Michigan Lights - Windmill Point

Windmill Point Lighthouse next to
the Detroit River. 9/26/19 dwm photo

We stayed overnight outside Detroit after a day of light-housing, with a goal of visiting two lights and a covered bridge the next day.

Our hotel was in Dearborn.  The first light was north of downtown in Grosse Pointe.

An hour later, I turned down a residential street, looked for a 90 degree right turn and then a park almost immediately on the left.

As I drove, I noticed Fox Creek running along the street and numerous houses with garage-style boathouses out back.  Later, I learned it was home to a yacht club early in the 20th century.

The area's changed, but quite a few homes still have boathouses.

While the first light was built in 1837, the one standing today was built in 1933.

This light doesn't use a lantern
room to protect the light.
9/26/2019 dwm photo

The first thing to catch my eye was the lack of a lantern room.  Instead, the light is encased inside a metal and glass pillar from the center of the tower.

At one point, land reserved for the light was exchanged so a Marine Hospital could be built.  It was eventually replaced by a housing development, which has also been dismantled.

Today, the light's land is Mariner Park and it's a popular place to fish.  There were at least half-a-dozen anglers with a line in the water.

From here, I could see the flash from next week's light,
the William Livingstone light on Belle Island. 9/26/19 (dwm)

The location is important to navigation because Lake St. Clair flows into the Detroit River which carries ships to Lake Erie.

I enjoyed visiting Windmill Point.  It's named for a stone windmill that stood here early in the 19th Century.

At one point, there were a pair of range lights paired with the larger light here to handle the maritime traffic.

Now the Windmill Lighthouse looks more like a candle greeting boats as they float by.