Light Hearted

Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse is the last screwpile cottage-style light station in its original location in Chesapeake Bay. It’s located about a mile and a half offshore from the nearest point of land in Annapolis, Maryland. The City of Annapolis owns the lighthouse, and the Chesapeake Chapter of the U.S. Lighthouse Society manages it. The Annapolis Maritime Museum serves as the departure point fo...

Lighthouse tenders were ships that were specifically designed to maintain, support, or tend to lighthouses or lightships by providing supplies, fuel, mail, and transportation. The tender Lilac was launched in Wilmington, Delaware, in 1933. Lilac in 1939. U.S. Lighthouse Society archives Nearly 175 feet long, Lilac was equipped with a steam-powered boom that could lift buoys weighing 14 tons or mor...

Peter Gellatly Peter Gellatly is a lecturer in accounting and administration at the Coatbridge campus of New College Lanarkshire in Scotland. About 25 years ago he saw a lighthouse on his way to the Isle of Man, and he was mesmerized. He has photographed many lighthouses on his travels over the years, and more recently he has built up a lighthouse memorabilia collection ranging from uniforms to a...

The United States Lighthouse podcast Light Hearted was launched in June 2019 as the only podcast completely devoted to lighthouses and their history, preservation, and lore. This marks the fiftieth episode, not counting a few “special editions.” To mark this milestone, this episode is different than most. Rather than featuring an interview with a guest from the lighthouse world, this e...

Katie Brydon greeting visitors at Burnt Island. Courtesy of Maine Department of Marine Resources. Katie Brydon and husband Jesse Gauthier at Burnt Island. Courtesy of Maine Department of Marine Resources. Living history performances are utilized at many museums and lighthouses, but few light stations have utilized the concept of living history to the extent that Burnt Island Light Station in Booth...

Ida Lewis; U.S. Lighthouse Society archive February 25 is the birthday of a woman who is arguably the most famous lighthouse keeper in American history — Ida Lewis of Lime Rock in Newport Harbor, Rhode Island. She was born in Newport on February 25, 1842. And to celebrate Ida Lewis’s birthday, the guest in this episode of Light Hearted is Lenore Skomal, author of one of the best books ever w...

Moose Peak Lighthouse, photo by Jeremy D’Entremont This episode of Light Hearted featured an interview with the owners of one of the most rugged and remote lighthouses in New England. Congress authorized the building of a lighthouse on the east point of 30-acre Mistake Island, about five miles offshore from Jonesport, Maine, in March 1825. The station was established in October 1826. A 24-fo...

(Use the player at the bottom of the page to hear the podcast) There are many creative ways to raise money for lighthouse preservation, and the two interview subjects in this episode of Light Hearted have found one of the most creative. Alison Richardson, a summer resident of Isle au Haut in Maine, and Molly Siegel, an Island Institute fellow on the island, decided to do something special to help...

Windmill Point Lighthouse, Vermont. Photo by Jeremy D’Entremont. Lake Champlain, bordering New York, Vermont and Quebec, was once a bustling waterway. More than ten lighthouses were built on the lake in the nineteenth century, on the New York and Vermont sides. A light was established at Isle La Motte, at the northern end of the lake, about 1829 – actually a lantern placed in an upper...

Joseph Smith as Augustin Fresnel at Montauk Lighthouse, New York, in 2018. Photo by Donna Dimino. Joseph Smith has been a theatrical performer based in New York City since 1995. He decided to take his love of acting and his love of history and to bring them together as a performing artist of living history. His passion is to create excitement and curiosity about history by giving voice to stories...

Fred Mikkelsen speaking at a symposium in Kittery, Maine, in 2016.. Frederick Mikkelsen was a Coast Guard light keeper at Conimicut Lighthouse in Rhode Island circa 1958 to 1961. The cast-iron “sparkplug” style lighthouse was built at the mouth of the Providence River in 1883. Conimicut was the one of the last lighthouses in the nation to be converted to electricity. The light was auto...

East Point Lighthouse, U.S. Lighthouse Society archive East Point Lighthouse began service in September 1849. It’s a type of building known as a Cape Cod-style lighthouse, because a number of them were build on Cape Cod in the early 1800s. It consists of a lantern on the roof of a two-story keeper’s dwelling. The light was automated in 1911 with the use of an acetylene gas system. The light was da...

Ernie DeRaps at Monhegan Lighthouse in 2007. Photo by Jeremy D’Entremont. This is a special edition of Light Hearted , featuring an extended interview with a former lighthouse keeper. Ernie DeRaps, a native Mainer, spent several years in the 1950s and ‘60s as a Coast Guard lighthouse keeper at four Maine lighthouses – Monhegan, Fort Point, Heron Neck, and Browns Head. After retirement he too...

St. Marks Light Station in April 2018; U.S. Lighthouse Society photo by Jeff Gales. St. Marks is a small city on Florida’s gulf coast that’s part of the Tallahassee metropolitan area. It was founded by the Spanish in the 1600s. St. Marks became an important port of entry for the prosperous planting region of Middle Florida and South Georgia. A light station at St, Marks, Florida’s second, be...

Don Terras, seen through the Fresnel lens in the Grosse Point Lighthouse. Photo by Jeremy D’Entremont. Grosse Point Lighthouse , located at the southern end of Lake Michigan in Evanston, Illinois, was established in 1873 as the primary lighthouse marking the approach to Chicago. The lighthouse tower stands 113 feet tall and is constructed of Cream City brick encased in concrete. Still in use...

Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse, U.S. Lighthouse Society photo. Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse is probably the best-known lighthouse in Maryland, and it has many distinctions. It’s the last surviving screwpile lighthouse in Chesapeake Bay, and it’s one of the few lighthouses in the United States to be designated a National Historic Landmark. It’s weathered many storms but it’s now in need of help. Jo...

Sakonnet Point Lighthouse under restoration; photo by Jeremy D’Entremont. Featured in this episode of Light Hearted is an interview with Scott Brown, president of Friends of Sakonnet Lighthouse . In 1882, Congress appropriated $20,000 for a lighthouse on Little Cormorant Rock at the entrance to Rhode Island’s Sakonnet River, near Little Compton. Sakonnet Point Lighthouse is a typical o...

Black Rock Harbor (Fayerweather Island) Lighthouse in September 2019. Photo by Jeremy D’Entremont. With its harbor at the mouth of the Pequonnock River, Bridgeport, Connecticut, became a center of trade, shipbuilding, and whaling. This episode of Light Hearted features two interviews related to the history of lighthouses in the vicinity of Bridgeport, with Bruce Williams and Phil Blagys. Bri...

In 1864 the Elbow Reef Light Station went into service at Hope Town, a small settlement on Elbow Cay, one of the barrier islands off Great Abaco Island in the Bahamas. The lens and rotation equipment, made in the early 1900s by Chance Brothers of Birmingham, England, is still in place today. The fuel is kerosene and the lens rotates on a mercury float. The keeper on duty has to wind up the weights...

The Flying Santa passes Boston Light, 1947 (Friends of Flying Santa) Capt. William Wincapaw (Friends of Flying Santa) The Flying Santa tradition goes back to December 25, 1929, when a floatplane pilot, William Wincapaw of Friendship, Maine, loaded his plane with a dozen packages. He flew to lighthouses around the Midcoast Maine area and dropped the modest gifts for lighthouse families as a way of...

Jim Pope The jagged ledge known as Whaleback lurks menacingly on the northeast side of the entrance to the Piscataqua River. Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on the Piscataqua, was established as an important port for shipbuilding and trade before the American Revolution, and wrecks occurred around the ledges at mouth of the river with sickening regularity. The first lighthouse built on the ledge in 183...

Pigeon Point Light Station in April 2015. Photo by Jeremy D’Entremont. Pigeon Point Lighthouse is tied for the tallest lighthouse tower in California at 115 feet, and it’s a favorite of sightseers and photographers. In September of this year, California State Parks officials announced that more than $9 million in state funding will go to the lighthouse for a major renovation that will take p...

This is a special edition of Light Hearted , devoted to a discussion of the movie The Lighthouse. The Lighthouse is directed and produced by Robert Eggers, who co-wrote the screenplay with his brother Max Eggers. Shot in black-and-white, the film follows two lighthouse keepers (portrayed by Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson) who start to lose their sanity when a storm hits the remote island on whi...

Sam Reid at the Wood Island Lifesaving Station (courtesy of Sam Reid) This podcast is devoted to lighthouses and lightships, but today’s episode takes a slight detour to a related subject. The U.S. Lifesaving Service is sometimes referred to as a sister service to the Lighthouse Service. Wood Island is a small island about a quarter of a mile inside the mouth of the Piscataqua River in Kitte...

Lightship Chesapeake (U.S. Lighthouse Society photo) The first lightship in the United States was established at Chesapeake Bay in 1820, and the total number in the U.S. peaked in 1909 with 56 locations marked. From 1820 until 1983, there were 179 lightships built for the U.S. government. The official use of lightships for navigation in the United States ended in 1985. It’s estimated that there ar...