Lighthouses not only symbolize hope, constancy and a friend in stormy times, many are fascinating architectural masterpieces. The earliest light, simply a bonfire built on a hillside to guide ships, served the old world city of Alexandria in 285 B.C. America’s first lighthouse was built in 1716 at Boston Harbor. Since then, hundreds of lighthouses have been built in this country and guided ships safely into harbor. This is our list of the best American lighthouses.
- Portland Head Light: Portland, Maine, Est. 1791
- Cape May Lighthouse: Cape May, New Jersey, Est. 1823
- Cape Hatteras Lighthouse: Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, Est. 1803
- Old Point Loma Lighthouse: San Diego, California, Est. 1855
- Cape Blanco Lighthouse: Sixes, Oregon, Est. 1870
- Marblehead Light: Bay Point, Ohio, Est. 1821
Portland Head Light: Portland, Maine, Est. 1791
Considered one of the most photographed and popular lighthouses in the country, Portland Head Light continues to attract visitors with its beauty, spectacular views, history and literary associations.
Completed in 1791, Portland Head Light’s original tower still stands. The original light was replaced by a second-order Fresnel in 1855, which was replaced by a rotating, airport style beacon in 1989. On June 27, 1942, the light was turned off so that it wouldn’t serve as a homing marker if German submarines were operating in the area. The fog signal also went silent July 5, 1942. Both were turned on again after World War II.
Some of the literary associations with Portland Head Light include: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow who walked near the lighthouse often and wrote about it frequently; Harriet Beecher Stowe who wrote "Pearl of Orr’s Island," and poet Edna St. Vincent Millay, who lived on Radded Island in easy view of the lighthouse.
Cape May Lighthouse: Cape May, New Jersey, Est. 1823
Cape May Lighthouse, which has been built and re-built three times, is one of the oldest continually operating lighthouses in the United States. The first lighthouse, built in 1823, sat on land that is now covered by water (about 100 yards off the current shoreline). Undermined by advancing currents, the tower fell into the ocean. The bricks from the original lighthouse occasionally wash ashore during storms. The second lighthouse, built in 1847, was poor quality and demolished.
The present lighthouse built when in 1857 is 157-feet tall and has 199 stairs that lead up to the tower. The Mid-Atlantic Center for the Arts has done extensive restoration, including the Oil House, which serves as a visitors center, overhauling the lantern and roof, repainting the tower in its original colors and reconstructing the lantern.
The first-order Fresnel lens, which was large enough for a keeper to stand in to refuel the lamp, was replaced in 1938 by an electronic beacon. The former lens is now on display at the Cape May County Historical Museum in Cape May Court House.
Cape Hatteras Lighthouse: Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, Est. 1803
Cape Hatteras is unparalleled in grandeur, scenic beauty, popularity and history. With a height of 208-feet, it is the tallest lighthouse structure in the country (although others sit higher above water because they are built on cliffs or rocks). Its diamond pattern daymark, which helps mariners distinguish it from other lighthouses, and beacon can be seen from more than 20 miles at sea.
The first lighthouse was authorized in 1794, completed in 1802 and lit in 1803, making it one of the nation’s earliest lights. Built by Henry Dearborn, it was an imposing 90-feet tall; however, it was not an effective marker since sea captains complained they couldn’t see the light even when near the Cape. Though the Federal troops repaired the lens, the lighthouse was still considered deficient. After the Civil War, Congress appropriated funds for a new tower, which was completed in 1873.
From 1936 to 1950, the lighthouse was darkened because of the threat of erosion. Its replacement was a skeleton steel light named Buxton Light Tower, which was used as a lookout tower during World War II.
In 1946, the wreck of the $170,000 yacht, Nautilus, whose captain was confused by the daymark of Hatteras and the beacon at Buxton Light, precipitated the restoration of the light to Cape Hatteras by the Coast Guard. The first-order lens was replaced by an electric beacon, lit on January 23, 1950, which was again replaced in 1972 by a powerful automatic beacon.
The present light station consists of the tower, the brick headkeeper’s house, the assistant keeper’s duplex—which is now the visitor center and Museum-by-the-Sea—and a brick oil house. Visitors can climb the 268 steps to the lighthouse service gallery. Restoration of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse was a catalyst to create the Cape Hatteras National Seashore in 1953. Covering about 45 square miles on the Outer Banks, this is the most extensive stretch of undeveloped seashore on the Atlantic Coast.
Cape Hatteras’ existence has been and continues to be seriously threatened by erosion. Originally built 1500 feet from the shore, it now stands just 120 feet from the waves. There is an intense struggle by preservationists to have the lighthouse moved.
Old Point Loma Lighthouse: San Diego, California, Est. 1855
One of the original eight lighthouses built in California, the Old Point Loma Lighthouse is located at the tip of Point Loma, eleven miles from downtown San Diego. The Old Point Loma Lighthouse overlooks the city where visitors enjoy a spectacular 360-degree view of the city and the Pacific.
When the year-long construction effort was completed, builders discovered that the tower was too small to accommodate the first-order Fresnel lens that had arrived for it. They substituted a third-order lens originally meant for the Humboldt Harbor Lighthouse in Northern California. Nevertheless, the Point Loma Light was powerful enough to be seen for 25 miles (and some sea captains even claimed to have seen it 40 miles away).
Old Point Loma was originally located at an elevation of 460 feet. At the entrance of the San Diego Harbor, it was the highest tower in America. However, this location proved to be a disadvantage because it was often above low-lying clouds. Therefore, in 1891, it was replaced by New Point Loma, which is still in use today.
The Cabrillo National Monument, which includes Old Point Loma, is one of the most visited monuments in the west with 1.2 million visitors per year.
Cape Blanco Lighthouse: Sixes, Oregon, Est. 1870
Cape Blanco is Oregon’s oldest, most westerly and tallest lighthouse with a 59-foot tower that stands 245-feet above sea level and shines 21 miles.
The first lighthouse keeper was Charles Peirce, who took the position after Yaquina Bay closed. Five years later, James Langlois took the post, serving 42 years until his retirement in 1918—the longest tenure on the West Coast. During his tenure, the lighthouse was a very popular site. Visitors often flocked to the lighthouse and were shown around by Langlois and his wife.
During World War II, the lighthouse served as a defense area with a coastal lookout. However, a Japanese submarine launched a small float plane which used the lighthouse to navigate by as it dropped incendiary bombs in nearby forest.
When the second-order Fresnel lens was damaged by vandals, a national search to find someone to repair it led lighthouse officials to Larry Hardin of Hardin Optical in nearby Bandon, Oregon. He and his colleagues spent more than a year creating several new prisms and a central bull’s-eye for the light. Special tools had to be built for the project since existing ones could not be used.
Marblehead Light: Bay Point, Ohio, Est. 1821
This is the oldest active light tower on the Great Lakes. Authorized in 1810, the lighthouse was not built until 1821, after the War of 1812. Just a few miles from where the lighthouse stands, General Perry won a decisive battle against the British.
The Marblehead Light remains relatively unchanged in appearance. Its tower height, however, was raised from 55-feet to 65-feet in the late 1900s. It seems to have survived because of the quality of the limestone from which it was built, and because the walls at its base are five feet thick.
The first keeper at the Marblehead Light was Benjamin Wolcott. He served from 1822 until 1832, when he died of cholera. His wife became keeper for two years, and when she remarried, her husband became keeper. In 1903 Charles "Cap" Hunter became keeper until he retired in 1933. Edward Herman, who became Hunter’s assistant keeper in 1913, took the keeper position in 1933 until he retired in 1943.
The present light was installed in 1969. The keeper’s house and grounds were turned over to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.