National Lighthouse Day

Cana Island Lighthouse 7/13/2013 dwm

 This blog started in 2012, a full year before I took pictures of my first lighthouse, and four years before my wife and I started visiting lighthouses to take pictures and get a tour, if possible.

 It surprised me Sunday when I was looking for something to write about today when I saw that August 7 has been National Lighthouse Day for 231 years! It seems I'm overdue to write about it.

 It was on this day in 1789 Congress first allowed money to be used to build and maintain lighthouses. In 1989, a different Congress designated August 7 as Lighthouse Day.

Old Mackinaw Point. 10/9/2024 dwm

The first light I photographed was Cana Island in Door County, Wisconsin (above left). The most recent lighthouse was Old Mackinaw Point in Mackinaw City last October (photo right). 

Lighthouses combine beauty and durability. Inside the each house, each light represents the men and women who endured hardship and were often heroic in carrying out their duties.

While some houses look alike, the stories are particular to their moment in time and how the people, elements, and waters interacted.

Split Rock. 8/25/2021 dwm

 Each lighthouse has its own stage and depending on the setting and the time of day, there might be dozens of looks at the lights and ways to show their presence.

 Split Rock Lighthouse in Minnesota (photo left) is the most dramatic light I've seen, from its perch 130-feet above Lake Superior (photo left).

 Old Mackinaw Point Lighthouse on the Mackinac Straits was vital to ships passing safely past. When the Mackinaw Bridge connected the Upper and Lower Peninsulas of Michigan, the bridge became the light. 

Michigan City. 9/16/2017 dwm

Global Positioning Systems (GPS) has removed the reason for lights with the exception of boat owners with less sophisticated systems who still look to the shore for a guiding light.

Our pursuit of more lights continues this fall on the fourth of the five Great Lakes, Erie. I'm looking forward to capturing at least 12 of 18. There are more lights than that, but several are too far off-shore or require a boat or plane to see it.

The most famous light in Ohio is Marblehead, the oldest continually operating lighthouse on the Great Lakes. I can't wait.