The next era of Kīlauea 's history began with the establishment of the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory on the volcano 's rim in 1912 . The first permanent such installation in the United States , the observatory was the brainchild of Thomas Jaggar , head of geology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology ; after witnessing the devastation of the 1908 Messina earthquake near Mount Etna in Italy , he declared that something must be done to support systematic volcanic and seismic study , and chose Kīlauea as the site of the first such establishment . After securing initial funding from MIT and the University of Hawaii , Jaggar took directorship of the observatory and , whilst its head between 1912 and 1940 , pioneered seismological and observational study and observation of active volcanoes . After initial funding ran out , the Observatory was successively funded by the National Weather Service , the United States Geological Survey ( USGS ) , and the National Park Service , before settling on the USGS , under whose banner the observatory has been operating since 1947 . The main building has been moved twice since establishment , and today is positioned on the northwest rim of Kīlauea 's caldera
1908 Messina earthquake
1908 Messina earthquake
Kīlauea