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Wiscasset’s Water Beacon
Every year tens of thousands of tourists pass through the beautiful hamlet of Wiscasset, Maine as they traverse U.S. Route 1, but no one alive today has ever seen the lighthouse-looking structure that once stood in the community. Today the town is probably better known for its massive summer traffic jams that are caused in part by Red’s Eats, a small take-out food stand.
In the late 1800s and early 1900s this structure was a well-known landmark in the community. Because of the popularity of lighthouses, especially in Maine, the owners of Hilton House Hotel constructed their water tower to resemble a lighthouse. However, on October 8, 1903, the Hilton House Hotel was totally destroyed in a fire. The lighthouse water tower was the only building left standing. The hotel was never rebuilt.
Eventually the Sortwell family, who owned property across Federal Street, purchased the land and they demolished the lighthouse water tower and they created the Sunken Garden as a private family space for recreation and entertaining. In 1958 the Sortwells donated the Sunken Garden to the Town of Wiscasset and it is still there today, but the lighthouse water tower only remains as images in the dusty pages of time.
The Lighthouse of
Stuart, Florida
The lighthouse on U.S. Rt. 1 and the St. Lucie River in Stuart, Florida was one of many unique curb side businesses in Florida that once used a lighthouse facsimile to represent their business. It was so unique that it would have easily fit right in among the many tourist attractions along America’s old Route 66. But, it was in Florida. The lighthouse was not only a road side attraction, but because it was also on a body of water, it was a “landmark” to boaters.
Thanks to Alice and Greg Luckhardt, and the Stuart Heritage Museum, we were able to learn an immense about of history about the business that a book could easily be written about. In 1923, a commercial fisherman, Harry Miles Speedy, built an automobile service garage at the site that included apartments above it and a marina nearby to dock boats. In 1932 because of a new bridge nearby the property was altered and remodeled. Now named Speedy’s Inn, the apartments were still on the second floor, but a restaurant and dance hall was on the main floor, and the automobile service area was moved to the back. In 1935 beer distributer Archie A. ‘Buck’ Hendry purchased the business and remodeled it and did away with the garage. However in the next two years the business was sold twice, first to George Kenney and then to Joseph A. Abbott from New Jersey. During that time a larger dance floor and orchestra area was added. The lighthouse was restored and the Lighthouse Trailer Court was constructed just beyond the building. Although it gained in popularity, the outbreak of World War caused a drop in business and it was closed form 1942-45.
Under the new ownership of O.C. Smith, who remodeled it again, it reopened on November 30, 1945. In 1948 it was sold again. The new owner was Charles Albert Lintell, a native of England who had been a rubber planter in Indonesia and had moved to the United States in 1921. Business thrived and by 1951, drive-in service was added. On August 16, 1956, during a mid-afternoon thunderstorm, a bolt of lightning struck the businesses neon sign which eventually caused a massive fire that destroyed the building, but the lighthouse survived. Lintell rebuilt, but this time it was a one story structure. When Charles Lintell died in 1956 his son, Dean, took over the business but in 1961 he sold it to Dr. Russell M. Wright of Michigan for $100,000.
Old vintage post cards of it showed just how diverse the Lighthouse business was. One card says it is “The Scintillating Spot of the Sunrise State,” and other card said that it is the “Sportsmen Headquarters for Florida’s Finest Fishing.” Fishermen who rented boats and docked at the marina weighed and showed off their catch. One colorful vintage post card called the place, “Frank Kenny’s Lighthouse” and “Frank Kenny, Keeper.” But in fact, Frank Kenny was a one-time manager and not an owner.
In 1962 with the widening of U.S. Route 1 and the Roosevelt Bridge was approved, the Lighthouse Restaurant lost out to eminent domain and everything was demolished, including the colorful red and white spiraled stripped lighthouse and a unique slice of Florida’s entrepreneurial history was wiped out as if it had been destroyed by a hurricane, rather than in the so-called name of progress.
This story appeared in the
May/Jun 2014 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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