Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1914-03-13
TITANIC lIEnoRlAL LIGHT HOUSE

by the sea breezes and needed the
frequent use of the bellows to keep it
alight There were many complaints
about the poorness of the lights and
the lanterns were subsequently re-
moved, but coal or wood fires re-
manned in use till 1922.
Candles were next thought of, but
these again had obvious disadvan-
tages, for the great heat generated in
the lantern melted the candles and
thus diminished the intensity of the
light The wicks also required the
constant use of shutters, and this
again was a serious disadvantage.
The use of oil was not universally
adopted until the middle of the eigf-
teenth century, while soon afterward
contrivances were adopted for increas-
ing the light by means of reflectors.
Gas was first used as an illuminant
in the early part of the nineteenth
century. but only for lighthouses on
piers and harbors near gas works,
and it was not until 1865 that gas
was used at out of the way light
houses. Soon afterward electricity
and limelight were introduced; and
these, gas and oil are now the princi-
pal illuminants employed.
1t was toward the middle of the
eighteenth century that schemes for
distinguishing one light from another
were introduced, and the first device
of this kind was invented strange as
1t may seem, by a barber of Lynn
called Robert Hamblin The method
consists Of hiding the light shown for
certain number of seconds. Thus
one lighthouse may show single
flash every Is seconds, another three
flashes in quick succession every 80
seconds, and yet another may show q
light for 80 seconds and then be OBJ
scured for ten seconds and SO on.
These methods, combined with the en-
ployment of white, red and green
lights. provide many different varie-
ties of lights and thus form ready
means of distinguishing one from the
other, as no two lights on our coast
are exactly the same.
0Ctt OF TIC tHIUCdpG ROCks
The present Bell Rock lighthouse is
situated off Arbroath, and this is the
place, it will be remembered, that has
been immortalized in the poem of Sir
Ralph the Rover" where
The good old abbot of Aberbrothock
Had placed that bell on the Inchcape rock.
On buoy. in the storm, it hoated and
swung
And over the waves it's warning rung
The first time a lighthouse was
erected on an isolated rock was in the
case of the first Eddystone lighthouse
completed by Winstanley in 1898,
where tallow candles were used as an
illuminant The tower was polygonaI
in form, which the ornamentation
above offered great resistance to the
wind. This lighthouse, however, stood
till 1903, when it was knocked down
by the sea, and Winstanley himself
and all the occupants persisted. The
next Eduystone was completed In
1908 by Rudyard, and this was COM
pletely destroyed by fire in December,
1855. It had been constructed OF
wood, and the next tower, of granite,
was erected by John Smeaton and
stood from 1858 10 1881. In 1879.
however. it was discovered that the
rock on which it stood was being IN
dermined by the action of the water
and this necessitated the building Of
a new tower on neighboring rock
with more secure foundations. This
tower was completed in 1881, when
| the old Smeaton lighthouse was re-
moved TO the Hoe at Plymouth. where
it now stands