Historic Lighthouse Preservation Handbook Part II, Page 1

History of the Lighthouse

Service

The U.S. Lighthouse Establishment was

created by the First Congress in 1789 to

manage the twelve colonial lighthouses

now controlled by the federal government

and to oversee construction of new

lighthouses. Sandy Hook Lighthouse, built

in New Jersey in 1764, is the only colonial

lighthouse that has survived (Boston Harbor

Lighthouse, built in 1716, was rebuilt in

1783-1784). Colonial lighthouses were

usually constructed of wood or rubble

stone. Between 1789 and 1820 about 40

new lighthouses were built by the

Lighthouse Establishment, many using brick

and cut stone. Of these, only a few have

survived, including Portland Head

Lighthouse, Maine, built in 1790 and Cape

Henry Lighthouse, Virginia, built in 1792.

From 1820 until 1852, Steven Pleasonton,

Fifth Auditor of the Treasury, was

responsible for lighthouse construction and

repairs. Though Pleasonton routinely

History of the Lighthouse

Service and Lighthouse

Construction Types

Figure 1. Assembly of Point No Point Lighthouse caisson at Solomons, Maryland, before being

transported to site in Chesapeake Bay.

National Archives photo

returned unspent funds to the Treasury,

during his tenure approximately 300

lighthouses were built. In 1847 the

responsibility for the construction of six

lighthouses was granted to the Army Corps

of Engineers.

On August 31, 1852, the U.S. Lighthouse

Establishment became the U.S. Lighthouse

Board, largely as the result of numerous

complaints about the state of the U.S.

lighthouse system. The nine-member board

was composed primarily of Naval and Army

engineer officers. The country was divided

into 12 new lighthouse districts, each with

an inspector responsible for overall

construction, maintenance, and purchasing.

Over the next five decades several

advances in lighthouse construction

technology took place, including the

development of exposed screwpile

lighthouses, skeleton tower lighthouses,

wave-swept interlocking stone lighthouses,

iron caisson lighthouses, and breakwater

lighthouses. Many examples of these
Part II, Page 2 History of the Lighthouse Service and Lighthouse Construction Types

lighthouses exist today. In 1886, the

lighthouse districts were increased to 16.

The Lighthouse Board was transferred to the

Department of Commerce and Labor on

July 1, 1903. On June 17, 1910, the

Lighthouse Board became the Bureau of

Lighthouses. The number of districts

increased to 19. Just before this transition,

reinforced concrete lighthouse towers came

into use, particularly along the west coast

where earthquakes were common. In 1913

the Bureau was assigned to the Department

of Commerce when it separated from the

Department of Labor. In 1939 the Bureau

was abolished and its functions transferred

to the U.S. Coast Guard where the

responsibility remains today.

At the end of World War II the Coast Guard

staffed 468 light stations. Following the

war, the Coast Guard embarked on a

program of automation. The rationale for

this program was 1) to reduce the cost of

maintaining lighthouses, 2) to remove

personnel from extremely isolated and

hazardous locations, and 3) to make billets

available for reprogramming. Despite these

efforts, the Coast Guard manned 327

lighthouses in 1962. The Coast Guard

initiated the Lighthouse Automation and

Modernization Program (LAMP) in 1968.

LAMP was designed to accelerate and

standardize the remaining lighthouses for

automation and to standardize the

equipment at those previously automated.

Over $26 million was spent on LAMP over

20 years; 1989 was the last year for LAMP

funding though a few automations were

completed as late as fiscal year 1990.

LAMP resulted in over 300 billet reductions

amounting to savings in excess of $63

million, and recurring savings of about $7

million annually.1

 Every Coast Guardowned lighthouse in the United States is

now automated and unmanned, with the

sole exception of Boston Lighthouse. It will

continue to be staffed in accordance with

Section 221 of the Coast Guard

Authorization Act of 1989 (P.L. 101-225).

The Coast Guard continues to use the living

quarters of several former light stations as

housing units for its personnel.

Lighthouse towers themselves have become

less valuable to the Coast Guard because,

with modern automated beacons, it is more

cost effective to construct and maintain an

aid to navigation on a steel structure or

buoy, rather than inside the lantern of a

traditional lighthouse tower. Thus, in many

locations, the traditional lighthouse tower

has been found to have little value to the

U.S. Coast Guard mission, other than to

provide a visual aid to mariners during

daylight and good weather.2

The lighthouse automation process resulted

in a loss of practical experience gained by

personnel stationed at the lighthouses. The

peculiarities and unique needs of the

station could no longer be cared for on a

daily basis. Experience and traditions were

no longer passed on from one keeper to

another. Many stations, especially the more

remote ones, are seldom visited by Coast

Guard personnel, as little as once or twice a

year. The lack of simple maintenance such

as mopping up condensation on a daily or

weekly basis from the inside of the storm

pane astragals of the lantern room now

result in rust and corrosion. A broken storm

pane (window), formerly replaced within a

matter of hours, now may result in bird and

rodent infestation. Vandalism from lack of

on-site supervision and security is an even

1

 United States Coast Guard Lighthouse Policy worse problem.

Review (enclosure 7 to Chapter 6 of COMDTINST

M11011.9B dated July 27, 1992), pp. 5-6, copy in files

of National Maritime Initiative, National Park Service,

Washington, D.C.

2 David Reese and Robert Browning, Lighthouse

Management:: A Balancing Act for the U.S. Coast

Guard, Cultural Resource Management (June 1997).
Historic Lighthouse Preservation Handbook Part II, Page 3

Lighthouse Construction

Types3

Politics, need, cost, location, and

geography of the site, as well as technology

available at the time of construction

influenced lighthouse designs. Before the

mid-nineteenth century, lighthouse

construction technology required solid rock

or other stable foundation soils; onshore

towers sometimes proved inadequate to

warn of a shoal located offshore. In some

locations a lighted buoy or a lightship4

solved this problem. Riverine and estuarine

environments, however, often had unstable

muddy and/or sandy bottoms which could

not support the heavy masonry towers then

in vogue. In areas such as the Chesapeake

Bay, Delaware Bay, the Gulf of Mexico, the

Mississippi River delta, and the coral reefs

of the Florida Keys, the development of

newer technology using screwpile, caisson,

and skeletal tower lighthouse construction

was essential to adequately light these

marine hazards.

As technology advanced, stations were

improved or even moved to better mark

hazards such as offshore shoals. The 95-

foot-tall tower at Cape Hatteras Lighthouse

(1803), North Carolina, was raised to 150

feet in 1854, and the present 208-foot tall

tower replaced it in 1870.5

 The first

Thomas Point Shoals Lighthouse (1825),

Maryland, was a stone tower built on shore;

it was replaced by an offshore screwpile

5 According to 1989 HABS documentation, the

overall height of the structure is 208 feet including the

foundation. The height from ground level was recorded

at 197 feet.

4

 Lightships are a relatively new type of aid to

navigation, first appearing in the U.S. in 1820. None are

in operational use today. Lightships, however, played

an important role in establishing light stations in

locations difficult or impossible for the construction of

submarine lighthouse structures.

3

 The following section is from Ralph Eshelman,

American Lighthouse Construction Types, part of the

draft Maritime Heritage of the United States National

Historic Landmark Theme Context Study for Lighthouses,

National Maritime Initiative, National Park Service,

1995.

NMI photo

Figure 2. Portland Head Light Station, Cape Elizabeth, Maine, one of the few remaining

towers built by the Lighthouse Establishment between 1789 and 1820.
Part II, Page 4 History of the Lighthouse Service and Lighthouse Construction Types

structure in 1875 to place the aid closer to

the navigation channel.6

Generally, coastal lighthouses on the low,

flat southeastern coast of the United States

tended to have tall towers to elevate the

lens high enough so the light may be seen

many miles at sea; whereas lighthouses on

the west coast tended to have short towers

built on sea cliffs high enough to project the

light many miles at sea. Several light

stations on the northeastern coast were also

located to take advantage of naturally high

elevation sites, such as Block Island

Southeast Lighthouse, Rhode Island, and

Monhegan Island Lighthouse, Maine.

Ironically, the low clouds so characteristic

of the west coast caused some station sites

at high elevations to be moved to lower

altitudes with taller towers in order to get

the light below the low cloud levels, but

high enough to be visible to ships at sea.

The first Point Loma Lighthouse (1855)

California tower was only 40 feet tall but

was located on a bluff providing a focal

plane of 462 feet above the water. It was

replaced in 1891 by a 70-foot-high tower

built at the base of the bluff with a focal

plane of 88 feet above the water.7

Lighthouses were made from a variety of

materials including wood, stone, brick,

reinforced concrete, iron, steel, and even

aluminum and fiberglass. Lighthouses were

built on land, in the water, on islands, on

top of ledges and cliffs, on breakwaters and

piers, on caissons, and at least five are on

fort walls. Some light towers are standalone structures, while others are attached

or integral to the keeper's quarters or fog

signal building.

The tower served principally as a support

for the lantern which housed the optic. The

lantern was typically constructed of cast

iron; round, square, octagonal, or

hexagonal-shaped, and surrounded by a

stone or cast-iron gallery. Access to the

lantern room was via stone, wood, or castiron stairs which either wound around a

central column or spiraled along the interior

sides of the tower walls.

Until the adoption of the Fresnel lens in the

United States in the 1850s, there was no

uniform design for the lantern. Pre-1850s

lanterns are rare and are often referred to as

old style or bird cage lanterns because

of their bird cage appearance. Selkirk

(Salmon River) Lighthouse, New York, built

in 1838, retains its bird cage lantern. The

bird cage lantern on Cape Henry

Lighthouse, Virginia, is a reconstruction of

one built in 1792. Many pre-1850s light

towers had their older lantern removed and

new cast-iron lanterns installed when

Fresnel lenses were added to a light station;

most light stations in the United States were

fitted with Fresnel lenses by 1860. In

addition to the replacement of the lantern,

the tower supporting the lantern was often

modified to accommodate the larger lenses.

Fresnel lenses were developed in seven

standard sizes, depending on need. The

largest first-order lenses were designed for

important coastal sites while the sixth order,

the smallest, was designed for small harbors

and rivers (the seventh size was a third-andone-half order). The meso radial and hyper

radial were two additional lens sizes that

were not used in the U.S. with the one

exception, Makapuu Light, Hawaii. To

accommodate these new lenses the

Lighthouse Board designed four pre-made

ready-to-assemble cast-iron lanterns for first,

second, third, and fourth orders. (The

fourth-order lantern could be used to

6 Robert de Gast, Lighthouses of Chesapeake Bay

(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973) p. 79;

F. Ross Holland, Jr., Great American Lighthouses

(Washington D.C., Preservation Press, National Trust for

Historic Preservation, 1994), p. 19; and Candace

Clifford, 1994 Inventory of Historic Light Stations

(Washington, D.C., History Division National Park

Service, 1994), p. 260.

7 Clifford, pp. 19-20.
Historic Lighthouse Preservation Handbook Part II, Page 5

accommodate the fourth-, fifth-, and sixthorder Fresnel lenses.) While it was possible

to install a smaller order lens in a lantern of

a larger order, it was not possible to

increase the lens size for a lantern of a

lesser order except for the fifth or sixth.

Detailed plans for these cast-iron lanterns

are available at the National Archives as

well as plans for many other lanternsoften

the exact plan for the lantern of a specific

lighthouse.

Windows in the tower were positioned to

provide daylight onto the stairs. For taller

towers, landings were provided at regular

intervals. The top landing ended at the

watch room where the keeper on duty

ensured that the light was functioning

properly. The lantern room above was

usually reached via a ladder.

In addition to a light tower, a completely

equipped light station on land often

consisted of a keeper's quarters, oil house,

fog-signal building, workshop, water

supply, privy, landing wharf, boathouse and

ways, barn, roads, walks, and fences. Some

regions required special structures to aid in

the operation of the lighthouse. The

elevated walkway or catwalk found on

some of the piers of the Great Lakes was

necessary for the keeper to get to the light

during severe storms when waves washed

over the pier or ice made it too dangerous

to walk on the pier. These catwalks are

significant components of this type of light

station and contribute to its historic

integrity.

Tower Construction Types—Period of Construction

1700 1750 1800 1850 1900 1950 Present

 Stone Masonry (1716-1907)

 Brick (1755-1915)

 Wood (1784-1922)

 Wrought Iron (1834-ca. 1900s)

 Cast Iron (1844-ca. 1900s)

 Steel (1880-present)

 Reinforced Concrete (1908-1943)

 Texas Tower (1961-1967)

 Aluminum Clad (1962)

 Fiberglass (ca. 1960s-present)

Tower Foundation Types—Period of Construction

1700 1750 1800 1850 1900 1950 Present

 Land Based (1716-present)

 Wood Pile (Straight) (1828-1905)

 Crib (Submarine) (1832-1938)

 Metal Pile (Straight) (1847-1907)

 Metal Pile (Screw) (1848-1910)

 Metal Pile (Disk) (1858-1880)

 Caisson (1867-1943)

 Caisson (Pneumatic) (1886-1914)
Part II, Page 6 History of the Lighthouse Service and Lighthouse Construction Types

Figure 4. Cape Henry Light Station, cast-iron

tower, Fort Story, Virginia.

SIDEBAR: Lighthouse

Construction Types

Most lighthouses can be categorized

by construction method, shape,

building material, or foundation

types. The lighthouse type can also

be classified as terrestrial or aquatic,

i.e., onshore or offshore types. The

major construction types for historic

lighthouses are wooden, masonry,

wave-swept, concrete, cast-iron

plate, skeletal, straightpile, screwpile,

crib, caisson, and Texas tower.

Wooden tower: Most early wooden

towers have burned and/or been

replaced. Prospect Harbor

Lighthouse (1891), Maine, is a good

example of a stand-alone, conical

wooden light tower. Plymouth/

Gurnet Point Light (1843),

Massachusetts is the earliest surviving

wooden tower.

Masonry tower: Masonry towers

were constructed of rubble stone, cut

stone (dressed stone), or brick. The

oldest standing masonry light tower

in the United States is the 85-foot-tall

Sandy Hook Lighthouse (1764), New

Jersey, built of cut stone. Towers

over 150 feet in height are referred to

as tall towers. The 208-foot Cape

Hatteras Lighthouse (1870), North

Carolina, is the tallest lighthouse in

the United States.

Wave-swept tower: Wave-swept

lighthouses were built on low rocks

or submarine ledges and constructed

of interlocking stones to withstand

the fury and power of waves in heavy

seas. One of the first wave-swept

towers built in the United States was

the 114-foot Minots Ledge

Lighthouse (1860) offshore in

Figure 3. Gurnet Point Lighthouse, wooden tower

near Plymouth, Massachusetts.

NMI photo

NMI photo
Historic Lighthouse Preservation Handbook Part II, Page 7

Massachusetts, which replaced a piletype lighthouse that was destroyed by a

storm. It was considered the most

important engineering work

constructed by the Lighthouse Board at

the time.

Concrete tower: Concrete towers

began to replace brick masonry towers

at the beginning of the 20th century; a

tower of reinforced concrete was first

used in the United States at the 115-foottall Point Arena Lighthouse (1908),

California.

Cast-iron-plate tower: Cast iron was

lighter than stone or brick, relatively

inexpensive, strong, watertight, and had

a slow rate of deterioration. The second

Cape Henry Lighthouse (1881),

Virginia, is the tallest cast-iron-plate

tower in the United States at 163 feet.

Steel and wrought-iron plate was also

sometimes used. This construction type

was capable of being dismantled and

moved; examples include Cape

Canaveral, Florida and Hunting Island,

South Carolina.

Skeletal tower: Onshore skeletal

towers were built of metal and were

typically constructed on concrete

foundations. Offshore skeletal towers

were also built of metal and typically

constructed with straight or screwpile

foundations (discussed below). Manitou

Island Lighthouse (1861) and Whitefish

Point Lighthouse (1861), Michigan, both

built from the same plan, are the earliest

onshore skeletal towers built in the

United States. Like the cast-iron-plate

tower, skeletal towers could also be

dismantled and moved.

Straightpile: The pile foundation

lighthouse utilized the principle of least

resistance. Waves would pass through

rather than crash against the foundation.

This design of lighthouse structure was

used offshore, even in wave-swept

Figure 5. Construction drawing for Cape Charles

Lighthouse, Virginia, an onshore skeletal tower.

National Archives
Part II, Page 8 History of the Lighthouse Service and Lighthouse Construction Types

locations. The earliest surviving

straightpile tubular skeletal

tower lighthouse is Sombrero

Key Lighthouse (1858), Florida.

Screwpile: To increase the

holding power of the pile, a

screw-like flange was fastened to

the bottom of the pile and

wound like a screw into the

substrate. There are two

principal screwpile type

lighthouses, 1) low spider-like

foundations for rivers, bays, and

sounds, and 2) tall offshore

coastal towers. Perhaps as many

as 100 spider-like screwpile

lighthouses were built

throughout the Carolina

sounds, the Chesapeake Bay,

Delaware Bay, along the Gulf of

Mexico, and one even at

Maumee Bay (1855) on Lake

Erie in Ohio. Thomas Point

Shoals Lighthouse (1875),

Maryland, is the oldest extant,

unmoved, spider-like screwpile

lighthouse in the United States.

The first of the tall skeletal

screwpile coastal towers built in

the United States was Carysfort

Reef Lighthouse (1852), Florida,

which still stands. A few

offshore screwpile skeletal tower

lighthouses built on coral reefs

used foot plates or disks to help

disperse the weight of the tower.

Examples in the Florida Keys

include Carysfort Reef

Lighthouse (1852), Fowey

Rocks Lighthouse (1878), and

American Shoal Lighthouse

(1880).

Crib: Wooden cribs,

constructed onshore, towed to

the site, and then filled with

stone to sink them in place were

a lighthouse foundation type

National Archives photo

Figure 6. Thomas Point Shoals Lighthouse with screwpile

foundation located in Maryland's Chesapeake Bay; shown here in

1885.

Figure 7. Sabine Bank Lighthouse with caisson foundation in

Texas.

USCG photo
Historic Lighthouse Preservation Handbook Part II, Page 9 National Archives

Figure 8. Construction drawing detailing the caisson foundation for Baltimore Lighthouse in Maryland's

Chesapeake Bay.
Part II, Page 10 History of the Lighthouse Service and Lighthouse Construction Types

Figure 9. Chesapeake Light Station, Texas tower at

entrance to Chesapeake Bay.

USCG photo

6 The caisson type lighthouse, though superior to the screwpile lighthouse type as far as stability is

concernedespecially in northern locations where ice flow conditions exist, did not prove satisfactory for

offshore ocean locations because of severe bottom scouring. In the late 1880s, a 54-foot-diameter pneumatic

caisson foundation with a tall steel light tower was sunk off Diamond Shoals, thirteen miles off the shore from

Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. But water currents scoured the site and tilted it out of level. The contractors

gave up in disgust as did the Lighthouse Board after a few more unsuccessful attempts. (Wayne C. Wheeler,

Diamond Shoal Lighthouse: The Lighthouse That Never Was, Keepers Log (1988) 4(3):24-29.)

used extensively in the Great Lakes,

usually to replace lightships. Once

settled and leveled, the cribs were

capped with concrete or some other

masonry upon which the lighthouse

structure was constructed. Perhaps the

two most significant crib foundation

lighthouses are the 93-foot Spectacle

Reef Lighthouse (1874) on Lake Huron,

Michigan, located 101⁄2 miles from the

closest land; and the 110-foot Stannard

Rock Lighthouse (1882) on Lake

Superior, Michigan, located 23 miles

from the nearest land. Crib foundations

were best suited for hardrock bottoms

typically found in the Great Lakes.

Caisson: Caisson foundations were best

suited for unconsolidated bottoms

composed of sand or mud. The caisson

lighthouse type used a large cast-iron

cylinder, which was sunk on the bottom

and filled with rock and concrete to

form a foundation. The caisson

foundation was sturdier and better able

to withstand heavy stress than the pile foundation lighthouses, so it is not surprising that

caisson lighthouses were built in areas where moving ice was a hazard. The Craighill Channel

Lower Front Range Lighthouse (1873), Maryland, is an early surviving example. Where

bottoms were harder, contained rocks, and/or needed greater depth of penetration into the

substrate, the pneumatic process was used. The substrate within the caisson was removed and

the caisson allowed to sink further into the bottom. Eleven pneumatic caisson lighthouses

were built in the United States. The Sabine Bank Lighthouse (1905), Texas, is the most

exposed, located 15 miles offshore in the Gulf of Mexicothe only successful caisson south of

the Chesapeake Bay.6

Texas Tower Type: A relatively recent technological development in lighthouse construction

was the Texas tower type which replaced exposed lightships offshore. These so-called Texas

towers were adaptations modeled on the offshore oil drilling platforms first employed off the

Texas coast. The first Texas tower lighthouse in the United States was the Buzzards Bay

Light, located in Buzzards Bay, Massachusetts, and commissioned on November 1, 1961. It

has been extinguished and may be dismantled. A total of six Texas tower lighthouses have

been constructed.