Original vintage 1980s Rolex Oyster Perpetual Date advertisement, featuring Hawaii's famously active volcano, Kilauea, and Dr. Michael Garcia. " 'You have to respect Kilauea's might - especially when you feel it rumbling beneath your feet,' he said. Demanding the highest standards from his instruments, Dr. Garcia insists that they be rugged and reliable. It's little wonder that he has chosen a Rolex Oyster Perpetual as his timepiece."
Dimensions: Roughly 6.5 inches wide by 10 inches high.
Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano has been erupting for over 30 years, making it the longest-flowing volcano on earth. In fact, it's most recent large eruption was in late May 2025, when it began shooting lava fountains over 1,000 feet into the air, and the the six-hour eruption marked the 23rd episode in a series of eruptions that began in December 2024.
Because of Kilauea's remarkable activity, it is also currently the most researched. Geologist Mike Garcia – prominently featured in the Rolex advert here – has studied Kilauea for decades and believes that analyzing the chemical composition of pieces of the volcano may yield clues to its future behavior.
Dr. Garcia joined the University of Hawaii in 1976 after completing his Ph.D. at UCLA, and it a professor in the Dept. of Geology and Geophysics. His research and teaching focuses on field and geochemical aspects of volcanism in Hawaii.
He teaches about igneous rocks at the undergraduate and graduate level, scientific paper writing and current events in volcanology. His NSF funded research includes the current eruption at Kilauea volcano, the Hawaii Scientific Drilling Project on the island of Hawaii, giant landslides off Oahu, and rejuvenated volcanism on and around the northern Hawaiian Islands.
During Dr. Garcia’s previous cruise using JASON2 remotely operated vehicle, nine new volcanoes were discovered on the flanks of Mauna Loa volcano. It is expected hundreds of submarine volcanoes will be surveyed during this cruise; many will be visited and sampled by JASON2.
Kīlauea is an active shield volcano in the Hawaiian Islands, located along the southeastern shore of Hawaii Island and is between 210,000 and 280,000 years old and grew above sea level about 100,000 years ago. Since the islands were settled, it has been the most active of the five volcanoes that together form the island and among the most active volcanoes on Earth. The most recent eruption began in December 2024, with episodic lava fountains and flows continuing into 2025.
Kīlauea is the second-youngest product of the Hawaiian hotspot and the current eruptive center of the Hawaiian–Emperor seamount chain. Because it lacks topographic prominence and its activities historically coincided with those of Mauna Loa, Kīlauea was once thought to be a satellite of its much larger neighbor. Kīlauea has a large, fairly recently formed caldera at its summit and two active rift zones, one extending 125 km (78 mi) east and the other 35 km (22 mi) west. An active fault of unknown depth moves vertically an average of 2 to 20 mm (0.1 to 0.8 in) per year.
Between 2008 and 2018, Halemaʻumaʻu, a pit crater located within Kīlauea's summit caldera, hosted an active lava lake, in part due to Kīlauea erupting nearly continuously from vents on its eastern rift zone between January 1983 and April 2018, causing major property damage, including the destruction in 1990 of the towns of Kalapana and Kaimū along with the community's renowned black sand beach.
Beginning in May 2018, activity shifted further downrift from the summit to the lower Puna district, during which lava erupted from two dozen vents with eruptive fountains that sent rivers of lava into the ocean in three places. The eruption destroyed Hawaii's largest natural freshwater lake, covered substantial portions of Leilani Estates and Lanipuna Gardens, and destroyed the communities of Kapoho, Vacationland Hawaii, and most of the Kapoho Beach Lots. The County of Hawaii reported that 716 dwellings were destroyed.
Concurrent with the activity downrift in lower Puna, the lava lake within Halemaʻumaʻu drained and a series of explosive collapse events occurred at the volcano's summit, with at least one explosion emitting ash 30,000 feet (9,100 m) into the air. This activity prompted a months-long closure of the Kīlauea section of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, and the eruption would only end in September 2018. Since 2020, several eruptions have occurred within the enlarged Halemaʻumaʻu crater from the 2018 collapse events as well as along the volcano's southwest and east rift zones.
And the watch? Rolex’s legendary Oyster Perpetual Day-Date!
The Rolex Oyster Perpetual Day-Date is a self-winding chronometer manufactured by Rolex initially in 1956. The Day-Date was the first watch to display the date as well as the day, spelled in full, with the calendar display offered in 26 languages.
Due to its association with the President of the United States and its imposing presence on the wrist, the Day-Date earned the nickname "The President."
We have a few other Rolex adverts featuring Red Adair, in both Kanji Japanese and French.