Today's Parade Newspaper insert features an article about the disposition of lighthouses. What is hoped and required of the recipient is that the lighthouses be restored, preserved and open to the public. I can imagine that these preservationists face many of the same issues we do in rail preservation. Worth the entire article is the quote from Tim Harrison, President of the American Lighthouse foundation. "A nation that doesn't save its history, is a nation that's lost."
Wise words to think about.

fwsturke@pacbell.net

Hear Hear! Lighthouses and Lighthouses are great historic artifacts. They have a great human story attached.

And to add a railroad element to this posting. The
main supply and research center for the US Lighthouse Service was in Staten Island, NY. So just take a guess about how much equipment etc was shipped out here to the west coast?

Ted Miles


ted_miles@nps.gov

Probably nothing more than the lens and ironwork were shipped by rail. One of the features that made lighthouses unique was that unless special circumstances existed, they were usually constructed out of whatever building material was available locally. In fact, I would not be surprised if the iron pieces for the lantern (room where the lens sat), stairs and railings were manufactured locally or in the District in which a lighthouse was being constructed. The raw materials would have traveled by rail, but not over vast distances as a general rule.

It has to be remembered that due to the nature of lighthouses and their locations, this was one situation where ships had an advantage over rail transport, especially since delivery of the material was not as time sensitive as today. The way that the Lighthouse Service ran their operation, delivery of supplies to light stations was only done by lighthouse service tenders, so the only use of railroads would have been between the Staten Island depot and the District supply depot and the service preferred to use their own ships to transport their materials. In the end, it could very well be possible that the United States Lighthouse Service shipped little or nothing by rail because of the availability of their large fleet of coastal tenders. After all, the first 16 west coast lighthouses were completed prior to the Transcontinental Railroad so the lighthouse service might not have seen any advantage to using the railroad to send supplies west, considering that many of their purchases, especially lenses were from foreign manufacturers.

awalker2002@comcast.net