of a canoe house (halevaka) on Taumako, to shelter the tepuke and two smaller voyaging canoes (tealolili), and to be the home of the newly founded Lata School of Navigation.