Lighthouse News

The above was the headline in the Baltimore Sun which caught the eye of Lighthouse News. The story is referring to the Maryland Lighthouse Challenge, and is a very nice overview of the weekend activities, which was to visit as many of Maryland’s ten lighthouses as possible. While it certainly seemed to be a fun weekend for lighthouse enthusiasts, the real meaning behind the story’s headline is that all of our nation’s lighthouses have so little time. And this applies to other countries as well. Most are endangered by years of neglect, as almost all are automated. Without a lighthouse keeper to tend to the maintenance, these historical gems are in danger of being demolished or just left to rot.

A lighthouse that has survived machine gun fire, air strafings, raids by French privateers (they damaged the lantern and stole the keepers’ beds!) and storms is now threatened by the same erosion that many lighthouses are now facing. Orfordness Lighthouse, where a light has stood since 1634, is now only 50 yards from the beach. Accelerated erosion and coastal changes over the past decade have brought it to a near critical mass, and may necessitate it being demolished, according to a story from the Evening Star.

The auction for Fourteen Foot Bank Lighthouse is now officially closed, and the bidder nicknamed “latea” has bought him or herself a unique property sitting three miles offshore of Bowers Beach in Delaware Bay. With no bids since latea’s $200,000 whopper on Friday August 31, the gavel has fallen.

Last minute bids keep extending the General Surplus Administration (GSA) auction of Fourteen Foot Bank Lighthouse, located three miles offshore of Bowers Beach in Delaware. Bidding for this cast iron lighthouse in Delaware Bay is now at $165,000, with the latest bid placed at 13:59:06 EDT, just 54 seconds before the announced close of the auction.

The oldest lighthouse on the Great Lakes, Fort Gratiot, awaits transfer to the city of Port Huron, as bricks fall and endanger visitors. The lighthouse was recommended to be transferred to the city in 2005, but two years later, it hasn’t yet happened. Grant money worth $400,000 is sitting there waiting to start rehabilitation, but can’t be issued until the transfer is complete.

Seacoast Online has published a current list of the non-profit groups interested in Whaleback Ledge Lighthouse, which includes American Light Foundation (Bedminster, NJ), American Lighthouse Foundation (Rockland, ME), Beacon Preservation, Inc. (Ansonia, CT) and Lifewise Community Projects (Hampton, NH) and of course People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Lifewise, which runs a program for safe drinking water (Future Water Guardians of New Hampshire) and a dropout prevention program (Wildcat Youth Mentors) is interested in partnering with the American Lighthouse Foundation to use the lighthouse as a symbol for its new initiative, Yankee Coastal Rangers. This program will focus on public education and outreach regarding the New Hampshire Seacoast and estuaries.

“I just bawled my eyes out” -Dot BlackOne would think that Maine is free from the tagging seen in urban areas. Not so for Rockland, apparently, a town of about 7,600 people on Penobscot Bay in Knox County, Maine, which also is home to the American Lighthouse Foundation and the Maine Lighthouse Museum. Dot Black, president of the Friends of Rockland Breakwater Lighthouse, was awakened Tuesday (August 21, 2007) morning by a phone call informing her that somebody or somebodies had spray painted grafitti all over the lighthouse windows, brickwork and base of the lighthouse. “I just cried yesterday when the MV Island Transporter called me,” Black said Wednesday. “I just bawled my eyes out.”

Execution Rocks, recently excessed by the Coast Guard, is the latest lighthouse to go on PETA’s fishing stringer. Applications for the light, located about a mile offshore in Nassau County near the west end of Long Island Sound, New York, closed July 29. The only two applicants are Historically Significant Structures, based in Philadelphia, PA and (no surprise) People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).

Once again PETA has applied for two more offshore lighthouses, Cleveland Ledge Lighthouse and Whaleback Ledge Lighthouse. There has not been another group step forward with interest in Cleveland Ledge, but the American Lighthouse Foundation was planning to send a letter of interest on Whaleback Ledge, as the ALF has already been maintaining it under a lease.

The Portsmouth (NH) Herald News has published a story about PETA’s latest efforts to convince the National Park Service that a lighthouse is best used to educate people that fish are “inquisitive and loving.” According to Seacoast Online:

PETA has offered to withdraw their letter of interest in Penfield Reef Lighthouse, by faxing a letter to the Town of Fairfield, saying that they didn’t know the town wanted the lighthouse, and if Fairfield can promise that no fish will be eaten or harmed on the lighthouse grounds, it’s theirs.

Does PETA
realize
that this
is an offshore lighthouse? And people certainly aren’t using it as a fish cleaning station. But that matters not to them, and according to the Connecticut Post today, the town of Fairfield “isn’t going to bite.” According to the story, First Selectman Ken Flatto wouldn’t directly respond to PETA’s offer, though he noted few people visit the offshore lighthouse due to safety concerns. “I don’t think it’s appropriate to respond to any applicant’s request regarding the town’s intentions. “This is not a negotiation,” Flatto said.