Hey everyone, I'm Vince. And I'm Emily. And you're
listening to The Lighthouse Lowdown. Welcome
to a three -year anniversary. Oh, for some reason
I thought you were going to say three -hour episode.
Oh, for some reason. Vincent gets a chance every
now and then to record an episode and Emily's
like, oh, it's going to be three hours. That
was one time and it was four hours. Oh my gosh.
Three and a half. So welcome to the show. We've
been doing this for three years. Cheers. Cheers.
Let me. Yeah. Thank you. Three years started
in 2022. This is the three year anniversary of.
us posting our first episode. Awesome. Obviously,
we were active before that. And today's the recording
date, so this will air after that. Oh, that's
right. But, you know, everybody, they're here
in spirit. Same spirit. So, yeah. So let's just
get into it. Okay. Today, risking life and limb,
the dangerous lives of lighthouse keepers. Is
this a history movie or an episode? This is the
episode title. Okay. Is there a history buoy?
There is a history buoy, of course. Hold on to
your pants. History buoy of the day. Folklore.
Yeah, this is my clip art. So this is my clip
art. The history buoy of today. Got to settle
in. It's folklore. So I found several articles
for today's purposes. One of the articles I'm
going to cite is about folklore regarding carrying
fuel oil and lighthouse keepers. Okay. So we're
going to, you know, I'm going to flashback. We're
going to talk about the lives and deaths of lighthouse
keepers. We are. In honorable fashion? Yes. We
have to make sure that we're in memoriam because
these are facts and these are real people. These
are real stories. Yes. Okay. But we'll also.
Have a little fun. Have some fun. We'll have
a little fun. You know they had some fun. And
then also we're going to talk not just death,
but also danger, right? We're going to do a pre
-task analysis. They go hand in hand. Yeah. Okay,
so for today, our history buoy is lighthouse,
oil myths, and folklore regarding carrying fuel
oil. Funny that there's folklore about carrying
oil. Yeah. Folklore. Well, what do you think?
What comes to mind when I talk about carrying
fuel oil? I think about their five -gallon jugs
that they had to take up and down the stairs.
Yeah. They'd refill it at the bottom and bring
it to the top. That's all I got. Yep. Well, you're
correct. I am correct. You're correct. It's not
folklore that they use five -gallon buckets.
They had different names instead of bucket, but
bucket is also one of the things, so that's what
I will say. But five gallons was the standard
measurement. They did have different sizes. Of
course, when it became United States Lighthouse
Establishment. That was the first one. Then Bored.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So when it became militarized,
it was more standard. Okay. And of course, there
are lighthouses all over the world. But five
gallons was generally the unit. And of course,
it started with whale oil, went through several
different fuels, and then kerosene. was like
the last most popular fuel before electrification.
So fuel oil, we'll call it, was stored either
in the tower, which we've seen some of those
containers, usually they're, actually, not usually,
some of them are well -kept and historically
preserved. Yeah. Where did we see one? We've
seen a couple. Ocracoke had one sitting in there.
I thought we saw one at Cape Cod. I don't remember
which lighthouse. They're kind of ornate. They
look a little bit, to me, like the Stanley Cup.
Stanley Cup. But, you know, they're typically,
they're cylindrical, they're banded, and I'm
guessing stainless steel. Try not to make it
rust, right? So it's material that's shiny. Or
at least coated in some fashion. Yeah, so they
store the fuel oil either in the tower, in that,
I'm going to call it a day tank, because in our
industry... Emily and I both work in engineering.
We design industrial projects. Often the term
used for fuel that's going to be burned within
one day or equivalent to a day or so is called
a day tank. So that's a little bit of a broad
stroke, but that's what I'll call it. The day
tank is either in the tower or the permanent,
more larger collection of fuel is in an oil house.
And there are many oil houses. And if you were
to look at our... lighthouse low down design,
which is now on screen. You could argue that
that is a lighthouse keeper's home next to the
tower. It could be a fuel oil storage. What did
you have in mind when you drew that? More like,
see the oil house is never that close to a lighthouse
because if it blows up, you don't want it to
damage the lighthouse. So it's usually a good
distance away just in case. So snuggled up like
that, I would definitely say either the Keeper's
House or like Body Island has that little house
in front that's connected to the tower by a little
run or like Curituck. Yeah. So that's kind of
what I had in mind, actually. Well, a little
side on our logo. Yeah. We went to Wood End Lighthouse.
Yes. Out on Cape Cod by Provincetown, which is
a whole fun story. If you don't know that story,
please go watch the episode. You will not be
disappointed. What did we call it? Cape Cod Plog.
Yeah, Provincetown. But I took a photo of the
oil house and tower in the same orientation as
our logo. Oh, did you really? Because I had our
newly made hats. And so anyways, I'll show that
now. Vincent, insert here. I haven't seen this
picture. I'll show it to you. Or maybe I just
haven't seen it with the correct lens. Didn't
catch your eye. Yeah. So we got oil. Right? Yes.
Some of the myths are surrounding how much oil
was used. So how often lighthouse keepers were
hauling oil and how heavy it was and so on. So
that's what we're going to talk about for a minute.
Okay. So the folklore, one of the statements
was if you look at keepers historically in photos,
right, they're wearing typically black uniforms,
a cap, and they're standing, they're posing because
it's the 1800s. because it's the 1900s, they're
posing a little turned, looking at the camera.
And the folklore is they did that because they
wanted to hide their arm. They had a preferred
dominant, usually carrying arm, that would become
so muscular that they didn't want it to be in
the photo. So I found a photo to look at. No.
This looks like AI. Thank you for that. So this
is AI, and I use chat GPT. You're the worst.
I asked for a prompt. My prompt was, show me
a lighthouse keeper in an official 1800s uniform,
which is his more or less kind of clothes. Good
for AI. It's just a trench coat. And then I said,
now give him one very muscular arm with no sleeve.
You'll also notice as I flash between these two,
they made him, his beard gets trimmed. See that?
It's like his whole face firms up. Yeah. And
they also took away his underclothes. Yeah, he
gets a little harder. He's like, I have nothing
on under my coat. And the light goes out for
some reason in the tower. Oh, no. Window moves.
It was probably just rotating. So many of our
viewers are boomers, I would say, and of the
older generations. And I would ask you to be
aware that AI can do things like this. You can't
trust all the lighthouse things you see out there.
Because AI has fixed the hand problem where they
could not get hands correct. Yeah, the number
of fingers. I hate that because it was such an
easy way to tell if something was AI. Now it's
like, it's kind of hard. Right. It could be an
extremely clear photo that's edited too much
or it could be AI. You can't really tell. Yeah,
there was some AI photo of a woman and a husband
and I can't remember the backstory. There was
some funny backstory. But clearly the women's
bodice was modified in AI. And the comments were
all about the man's three fingers. He would like
his hand around his wife. Yeah. Three fingers.
Anyways. So talking about, you know, they would
hide their arm because it was overly muscular.
That's not true. And they actually didn't have
to haul that much oil. Now, a lot of our visits
and people that we've talked to and stories that
we hear online are focused around, oh, the labor
of. hauling a bucket of oil all the way to the
top of the tower that's real except uh it would
usually be once every 24 hours yeah so the person
who wrote this article and we have everything
credited at the end but the person who wrote
this article said um for example this is written
2024 so they said the longest night of this year
2024 is tuesday december 21st and the length
of no sunlight is 14 hours and 48 minutes. I
can't recall where they're at. I'm sure that
would factor in. It's not get too deep. They
said still using kerosene, which of course is
more efficient of the fuel oils. And the quote
is smarter people help me out. Let's say it's
15 hours of lighted time for the tower, for the,
for the assembly. If that had 30 ounces of fuel
is burned an hour on average for a five wick
lamp. which is one of the larger, more fuel -consuming
lamps for the application. The total use is 450
ounces over a 15 -hour long night. So divide
that by 128 ounces, which is one gallon. Gives
us a little bit more than three and a half gallons
of kerosene needed for the longest night of the
year. So that's less than five gallons by a lot.
One and a half gallons would still be left. That
would be used in emergencies or to prepare the
lamp for the next lighting in the morning. Okay.
So you're not going to carry the fuel back down.
True. You've already carried it up. So it's like
a nice overage. So the myth was that they're
carrying fuel all the time and every hour and
up and down, and they're getting strong and hiding
their arm. All this is built around the assumption
that they were burning a ton of fuel oil, which
was not accurate. Yeah. So there you go. Wow.
History of the day. Maybe that used to be different.
Like that's using kerosene, which is like a better
fuel than in the past. So there's a chance that
like well oil did have to do refill multiple
times in a night or something, but we don't know.
Yeah. Certainly wouldn't want make one arm significantly
unless you're like doing curls with the bucket
as you're going up. Make sure you get your 12
reps in, four sets, eat your protein. Yeah. Thank
you for indulging me on the Lighthouse Bowie.
Thank you for that. So I've wanted to do this
for a while. So again, the title, Risking Life
and Limb, the Dangerous Lives of Lighthouse Keepers.
This is episode 77. It's been three years. I
thought about this about a year ago when I found
a website that is our favorite people, the USLHS.
They have a page called In Memoriam, which is
one of the many resources that they have. Oh,
yes. I'll just read this. Many Lighthouse personnel
crossed the bar due to natural causes of sickness
or age. However, some Lighthouse personnel gave
their lives for their country and service due
to accidents, drownings, or even murder. Listed
below is a memorial to those courageous members
of the Lighthouse service who lost their lives
during their service. and the time and manner
in which the passing occurred, the society, USLHS,
will be adding to this list as other personnel
are found who gave their lives in such a manner.
Okay. So, again, I wanted to say that now because
I want to show some honor to these people. Yeah.
But I use this table and develop some data around
it. Okay. Just for a glimpse in. This is, of
course, not going to capture. Like how likely
you are to drown? As a lighthouse keeper? Exactly.
Yes. 39 ways to die as a wiki. So there's 100
ways to die in the West. What is this? 39 ways
to die as a wiki. So on that page, I know there's
a ton more data, but let's just isolate it to
that page. There are 220 entries, okay? Can I
say something? Please. It's funny that there's
a lot of fell from, and sometimes they get really
specific. You bet, yeah. Fall. Sometimes it just
says fell. And then there's station vehicle plunge
down 60 foot embankment. And like, why are some
so specific and some are just like, I don't know,
he fell down. I think, so I'll get, I'll get,
I analyze this. Okay. But I think it's because
they had certain amount of details from Keeper's
Logs and historical records. Yeah, if they just
say like. you know, primary keeper fell. Yeah.
He fell to his death. It's like, Oh, that sucks.
How? Give me more details. Was he painting or
did he get in a vehicle and it went down a 60
foot embankment? It is a second one. Or was it
a cliff? So again, it makes me chuckle. And I
know someone actually died that way. So it's
kind of a, I've been trying, I've been wrestling
with how to present this in an honorable way.
And also difficult. do what we do and just talk
about life, right? So there were 39 different
categories listed out of the 220 deaths on that
website as of May 1st, 2025, when I was on there
last. So 39 ways to die. And you're going to
guess that some of these are more popular than
others. Popular. Some of these are more popular
ways to go. What's a better word? More frequently
occurring. Yes. Oh. A pie chart. This is a pie
chart. Now, I did not label the data on purpose.
Okay. So I can guess? Yes. Based on the 39 entries.
You want to see them again? Yes, please. So we
got a lot of purple, right? Yeah, it's almost
75%. Some brown, some green. Actually, no, that's
probably a solid like 70%. Okay, so I'm going
to show you the categories again. Okay. Let's
read some of them while you're thinking. Okay,
so accident ruptured a blood vessel. I bet that's
pretty low. Accidentally shot. Fatally is important
information. Yeah, accidentally, fatally. We've
got burns. We've got, which is different from
died in fire, died from coal stove fumes. I feel
like that could, I don't know. That's like the
modern day dying from carbon monoxide. Disappeared.
He disappeared dead. Like, we just assume dead.
It's just awful again, but. Froze, killed in
explosion, drowned by car ferry. Let's see. suicide
that's probably a big one though not it's been
not the biggest for sure killed in tsunami killed
on duty civil civil war okay i'm gonna say okay
what is this you have accidentally shot shot
and murdered i didn't i'm telling you i didn't
okay no you don't oh shot and killed by assistant
keeper so all of these are very they're the same
Just give me a, give me a guess. We can come
back to these two. We'll talk about it. Okay.
I'm going to say, um, fell while painting tower.
Okay. Is, uh, am I, so here's the data and here's
the key where, uh, the colors are too drowned.
Okay. Well that, that almost should have gone
for the easy one. I was gonna say almost all
of them. That's not true. A large majority, 65%.
I can tell you roughly. Okay. Um, because I reanalyze
the data. Oh, good Lord. So I put them into subcategories.
The subcategories boil down to just these. So
disappeared, drowned, equipment slash machinery,
fall or fell, fire, which is, I guess, explosions
too, physical and mental health, only four entries.
That's shocking. Good for them. Which that just
means they retire before they're... Or suicide.
Overdue. Yeah. Yeah. Violence, which I... I didn't
put suicide and violence. Didn't think about
that. Well, person on person violence. Violence
was not that uncommon. 6%, 14 entries. And then
weather. Why did I guess fall from? I think I've
heard. You talked about a lot of falling deaths.
Yes. And injuries. And the drowning, I felt it
was too easy of an answer. But it makes the most
sense because lots of lighthouses you had to
row to get food. Yeah. From the market. You had
to drop your kid off at school. Now, as an asterisk,
I've got to insert the fact that these statistics
also include light ship incidents. Oh, okay.
Which are not insignificant. So as we go back,
I'm killing myself with these slides, but you're
going to see light ship sunk in a hurricane,
drowned is listed. And I actually don't remember
the number of entries on that. Let's see if it's
on this. We're not going to be able to find the
color. Oh, it's the bottom. Yeah, I know. So
one of the light purples. So it's in there somewhere.
Maybe it's just one listing. One of those teeny
slivers. But the point is there's all these descriptors
were provided. I reorganized them and put them
into these buckets. And again, I have the total
of 220. So 1 % disappeared. 65 % drowned. 6 %
died from machinery or equipment. 5 % fell to
death. This is low. It's low. 2 % died in fire,
which is surprising to me, too. That is, too.
Physical, mental health, 2%. Violence, 6%. Weather,
13%. Kind of nuts. You know, it's comforting
that disappeared didn't end up just being one
guy. Yeah, two guys. And I'm pretty sure there
were two separate accounts. Yeah. I'm pretty
sure they didn't disappear together. But you
don't want to be the one singular statistic on
anything. Yeah. So it's good. It's good. It's
not alone. It is good that they're not alone.
Oh my gosh. So yeah, these are the, I call this
the refined results. And now I just started listing
like, so we talked about some deaths, what caused
them. These are just risks that I've thought
of. I've just thought about some of the stories
that we've heard. Think about standard rock where
the boiler or something in the fuel storage basement
exploded. One man died. Three men spent two days
outside on a ledge waiting. It kept burning,
by the way, the whole time. We've talked about
violence. We've talked about murder mysteries.
Do you remember that one? I'm quizzing you now.
That was the one in Scotland. I might actually
have the... the note on that it was an island
so standard rock we talked about um fire and
lead so again i'm citing some articles now yeah
but eddy stone lighthouse yes remember there
was a fire in the tower and a keeper went out
and tried to put it out he got lead in his mouth
yeah his stomach that's one of these things that
was cited um the perils of rest i could read
all these articles if you have any questions
they're like Paragraphs each, but the perils
of rescue. Ida Lewis went out a rowboat to save
people. That didn't go very well. Wild weather.
Talked about when three guys disappeared. Where
was this one at? North coast of Scotland. Yeah.
Eileen Moore. Lighthouse on the island of Eileen.
E -I -L -E -A -N. No, that's not the one we covered.
Well. It starts with an F. After stormy weather
delayed his trip to the lighthouse for days,
replacement keeper arrived at Eileen Moore by
boat, only to find that three of the on -duty
keepers, all of them, were gone. Only vague and
scattered clues remained, a stopped clock, a
knocked over chair, and one coat. It's the correct
story, but it's not the lighthouse. They don't
say the lighthouse name in this article. It's
kind of weird. Oh, that's what I thought. Well,
we'll come back to it. Toxic mercury. We just
talked about mercury floats in a recent episode.
Yes, we did. That is a definite health risk.
Extreme isolation. This one we'll have to come
back to because it's pretty wild. I read the
whole story. But so we watched The Lighthouse,
the movie with Gerald Butler. No, Robert Pattinson.
Robert Pattinson and William Defoe. Yeah. Gerald
Butler is not in it. But he is in a Lighthouse
movie. The one about the story you just said.
What is it called? Oh, I haven't seen that one
yet. It starts with an F. Flannan Isle. Flannan
Isle Mystery. Thank you for that. So those three
guys just disappeared. No one ever found them.
And the Keeper's Log said that they were going
to go do something or they were in the middle
of some action. Yeah. So maybe they all went
outside at once. They got like taken off in a
wave. Yeah. We don't know. Aliens. Aliens. So
this one, extreme isolation. I don't think you've
ever heard of this before. Clipperton Island?
Nope. I'm just going to read this. Clipperton.
These are not my words. I read the whole story.
This is a short version. Oh, okay. Lighthouses
likely attracted some folks who had trouble fitting
into society, but the keeper of Clipperton Island
was an extreme case. The danger in this situation
wasn't to the keeper, but to the people stuck
on the tiny Pacific Island, a thousand kilometers
off Mexico's southwest coast. Doesn't sound good.
Since 1899, Clipperton Island had been supported
of a guano mining colony. Ew. So I'm going to
fast forward. Guano was bad bird shit. Yes. It
was very valuable at one time. Mining. Yes. Collecting.
Ew. Extremely valuable. Wars were fought over
guano, by the way. It was a whole thing. Just
keep that. Yeah. It's like, but you know, salt
was really valuable at one time. And then pepper
was huge. The silk trail. Those are spices. Those
are not poop. Guano. was a fertilizer, and it
was extremely important. Yeah, I needed some
context there as to why people would value this.
So I'm just going to make my own summary because
I read the story recently. So guano was mined
there. The United States, Spain, and because
this is almost 1900, by the way, not that long
ago in lighthouse history, Spain and Mexico kind
of got in a... about about this one island okay
because it had a ton of bat traffic that was
excuse me bird traffic and the guano was supposedly
of high quality anyways it's actually not a great
place to live so the people who did get there
had trouble living there of course and then because
of the trade war between the three countries
and who claimed they had it's so funny britain
couldn't even land on the island They failed
to land, so they did a lap, and they yelled from
the boat that we now own this island. It's like,
put a flag on it, and then I'll believe you.
But there weren't that many people on it, and
there was a lighthouse, and there was a guy,
Victoriano Alvarez. Victoriano. I'll call him
Vic. So Vic was the lighthouse keeper, kind of
a weirdo, kind of a recluse. Okay. And through
this trade war, ships just stopped coming to
the island. Oh, no. So people started dying of
vitamin deficiency. Oh, my gosh. Specifically,
they had scurvy, the men. And the men, how did
this happen? Four of them thought they saw a
boat. So they got in a rowboat and went out to
sea. And then they realized it was a hallucination.
So the guy who had directed them to do that was
on the boat. He's like, let's go. We got to save
ourselves. We got to get the attention to this
ship. They got mad at him, overturned the boat,
they all died. So that was four of the last like
12 men. That was fruitful. So the men died and
there was one man left, Vic. Vic took all the
guns and threw them into a lagoon except for
one rifle. He kept that for himself. The story
gets dark. There were several women on the island
and he made them the slaves, if you will. Skip
that. It's just, it's bad. This is a true story.
Eventually, they killed him with a hammer. Okay.
They got away. They were rescued by a passerby
boat. The United States was looking for submarines
because it was World War I. What? Yes. How did
they live there that long? It was like the, I
forget the boat, the USS Yorktown or something.
I'm sorry. That's not the point of this episode.
Yeah. The point is. This guy terrorized these
women on an island. Died by a hammer. And it
was, well, what's the cause? Was he going crazy?
Was he already crazy? Was the ice like, this
is it. This is the last stand. What would you
do if you knew you were going to die? Well, this
guy showed his colors. Yeah. So they killed him.
Eventually they were reunited for the most part
with their family. I think they were from Mexico.
Huh. Those ladies. Well, not good. So that's
the case of extreme isolation. Oh, I see. And
then another article, just the Smalls lighthouse
tragedy. One of the keepers died, and the other
keeper put him in a coffin and put him outside
because he didn't want him to be inside the lighthouse
with him. And the coffin broke loose in his body.
His arm was banging against the window. Ew, what?
Like a horror film. That's a whole thing. Oh,
terrible. This one's talking about another sailing
competition was taking place off the coast of
Ireland called the Fastnet Yacht Race. It's the
tragedy of 1979, also recent. Highlighted the
dangerous waters surrounding the tower and killed
15 sailors. Oh, no. So the lighthouse keeper
went into action to try to help, but 15 people
still died. Again, that's 1979. What does it
mean? Everyone crashed? I don't know the details.
There's a link here, but I won't dive because
I haven't read it. Eddie Stone we talked about.
Great storm. Died by lead consumption. One of
these people, I just thought it was funny. I
get to the end and there's comments. They're
all dudes. Some of the comments are, I need this
job. How can I applying online for this job?
I want job in lighthouse. Oh my gosh. I'm ready
for the lighthouse keeper job. So how to apply?
They've got to be bots. This is, so this is the
internet. This is where we're at. Yeah. But I
don't know. I mean, I've gotten us a little off
track, but you know, I don't have a lot more.
I was just talking about some of the risks of
being out there historically. And it's a little
silly, but the risks of today. I keep thinking
about, I'm trying to put together a presentation
eventually to give to a group in Boise, where
we're going to talk about probably lighthouse
tourism, I think is going to be the main focus.
But we'll also talk about our podcast. We'll
probably play this clip from our episode talking
about talking about it. That'll be fun. Oh, good.
And however silly this is, I've had two professional
jobs now, and both of them, safety is first.
So one of the things to talk about. With lighthouse
tourism in general is being safe yourself as
a tourist and like your risks are so low compared
to looking at historical lists of things. Of
course. Keepers had to do. Yeah. But just as
a tourist. Be aware of things like your own abilities.
Yeah. A lot of the folks are young and old and
fit and not fit. And the infrastructure itself
is also aging. So there are professionals. at
most places, who are looking after these lighthouses
if they're going to give you tours or tell you
what's safe or not safe. But not everywhere.
For example, we went to a lighthouse, which will
remain unnamed, where we could have just walked
in. There was no one there. And it was not in
good shape. And we could have gone up what was
a set of stairs. I already blasted it on the
USLHS. Anyways, I'm 250 pounds. And, you know,
if you and I are standing on the same stair all
of a sudden because, oh, look at the view out
this window. Oh, let's get a picture. Like, we
don't know. That thing was corroded. Yeah, we
don't know how many, like, connections to the
walls were even still stable. So the point is,
clearly people go up. I'm sure it's fine most
of the time. But you don't want to be that person
who is. Oh, how'd you break your leg backwards?
Oh. Oh, gross. You tried to take a picture in
a place that said keep out. Yeah, you went in
somewhere that was Mark's private property. Yeah,
don't go in there. You're not Indiana Jones.
So I'm getting off track. There is safety concerns
today. If you go to a place that's well kept,
that's giving tours, it's going to be safe. No
worries. They're doing all the work, and that's
a lot of the modern day work in Lighthouse and
historical sites. is that they have to keep up
with modern standards, even though it's a historical
building or structure. That is very difficult
to do. So some credit there, but dehydration,
climbing 200 plus steps, slips, trips, and falls,
weather. Oh, like there were, oh, maybe this
was, this applies to lots of lighthouses. And
I was trying to remember if this was, the lighthouse
I climbed with Carly or with you, but they warn
you multiple times to watch your head because
you're climbing upwards through a tiny hole.
And if you don't hug the ladder closely, then
you are in serious danger of hitting your head.
If you hit it too hard, you fall off the ladder.
So it's a double whammy. Whammy. Double whammy.
All in suit. I know you took a picture of me
at Cape Cod. I don't know if it was Highland
Light or if it was. It was Highland Light and.
Martha's Vineyard. Edgar Town. Yeah. But that's
on Martha's Vineyard, right? Oh, yes. Yeah. So
I'm like crawling through this thing. Now, I'll
insert here. Yes. I am kind of a bigger person.
Okay. Of course. But I also exercise, stretch.
I do all sorts of activities. You're prepared
for movement. And I'm not that old yet. Oh, my
gosh. Some people would be so angry hearing you
say that. Well, it's supposed to be a joke. I'm
pretty young for our listener base. You're pretty
young in general. Yeah, I suppose. Could die
any moment. Count your blessings. Yeah, I'm almost
30. But anyways, I'm still in pretty good shape
to get around and see lighthouses. So I'm very
fortunate. But if you were not. You could get
up the stairs. You could probably get up the
ladder, but getting through the opening would
be uncomfortable. It would be difficult. Especially
if you were overweight. Especially if you were
real elderly. It would be a challenge. I don't
want to discourage people from going, but honestly,
if that's the motivation you need to get stretching,
get working out, you should do it before you
go and you really want to see the top of the
lighthouse. Poor Emily. I'm looking like I'm
pointing at her. For everyone who's not here.
Am I weak? She broke her... foot. You broke your
ankle. The bone that connects the foot to the
ankle on the outside. Right before we went on
our first trip. Two weeks. Which was to the biggest
lighthouses in the world. The Outer Banks. Some
of the tallest. And we did not get to climb any
of them for that reason. You should have gone
anyway. Nah. Emily was on a little scooter. And
we've told those stories before too. And she...
She got to see things. We got to meet people.
We got to go to great restaurants and go to the
beach even. We carried the scooter out there.
But it was not ideal. You were the only reason
that trip was successful at all because if I
went there by myself or with somebody like my
sister, she can't carry me. There were some times
where I needed some serious assistance. It's
hard getting around when you only have one leg.
Yeah, I'm good at that. But Emily did drive the
golf cart. Yeah, it was an important job. Played
nine holes at Nags Head Golf Links. But I was
telling my mom recently that I hardly remember
that I was on a scooter because you made the
trip so fun anyway. That's great. That like my
memory, I have to like be like, oh, that's right.
I was on a scooter. It's not like the trip was,
it was still great success. Great success. So.
That's really powerful, though, because who are
we as 20 -somethings to say, well, everybody
should go. Yeah, absolutely. It's so much fun.
But a lot of people, they're just not lucky or
they've been through things and they can't climb
a lighthouse. Well, we've actually done that
trip. And you can still have a great time. Obviously,
life is more fun when you have more opportunities.
For sure. People can't control everything. So
that's going to go into safety, travel. And it
kind of helps me to build the picture of who
we're talking to. It's not like everybody's old
and decrepit. That's not what I'm saying. It's
just like life happens and sometimes you can't
do everything. So slips, going back to my, my
total list of like threats I could think of for
lighthouse keepers. Yeah. Slips, trips and falls.
High temperature, high pressure equipment. Yeah.
war and violence repetition yeah ergonomically
yeah they're gonna get arthritis also with repetition
that you get really comfortable doing things
you're familiar with that you get like loose
with your too confident yes like with your safety
stuff so um fatigue think about that you're sick
oh too bad too bad go to work Constant work required.
There's no like, well, we keep the light on and
that's the job. Yeah, just make sure it's on
every once in a while. That's modern day. Yeah,
there's constant work. Also, I didn't put it
on here. I put dehydration, but like water quality.
Like most of the water was collected in cisterns
from rain. Yeah. And sometimes it had other stuff
in it. We've heard several of those stories.
Yeah. Poisoning and oils. Yeah, one of my last
episodes I talked about. Lead paint being the
lining of the cistern. So naturally. Yeah, not
ideal. Yeah. So there's just been like lots of
dark history of lighthouses. This is a generic
image that I've had saved for a long time in
our stock images. That's what this reminds me
of. We should do another. This is AI too. Can
we have some real photos around here? This was
a stock image I got a long time ago. Look how
tall. The lighthouse, the lightning rod is. It's
ready to be struck. That's like 15 feet tall.
We need to do another spooky episode. Yeah, probably
around Halloween. There's lots of lighthouses
that are known for their spookiness and they
love to play on that. Inside joke. Only long
-term listeners would get it. Someday you'll
get it. But yeah, I mean, I don't know. Like
again, you can see how this is hard to put together
because I don't want to make fun of people's
death or injury. Like there's so many stories
and I don't want to just pick a couple because
then I'd miss other ones that are so important
that were so impactful. So one thing I did learn
as a fun fact, I don't know this to be true,
but do you recall, I brought it up earlier and
this reminded me a little bit of this. Standard
Rock. We talked about how there was an explosion.
Yes. There's four men out there. The middle of
the night, I think it was, there was an explosion
that originated from the lower level of the lighthouse.
A separate oil house. It's not separate because
Standard Rock is on its standalone concrete crib.
And inside, there's only one structure. Inside
in the basement was the fuel storage, boiler.
And other machinery. Did you confirm? I read
that recently, yes. Okay. But there's no other
structure, which is part of the importance of
the accident that happened there. Because it's
the middle of the night. No one to today still
knows what actually caused the explosion. Yes,
we do. I read this yesterday. I did the episode.
What's the answer? That he put down his lantern.
You're thinking of a different explosion. You're
thinking of San Francisco. There's an Airbnb
there now. Was that that place? Yep. Okay, that's
probably why I have this whole imagery of what's
happening in my head. East Brother. East Brother
Light Station had an explosion as well. It was
the boathouse was gone. Yes, it was leaking fuel.
But yes, he put down his lantern and then knocked
it over, right, as he was handling fuel. And
so there was, in the middle of the night also,
massive explosion. Not good. But it was separate
from the lighthouse because the lighthouse survived.
Yeah. The boathouse, if I remember right, and
the fuel storage were all gone. And that person
died. But Standard Rock, which is Lake Michigan,
Lake Superior. Lake Michigan? Lake Superior.
Yeah. Great Lakes. North of Michigan. People
are like, north of Michigan? I'm like, no, this
is right. And you're like, Lake Michigan. Hold
me. Hold me. Hold on. Standard Rock. Do you remember
that explosion and that story? No. Apparently,
zero percent. I remember them. I remember that
somebody died. I remember that they all had to
huddle outside because the tower was filled with
smoke for the entire time. That's what I got.
So there was four people in the building. And
it's just like the image on screen. It's got
a concrete crib. that the tower is on, but there's
only a couple feet of ledge and then that's it.
There's no island. There's nothing else around
because it's on a, it's on a, I think a coral.
Yeah. A reef. Yeah. That's a high point, which
is why the lighthouse is there. So boats don't
hit it. Right. That lighthouse is still there.
We talked about it on several episodes. We did
some interviews on it as well. So standard rock
had an explosion. The origin of that explosion
is still unknown. It could have been human air,
similar to. East Brother Light with the lantern,
with our buff guy we saw earlier. Oh, God. Or
it could have been equipment failure, could have
been a leak. Interesting topic. We all know that
it's a dangerous job, and there's lots of different
facets that could kill you. They could. They
have. Yeah. Unfortunately. 39 different ways.
Yeah. I want to see that list again. I'm really
interested in this. killed in an Indian raid,
hit in the head by a derrick. So I think that's
a rotate, like one of these things goes up and
down and like pumps, like an oil derrick is one
of those. Oh, I thought that was like when they
are bringing stuff up from a boat, like on a
barge, not a barge. Machine Googled someone named
Derrick. Oh yeah, Derrick, that's the name. It's
a hoisting apparatus. You're right. Excellent.
Framework used in oil drilling. And other things.
There could be several Derricks that it's referring
to. One of them could be a man hit in the head
by Derrick. Yeah. A type of crane that is used
as a mast to boom and a hoisting mechanism to
lift and move heavy objects. So, you know, those
arms that we see. Yeah. Usually for boat use.
You didn't listen to my joke. I did. I did. That
one deserved something. Froze to death. Fell
from lighthouse. Fell from scaffolding. Killed
in hurricane versus killed in tsunami. I don't
know the difference. What do you mean you don't
know the difference? I've forgotten. One big
wave air. Why use more words when less words
do? That's all I had. Fell from cargo net. Electric
shock. This is what they show you. They're like,
are you sure you want to be a lighthouse keeper?
Job description. Okay. Thank you for indulging
me. Of course. And thank you for three years
of Lighthouse. Woo! Pretty good. We are awesome.
If I could ask our listeners for one thing, it
would be to go to our YouTube and to like or
subscribe. I would note, I have never in three
years asked for this. So this would mean a lot
to me. Like and subscribe. I mean, both would
be great, but just anything would be awesome.
Yeah, some interaction of some kind. Because
I do a lot of YouTube work and I don't know.
I just want to make sure people want it. That's
all. Yeah. And leave us a review on our website.
Yeah. Because we only have three. And it's been
a long time. They're all positive, though. Yeah.
Five -star reviews. But it's been a long time
since our last one, so. I know we're Jones in
for some reviews. You can leave a review. You
can leave a voicemail for us if you want, or
send us an email or a message, anything you want
us to talk about. Um, any stories you have. Yeah,
we do have a nice lineup of listener lighthouses.
Nice. Um, double L. So we haven't forgotten anyone
who sends us a message. We get it. We've got
a note in there and I have a system. It's just
that I can't do a listener lighthouse every time.
It's gotta be like a special occasion. all right.
Well, thank you for listening. We will see you
next time on the lighthouse.