The broad history of the Hansen's disease colony on Moloka'i's Kalaupapa Peninsula is well-known: Patients separated from home and forced into isolation; the heroism of Father Damien and those he inspired; the evolution of the colony from a place of tragedy to an international symbol of inspiration and hope.

But the most important part of that history — the patients themselves — is fading away in the land of their exile.

About 8,000 people were sent to Kalaupapa and Kalawao, from the first 12 people, all Hawaiian, on Jan. 6, 1866, to the last one in 1969.

An accounting of their names remains incomplete. On the peninsula itself, only about 1,300 graves have been identified, and many of those are no longer visible.

Nonetheless, worthy preservation efforts are under way.

Ka 'Ohana O Kalaupapa's Kalaupapa Memorial Names Project is attempting to collect all the names and develop a geneaological database. And on Tuesday, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill to authorize the monument, to be erected in the National Historical Park at Kalawao and/or Kalaupapa. A similar bill is pending in the U.S. Senate.

The monument would bear the names of the original 5,000 people sent to Kalawao between 1866 and 1896, as well as the 3,000 sent to Kalaupapa in its later history.

It would be fitting that, in a place where they were sent to be forgotten, their names would be enshrined forever.