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Sebago Lake’s Beacon
This vintage post card, postmarked in 1924, shows a lighthouse on Maine’s Sebago Lake. At 45 square miles, it is the state’s second largest lake which is more than 300 feet deep in some places. Sebago Lake and the surrounding area are known for their erratic and sudden changes in weather during all seasons, which is likely due to its proximity to the Atlantic Ocean and to Mt. Washington. This privately-owned lighthouse still stands today, although its lantern has been changed.
Burnt Island on the Cover
A painting of Maine’s Burnt Island Lighthouse by artist Claude Montgomery (1912-1990) was featured on the cover of the August 1974 edition of Down East, The Magazine of Maine. The Burnt Island Lighthouse is celebrating its bicentennial this year.
Transitional Era
This vintage real photo post card of the 1873 Yaquina Head Lighthouse in Newport, Oregon is from the time when it was still an active Coast Guard Light Station. The lighthouse was automated on May 1, 1966, and the buildings were boarded up. In 1984, the vandalized buildings were all demolished. The light station underwent a major restoration in 2006. If you look closely on the bottom left of the post card, you will notice two vintage automobiles, one each from a transitional era of the changing styles of automobiles. Today, it is estimated that over 400,000 people visit the lighthouse every year.
Deteriorating Light Station
This 1966 aerial view of Florida’s Anclote Key Lighthouse which had been automated in 1952, shows the 1887 light station in a rapid state of deterioration. The 102-foot-tall lighthouse has since been restored and was relighted on September 13, 2003.
SOHIO Road Map Shows Color Change
By the time this 1947 SOHIO Road Map of Ohio came into our possession, it had seen some pretty good use. The map cover features that state’s Marblehead Lighthouse on Sandusky Bay, Lake Erie. Built in 1821, it is the oldest continuously operating lighthouse on the Great Lakes. The photograph of the lighthouse shows when the lantern was painted black. In 1974, the lantern was painted red and has remained so ever since. Although SOHIO gas stations have ceased to exist, a few marina gas stations on Lake Erie and the Ohio River still bear the SOHIO name. We wonder, if GPS should ever stop working, will the next generation know how to read a road map?
The Lost Home
This vintage post card of Maine’s Deer Island Thorofare Lighthouse on Mark Island in Penobscot Bay shows an adorable keeper’s house in a tranquil setting where life was good for the keeper and the families who once lived there. However, that all came to an end on September 10, 1958 when a battery explosion in the basement caused a fire that destroyed the house. The 1857 tower still stands as a silent reminder of another era, but void of human life. The island is now owned by the Island Heritage Trust and is managed as a wildlife refuge.
Keeper’s Son Returns
Eighty-five-year-old Russell Knowles is shown here on October 9, 1992 when he visited the 1868 Great Captain Island Lighthouse. His father served there as the assistant keeper from 1905 to 1907 when he was promoted and transferred to become head keeper at the Saybrook Breakwater Lighthouse. Great Captain Island Lighthouse is located in Long Island Sound, north of the main channel into the East River, near Greenwich, Connecticut. (Photo by Maxwell Balmain)
Servicing an Alaska Beacon
A Coast Guard Air Station Sitka MH-60 Jayhawk crew waits on the landing pad at Alaska’s Cape Decision Lighthouse to pick up two crewmen from the Aids to Navigation Team who were servicing the beacon on March 11, 2011. (Photos by Petty Officer 1st Class Sara Francis, USCG)
Followed in His Father’s Footsteps
Lighthouse keeper William Yeatman, Jr. is shown here with his four children in front of the 1883 Drum Point Lighthouse, located in the Patuxent River in the Chesapeake Bay, Maryland, where he was the lighthouse keeper from 1918 to 1919. He had started his lighthouse career serving at Smiths Creek Beacon in 1904, followed by Point No Point Lighthouse and Seven Foot Knoll Lighthouse, all in Maryland. He had followed in his father’s footsteps, who had been a lighthouse keeper at Maryland’s Point Lookout Lighthouse from 1871 to 1908. Interestingly, after serving at Drum Point Lighthouse, William Yeatman, Jr. was stationed at Point Lookout from 1931 to 1939, just like his father had been before him. In 1975, the Drum Point Lighthouse was moved to the Calvert Marine Museum in Solomons, Maryland. It is one of only three screwpile cottage-type lighthouses remaining of the 45 that once stood in the Chesapeake Bay. (Loretta Yeatman Goldsborough collection)
This story appeared in the
Sep/Oct 2021 edition of Lighthouse Digest Magazine. The print edition contains more stories than our internet edition, and each story generally contains more photographs - often many more - in the print edition. For subscription information about the print edition, click here.
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