Here's a continuation of the previous posts on January events.

Here are a few Feb dates that were posted to the January thread:

Nana
Cruise Director
Posts: 1667
From: Brandon, FL
Registered:
posted 02-01-2002 08:40 AM
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Frbruary 7, 1967
The Diamond Shoals Lights, 13 miles SE of Cape Hatteras, NC was struck by a waterspout at 5:30 am. Heavy damage was done by winds of over 100 mph, no crew was hurt. All 20 glass storm panes were blown out in the lantern, and the gallery frame was bent. The radiobeacon antenna blew away. It was built in 1966 and had only been in commission for 3 months when the waterspout hit.


Randy Kremer
WACKO
Posts: 925
From: Mason, OH, USA
Registered: Jun 99
posted 02-01-2002 10:17 PM
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February 1, 1856, saw the reconstructed
Point Conception tower lighted.

Randy Kremer
WACKO
Posts: 925
From: Mason, OH, USA
Registered: Jun 99
posted 02-02-2002 10:16 AM
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Tillamook Rock Light, Oregon
Tillamook Rock Lighthouse on the coast of Oregon went into service
on February 1, 1881, and marked the southern approach to
the Columbia River.

Point Pinos Light (1855)

Major Hartman Bache, decided to alter the top of the Point Pinos tower
and used the Fort Point lens on it, and on February 1, 1855, the West Coast had it's second light.


[This message has been edited by Randy Kremer (edited 02-03-2002).]

The keeper of Sharps Island light had a wild experience in February, 1881,
when ice ripped the screw-pile structure from its foundations and floated
it down the Chesapeake. The keeper rode the lighthouse for some miles
before it grounded. Needless to say, the Lighthouse Board concluded
that a screw-pile building was not sturdy enough for the site, and
rebuilt the lighthouse using a caisson design.

Timbalier Island Light (1857) - Louisiana

Built on a low sand spit at the east end of Timbalier Island, the
lighthouse remained there for ten years before erosion threatened
its existence. In danger of toppling, the tower had its lens
removed in February, 1867, and stored in the keepers' dwelling.
The following month a hurricane struck that section of the coast
and leveled everything on the island, including the keepers'
dwelling. The keepers kept the temporary light going to the
very last, "barely escaping with their lives," before the tower
went over. They took refuge in an iron can buoy where they lived for several days.

Inchcape (Bell Rock) Light - Scotland

In the early 1800's, Robert Stevenson, engineer of the Northern Lighthouse Board, began gathering information for such a lighthouse and concluded that a stone tower with a flared base similar to Smeaton's on Eddystone would be feasible for Bell Rock. Work began on the structure in 1806. The glass finally arrived and the keepers lighted the lamps on February 1, 1811.

Portland Head Light - 1868

Driven for more than a century by a second-order Fresnel lens, the flashing light on Portland Head has guided countless vessels to safe harbor. One that never made it, however, was the steamer Bohemian. Bound for Liverpool, England, to America with 218 passengers, many of them immigrants, the Bohemian was just short of its goal when it met with disaster on February 22, 1868. Plowing through heavy seas and fog towards Portland, the steamer slammed into Alden's Rock a few miles south of the lighthouse. The rock tore through the ship's tough iron hull as if through thin wood planking, and people were soon jumping into life boats. The fully loaded #2 boat broke away from its hoist and fell, dumping several dozen people into the winter sea. Most of them quickly froze to death or drowned. However, five other lifeboats reached shore safely.

Disaster struck in February, 1907, when the steamer Larchmont ran into the schooner Henry Knowlton just off the northwest coast of Block Island, R.I. The Larchmont got the worst of the collision and rapidly sank, dumping 150 passengers and crew into the freezing waters of Block Island Sound. Only nineteen of those aboard the Larchmont survived. The Knowlton also sank, but more slowly, and its crew rowed to safety near Watch Hill Light several miles to the northwest.

The end of the Civil War left the troops at Newport's Fort Adams with little to do, and like bored soldiers everywhere, they often found relief at the bottom of a bottle. One day in February 1866, three drunken warriors were returning to the fort from Newport where they had celebrated, no doubt for the 100th time, the victory of the Union. Spying a skiff, which, as it happened, belonged to the Lewis family, the three decided to take a shortcut across the harbor to the fort. One of the soldiers sang while his buddies pulled at the oars, and stomping in time with his sour notes, put his foot right through the bottom of the boat. The oarsmen managed to swim to shore, but the tipsy singer would have drowned had not the arms of a strong young woman looped a stout rope under his armpits. Unable to lift the man into her boat, Ida Lewis towed him to shore. There she left him to face the ire of his officers and the inevitable torments of a Civil War-size hangover.

Thsnks for keeping this thread going, Randy! I and others appreciate it.

Charleston Light - 1864

Although the naval assault on Charleston failed, the blockade of Southern coasts began to strangle the Confederacy. Increasingly desperate, the Southerners made a variety of innovative attempts to break the blockade. One of the most dramatic of these efforts took place within sight of the Charleston Lighthouse tower when, on February 17, 1864, the Confederates staged the world's first successful torpedo attack with a submarine. That night, a thirty-five-foot submersible with six men on board sailed out of Charleston Harbor to take on the Union fleet.

Corpus Christi Lighthouse - Texas

In order to avoid possibly disastrous confusion, lighthouse officials tried to give mariners plenty of advanced warning in existing lights or the replacement of new ones. The lighthouse described in this pre-Civil War notice no longer exists.

"Notice is hereby given that a fixed light of the natural color will be exhibited from the beacon at Corpus Chirsti, at sunset on Thursday, the 10th of February next, and will be kept burning during that night and every night thereafter from sunset to sunrise.

The lantern is on the keeper's dwelling, and the illuminating apparatus is a Fresnel lens of the 5th order, showing a fixed light, and illuminating 350 degrees of the horizon.

The keeper's dwelling is built of brick, and is colored white. The focal plane of the light is 38 feet above the ground, and 77 feet above te level of the sea, and the light should be visible in good weather a distance of 14 nautical miles.

The building is at the north end of Corpus Christi bluff, and the light is intended for local purposes."

By order:

W. H. Stevens,
Light-house Inspector Ninth District

Galveston, Texas
January 26, 1859

Sand Island Light - Alabama

On February 23, 1862, Confederate Lieutenant John Glenn and his raiders stuck the light tower. They placed a seventy-pound gunpowder bomb at the base of the tower, lit the fuse, and ran for cover. The explosion came quickly, and falling bricks and masonry from the collapsing tower nearly killed the young lieutenant. Ironically, Glenn would later proudly deliver his offical report on the tower's destruction to Confederate General Danville Leadbetter. Just three years earlier Leadbetter had been the federal engineer who designed and built the Sand Island tower. The lighthouse was rebuilt in the years 1871-72.

Block Island Southeast Light - 1875

Block Island Southeast Light was finally completed in the summer by T.H. Tyan of Staten Island, New York, and a light was first exhibited from the tower on February 1, 1875.

February 25, 1999:

The Double Keepers' Quarters at Cape Hatteras NC was lifted and transported to the new location which was previously prepared.


A great overview of the move:

http://www.outerbanks.org/moving%20LH.htm


[This message has been edited by JChidester (edited 02-18-2002).]

Great Captain Island Light - Greenwich, CT

A new lighthouse and keeper's home was built of stone to replace the original light on the island on February 18, 1868.

Ledge Obstruction Light - Stamford, CT

Ledge Obstruction Light(also called Chatham Rock Light or Stamford Light) was first exhibited on February 10, 1882. It was visible for 13 miles.

Boca Grande Lighthouse - Florida

Old Port Boca Grande Lighthouse was abandoned in 1967 and fell victim to vandals and the elements. Local residents felt the sentinel should be preserved and had it transferred from federal to county ownership on February 11, 1972 for inclusion in a park. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.

[This message has been edited by Randy Kremer (edited 02-20-2002).]

Greens Ledge Lighthouse - Norwalk CT

Greens Ledge Lighthouse, established on February 15, 1902, is located on a wave-swept site at the southwestern end of the Norwalk Islands, an archipelago near the Connecticut shore in western Long Island Sound.

Automation of the Lights

The romance of lighthouses has been extinguished in most of the nation and the world as new scientific technologies emerged in the second half of the 20th century and automated electronic lighting equipment took over the job of the old keepers, or "wickies" as they were sometimes called. Coast Guard officials began automation of the lighthouses on Long Island Sound in the mid-1960's. Eaton Neck Light at Northport, New York became the first automated light in the nation on Monday, February 7, 1966, and became the prototype for the modernization process which followed.

Point Isabel - Texas

Like many of the lights in the South during the Civil War, Point Isabel was just one of many put out of commission by the Confederates. November 1863, retreating rebels again tried to destroy the lighthouse to prevent its use by Federal troops, this time setting off a twenty-five-pound keg of powder inside the tower and blowing off the door, resulting in cracks to the upper part of the brick masonry and damage to the revolving mechanism for the already removed lighting apparatus.

After the war, Foreman George G. Burns and his men braved consecutive northers and wet weather as they worked on the station, finally completing their efforts in mid-February. The light was exhibited again for the first time on February 22, 1866.

Eldred Rock - Alaska

On February 5, 1898, eight years before Eldred Rock light was built, the Clara Nevada crept out into storm-tossed Lynn Canal, southbound for Seattle. She was a passenger ship carrying some one hundred passengers, an illegal shipment of dynamite, and more than $100,000 in gold dust from the Klondike. The weary but elated miners never had a chance to spend their golden profits.

Hurricane-force winds, estimated at ninety miles per hour, blasted down the canal that night. A witness on shore related that he saw a ship on fire near Eldred Rock. It was impossible for any craft to reach the stricken ship that night, but a week later the steamer Rustler out of Juneau reported a wreck off Eldred Rock. Only one body was recovered, some forty miles from the site.

Congress responded to the accident by releasing funds for a light station to be built at Eldred Rock. It was completed in 1906.

Michigan City Breakwater Light - 1911

This light was built in Sept. 1911, after the breakwater was rebuilt following its destruction in a storm in February, 1910. The light tower is a concrete pyramidal structure resting on a concrete base, that tapers from 5 feet square at the base to 2 feet, 6 inches square at the top, and is surmounted by a plastic lens lantern. Overall, the structure is 32 feet high and creates a lens focal plane 36 feet above the lake level.