Penrhyn (also called Tongareva, Māngarongaro, Hararanga, and Te Pitaka) is an atoll in the northern group of the Cook Islands in the south Pacific Ocean.

The atoll is atop the highest submarine volcano in the Cook Islands, rising 4,876 metres (15,997 ft) from the ocean floor.

The brig Chatham ran aground at Penrhyn during a storm in January 1853, resulting in some of the crew being stranded on the island for almost a year.

In 1862, the ship Adelante took hundreds of Tongarevans aboard, ostensibly to transport them to a nearby island as agricultural workers.

[6] The Tongarevans went willingly: coconut blight had led to famine, while the local missionaries saw work overseas as a way of bring money to the atoll to pay for larger churches.

Penrhyn was officially annexed for Great Britain by Captain Sir William Wiseman of HMS Caroline on 22 March 1888.

The island was considered to have a strategic location on the route of a proposed Trans-Pacific telegraphic connection between Canada and Australia.

U.S. Navy Seabees began work on a runway in July 1942, with aviation gasoline storage tanks added to the completed field.

During the war, U.S. Navy PBY Catalina and USAAF B-24 Liberator bombers were stationed on the island, along with about a thousand support personnel.

The U.S. Army vessel Southern Seas struck an uncharted reef on 22 July 1942 and was severely damaged with flooded engine rooms and abandoned in Taruia Pass while on an island charting assignment in support of the construction.

Tongareva's Women's Craft Guild loaned their meeting house; however, this meant that five classes ranging from 3 to 16 years old had to be taught in a single room.

The main village of Omoka, the seat of Penrhyn Island Council, is on Moananui Islet, on the western rim of the atoll, north of the airport.

The locally produced Rito hats are woven from fibre from young coconut leaves, which are stripped, boiled and dried, resulting in a fine white leaf.

[21] The present population of the island relies on the ocean for most of their food as well as locally grown plants such as coconut, pawpaw, breadfruit and puraka (yam).

Every morning (except on Sundays), men from the island head out in small tin boats to spear or trawl for fish for their families.

Provision of diesel fuel required two long sea voyages: Auckland to Rarotonga, then onwards to the northern Cooks Islands (ships travelled 7,000 km each way).