We're rolling. Oh my gosh. Hi everybody. I'm
Emily. And I'm Vince. And this is The Lighthouse
Lowdown. Oh. Vince just went crazy. I've never
seen you dance with such gusto. I just pretended
it was a drum solo. Oh. I also had to try not
to hit things as I was doing that. Well, you
were pretty open over here. We're in the studio
number five? Number six? Probably five. Maybe
four. Studio South. South KC. Yeah, not even.
So what episode are we on? We're on 82. 82, welcome
to the show. Thank you for asking. And Vince
was going to be doing our history buoy today,
but I powered through and managed to create one.
And I also have one. I would like some credit
for that. Credit is given. Yeah. Congratulations.
Thanks. So I'm going to go into our history,
Bowie. It does come up during the episode, and
that's how I came up with an incredible idea,
which was to cover the U .S. Lifesaving Service
Stations. Cool, yeah. So you talked about them,
the Lifesaving Service, before, right? Or maybe
you briefly covered it in an episode. Recently
we talked about the Lyle Gun and the Lifesaving
Station using that. Before that, I thought you
covered... I covered what is the USLHS, which
has many answers, actually. Yeah, maybe you covered
part of the life -saving service in there. USLHE,
all that. USLSS. So I'm covering that today.
Thank you. Slightly too long. I need my headset
to turn down a little. Can you do that, please?
Sure can. What number? I think it's one. How's
that? Much better. Blasting out my eardrums.
Sorry. It's okay. Anyway. History boot. History
boot. I'm in charge of this today. I did a little
cover like you do. I like this. Thank you. Nice
images. I didn't spell check, but everything
seems to be in order, so that's good. Yeah, the
images below. that I pulled up are going to be
what I cover in this episode and in this history
buoy. Cool. Yeah, I can't wait. Yeah, they have
a couple different types of service stations,
so I'm going to cover all of those. The most
well -known one are the life -saving stations.
So I'll pull a picture of an example of that.
Carly and I went to this one near Rehoboth Beach.
Called the Indian River Lifesaving Station. Okay,
okay. What were you going to say? Indian River
Lifesaving Station. Yeah, last episode I said
Indian Point, but it's Indian River. But that
was wrong. Yeah, it was so wrong. And you know
what else? When I went there to get a stamp in
my passport, they gave me a general stamp and
not a location -specific stamp, so it doesn't
even count. Do they have a location -specific
stamp? Yeah, so that you can get credit for it
in the passport. Damn. But they gave me a general
USLSS. Yeah, if anyone doesn't know, there's
a USLHS passport system where you can take the
small booklet, looks like a passport, and get
stamps that prove you were here and there at
lighthouses. And then you can eventually turn
in those stamps for patches that you can collect.
pretty sweet I'm not even remotely close to my
first patch we're pretty good at it one of these
days I'll catch up and the best part is that
most places you can get if you prove that you
were there with a photo then you can get a um
you can get one of the stamps by mail so it's
not not it's not a lost cause it's just that
I have to do a little extra work in order to
make it happen so anyway That's the example I
pulled up. It's yellow and red. It's a pretty
one. Yeah, it's well taken care of, which is
important. Basically, the difference between
all these is we've covered it in the past, so
I don't go into detail about what is the life
-saving station, what do they have, blah, blah.
It's just the difference between the types. Okay.
So this one had a full crew and a keeper, and
these were mostly along the Atlantic coastline
with some... just like a couple on the Great
Lakes Gulf and Pacific coast. So mostly the Atlantic
coast had life -saving stations. The station
would have a ground floor, like mess room, like
mess hall, but like smaller kitchen and a boathouse.
And then the upstairs would be dorms. And then
on the top, they'd have like a cupola and a watch
room, some with remote lookouts. So they would
have to leave. Most places had them built into
the station building. It's nice. Most notably,
the stations were on really remote areas of the
beach. And you've talked about this too. Because
of this, the boat had to be launched over sand
and into the surf. And I remember last time you
had a picture of horses like towing the boat
over sand. So I included a picture of the path
at Indian River that they had to take down to
the water's edge. So it's all sand. Not easy
to get across. So that was most of them were
these really remote areas. There's a lot of sand,
hard work to get such a heavy boat out there.
Yeah. And push it out onto the water. And then
you start the rescue. Yeah. It's like gently
sloping. You know how complicated it would be
to get a boat? It's not like you can just get
to the water's edge and be like, all right, we'll
just float it out. It's like there's waves and
yeah. Yeah. It's almost always bad news. It's
crazy. So the next category is lifeboat station,
which is what we encounter in our episode today.
I don't use pictures in the example so that I
can save it for later. So I have an example from
a different station, different lifeboat station.
Lifeboat station. But yeah, I kept seeing lifeboat
and I was like, is it the same thing as a life
-saving station? It sounds exactly the same.
And it's basically, there's very few differences.
It still has a full crew and a keeper. And the
building is basically the same as the life -saving
station. The lifeboat stations were always at
or near port cities that had like deep water
or piers. And so the boats would launch from
a railway ramp into that water instead of it
being over sand and stuff. And these are always
along Great Lakes and Pacific Coast. So the Atlantic
Coast didn't have really any lifeboat station.
Those were all lifesaving. And these are like
Great Lakes specific. So the difference is that
there's no beach. Yeah, like very little sand.
And it always had a ramp. And I have a picture
here of what that looked like. So very easy entry
into water from the lifeboat stations. That's
cool. And the last one is houses of refuge, which
I'm pretty sure we've mentioned these a couple
times. And these are very different because they
only had them on the east coast of Florida. So
like very specific. I pulled up a picture of
an old one. This was Orange Grove, Delray Beach.
And the reason for that is the water there never
got so cold that you would be worried about shipwreck
survivors dying because of how cold the water
is. And that's pretty much a concern everywhere
else you go is that water can get cold enough
that you'd be concerned about people drowning
because of the cold. But on the east coast of
Florida, they don't really have to worry about
that. And because the beaches are so sloping,
the shipwrecks are probably from grounding and
then people can make it pretty easy to shore
as opposed to like the other locations where
it's choppy, it's deep, like it could be from
rocks or a reef or whatever. These are pretty
much, you don't have to worry about collecting
people from shipwrecks. They can just kind of
swim up. Broken up in the open water. Yeah, so
the point of houses of refuge were to give like
a place to sleep, some food, and then directions
to the nearest settlement. So that's what that
is. Didn't we learn about these? Who are we talking
to? I think it was Ralph. Yeah. Krugler? Yeah.
So tell me what happened. There's life -saving
stations, which have horses. Yeah, which you're
having to bring the boat over a lot of sand.
And Atlantic Coast Focus. Lifeboat Stations.
Great Lakes Focus. Ramps. And Houses of Refuge.
Florida. Specifically. Yeah. I thought there
was a fourth. No. Okay, that's why you caught
me off guard. I was waiting for number four.
Oh. I thought you showed four pictures. Yeah,
well that one shows up later. One of the photos
is later. To remain anonymous at this time. Cool.
It's up here. Well, very nice. I like that. Yeah,
we'll be talking about that other photo later.
And so on to the lighthouse we're talking about
today. This is a listener lighthouse. So thank
you, Haley, for sending this one in. We're going
to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. And around
here, whitefish is a very popular food item.
Whitefish. Huh. And the most productive whitefish
fishing is at the aptly named Whitefish Bay at
Whitefish Point. And so, as you can guess, that's
the lighthouse we're talking about today. It's
not in Whitefish, Montana, otherwise. Oh, is
that a thing? Oh, yeah. Very nice area. Landlocked
Montana, right? Whitefish. There's a big lake
there. Oh, very cool. Oh, I guess whitefish would
be a freshwater fish. It must be. Because the
Great Lakes are freshwater. Flathead Lake is
what's up there, I'm pretty sure. Flathead. Sorry.
Mystical. So we are here at Whitefish Point Lighthouse.
Yeah, so I pulled up a map picture. You can see
in reference to Mackinac City and Old Mackinac
Point Lighthouse, which we've covered in the
past. So there's a little pin on there for that.
So just in reference, the gray line that cuts
through the top corner of the photo is the line
of Michigan. It's like the upper part. Very close
to the property line of Michigan. And then Lake
Superior. Interesting. In 1846, the idea of a
lighthouse on this point was brought forward
because this area marks the eastern end of 80
miles known as the Lake Superior's Shipwreck
Coast. So it's a pretty dangerous area. Lots
of traffic, lots of fishing, and so we needed
a... Lighthouse to mark the end of it. Of the
550 known shipwrecks that are laying on the bottom
of Lake Superior, 200 of them are in the vicinity
of Whitefish Point. Really? Almost half of the
Lake Superior shipwrecks are around in this area.
That's so crazy. Isn't that wild? I saw a video
last week. There was not a lot of content, but
the guy was saying, people always say... The
Great Lakes, Lake Superior, is like the ocean
when they see it. Yeah. And then he showed, he
was on the beach, I don't know where, but he's
like, yep. Yep. Looks like the ocean. Like, you
take a glance and it's like, eh, it's kind of
rough out there. Yeah. I don't really see the
other side. Really no differences when you're
on the shore or even in the water. So, yeah.
Giant. Is Lake Superior the biggest one? I think
so. Okay. Nice. I don't think it's the deepest,
though. Yeah, I've heard that the deepest and
largest are different. Yeah. Like the volume
of water is bigger in a different lake. I'm totally
guessing. Oh, yeah. No, I have no... Do not learn
from this message. Yeah, this specifically. The
rest of the podcast you can learn from. Okay,
sorry. I got off track. Drifted out to sea. Congress
put aside $5 ,000. for this new lighthouse a
year after they asked for it. How quick. I know.
Wow. Along with setting aside over 110 acres
for the light station. So I'm like, that's pretty
significant. 110 acres is a lot. Nice little
chunk. Yeah. Chunker. Nice little chunk. Construction
started in 1848. So that's promptly after setting
aside money and was completed within just a couple
of months. So this may go down in history as
one of the fastest lighthouse process of all
time. Why do you think that is? Is it because
it's almost not in America? I feel like it's
because, one, it's really important, blah, blah,
blah. They always are. But also, it was early
in the game, and so maybe it was easier for them
to be like, if someone brought up the idea for
a lighthouse somewhere, it was important enough.
Less red tape. Yeah, less paperwork and everything
to just make it happen. Nice. Construction also
was probably less. aggressively regulated in
18 yeah what is osha yeah 1849 i guess 1848 so
yeah i was completed 1848 it was a 42 foot tall
tapered stone tower of which i have no photos
of i'm like a shame that's interesting 13 lamps
produced a solid white light and they had a four
room story and a half stone dwelling which was
also constructed for the keepers at the same
time And I do have a photo of that for some reason.
Yeah, what the heck? Just to, yeah. Whoever took
a picture of a keeper's dwelling or like a storehouse
and not the lighthouse. Well, I'm saying at this,
like by the time the lighthouse tower was gonzo.
Some story. I think they didn't really, they
weren't taking pictures yet. So this is for Zillow.
You think the posting was like. It was for Zillow.
For Zillow. Oh. You were so excited. What's for
Zillow? What's for Zillow? Is it a style of architecture?
No. Sorry, I misheard. Your joke, it is funny.
Yeah, thank you. Wait, let me get a sip. Thank
you for narrating the second slurp. You're welcome.
So they did this really fast construction, right?
They went over budget by $3 ,300, which is almost
twice the allotted budget. Back then, that's
a lot of budget. Yeah, that's a lot. And that
amount was awarded back to the construction company
a year later by Congress. So the company spent
its own money finishing the lighthouse, and then
Congress paid them back. I'm like, that's a lot
of trust. Because I'd be like, I'm not going
anywhere until you give me more money. And that's
how it works today, right? Yeah, the term is
retainage. If you're hiring, like, you know,
I'm the general contractor and the mechanical
contractor is doing the duct and all the piping
and stuff. I won't pay them the last 10 or 20
% of the total contract value until all the work
is done. And I've walked through and I've confirmed
the work is done. Then, bloop, you know, send
the Venmo, 20%. But that's a big chunk of money.
That's a big piece of contract. So in this case.
The contractor at their own risk completed the
work. Yeah. And then the government paid them
back. Yeah. Which again. All very unlikely. I
don't think that would happen today. Yeah. I
agree. Because, because what leverage do you
have? You're just. Yeah. Lighthouse is already
there. They're like, oh, well, we didn't promise
that we'd pay you back. I don't recall that.
Maybe it was in the contract or something. Like
if you have to go over, make it happen. But.
Yeah. Crazy. I don't know. Yeah. It's just. So
Whitefish Point, I don't know what it's like
today, but at the time when they built the lighthouse,
it was really isolated. And the first eight keepers
all resigned at this lighthouse. Which is funny
because we've talked about a lot of isolated
lighthouses, and that didn't happen at any of
those other ones. So there must have been something
extra. Yeah, sometimes there's something that's
not mentioned. You know, isolated. and cold isolated
and obviously lonely or yeah food was terrible
because you couldn't get to the supply i don't
know and a lot of stone buildings were leaky
and drafty and that's and they suck up all the
heat yeah so suck up all the heat i don't know
what that means well like the the there's no
insulating value to stone so if you sit down
on a concrete floor it's cold Oh, yeah. It's
the same. Now, imagine the house is all stone.
Oh, you're just saying that any available heat,
it would have kind of. Even if you have a stove
or a fireplace. Oh, yeah. That's why people like
wood. That's one of the reasons people like wood.
Not warm sucking? Yeah, slightly not warm sucking.
Thank you. Well, good. Snatched my coffee. For
anyone interested, Vince and I are drinking the
new Chips Ahoy and Nutter Butter coffees from
Scooters. We are not sponsored, but we could
be. We go there a lot. Well, now it's not on
my route home or to work, which actually has
been pretty devastating. We get a lot of different
coffee. I went to the roastery yesterday, Kansas
City Institution, and I had a fantastic turtle
latte. What are you talking about? Where were
you going? Dinner and a movie with a buddy. Oh,
yeah, that's right. On your date. I was editing
photos from my trip to Sweden. And I saw on our
last video that we posted on YouTube, which was
Fjellbecka and the archipelago in Sweden. Someone
commented that they are half Swedish. They enjoyed
listening and they learned a lot from our podcast.
That's so cute. They liked the photos, they said.
I didn't get a message. Of that. Thank you to
that individual. That's nice. You're also half
Swedish. True. Well, by heritage, yes. Yeah.
Yeah. What would make you half Swedish? Well,
like my direct family is not from Sweden. Oh,
you're saying like - It's three generations now.
Yeah, generationally, yeah, you're half Swedish.
But by blood, yes, I am half Swedish. Okay. That's
why I'm so handsome, tall, and blonde. Wow. And
humble. Especially. Okay, can I continue? Yeah,
yeah, sidetrack. Okay, wow. 1857, a fourth order
Fresnel lens was added, but two years later,
a new lighthouse was requested by the lighthouse
board. I have no information about why. I mean,
it was stone, so maybe it was just leaky. And
also, I have no idea what happened to that first
lighthouse. I don't know if they demoed it and
then built the new lighthouse in the exact same
spot or... If they built it nearby, what I do
know is the stone dwelling survived and stayed
for a while. But I just don't know about the
tower. I don't think that they were there at
the same time. But I guess I have no way of proving
that. Did you hear, did you read if the original
tower was integral to this house? This dwelling?
Are you asking because of the big, what may have
been a hole in the side of the house? Yeah. I
have no clue. I have no pictures, no descriptions,
no nothing. Okay. On almost the edge of Canada?
Yeah. I want to say probably integral or like
connected by a walkway. Because it's cold. Because
it's so cold and icy that likely they would give
them some kind of chance. But then how expensive,
I don't know, did Demo just... Just the lighthouse?
Just the tower and then keep the house. Couldn't
have been that good. It's not like it was good.
I don't know. I don't know. So they built the
second tower. 1857 was the Fresnel Lens. And
then 1861 they finished building the new tower,
which was a 78 -foot -tall iron pile brown skeleton
tower. The same year that President Lincoln took
office. So that's just a little reference there
for timing. Hey, honest Abe. I was just thinking
the other day about how you used to say, like,
in this year, these things also happened. And
it helped put things in a reference because I
was just talking about how we've kind of lost,
like, oh, that's not that old. Right. Because
of lighthouse history that things aren't really
in reference anymore. American history and lighthouse
history. So that was when he took office. 1861.
Yeah. Cool. Lincoln's the shit. He is. He had
long legs. What? Or he has a long torso. Tall
hat. He was tall. This is the weirdest collection
of short sentences ever. Tall hat. He was tall.
Somehow related. Okay. So this tower. Oh, something
very interesting, and I do have a picture of
this. This tower that they built had a covered
walkway from the second level of the dwelling
to the middle part of the central shaft of the
lighthouse. So instead of building a walkway
from the first floor to the shaft of the lighthouse,
they built it from the second floor to the shaft
of the lighthouse. Seems unnecessarily expensive.
Because the central shaft did not continue all
the way to the ground. And the why of that...
Is unknown to me specifically. I don't know.
But it's pretty cool. I've never once seen that
before. And also the lighthouse is a lot taller
and we haven't seen a skeletal tower that's so
wide at the bottom. Yeah. So you said iron pile.
Iron pile, yeah. So the piles are like columns
that are driven or buried into the ground for
foundation. to get through the sand down to something
more solid. And then there's a platform on the,
we call it level two. It's a little stilt action.
Yeah, it's really interesting. I don't think
I've ever seen a tower like that. Because that's
like 10 to 15 feet before the central shaft of
the lighthouse starts. So pretty interesting.
I was going to say maybe they did like, you know,
the clockwork, maybe the weight dropped down
below the lighthouse. No, they didn't have rotating.
Yeah, they didn't have rotating. Oh, really?
All fixed? At the beginning. Call me Sally. I
have no idea. Oh, something else that's interesting
is the watch room and the lantern room were,
how do you pronounce this? Decagonal. Decagonal.
Ten sides? Oh, is that deca? I thought deca is
nine. Deca is ten. Okay, so ten -sided. Like
a decade. Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, thank you for
that. What's nine? Nine -ade. I have no idea.
Ninineal. Nona. Nona? N -O -N -A. Wow, we don't
come across that very often because I would never
have guessed that. A nine -sided polygon is a
nonagon. Nonagon. Or enna. Enagon. E -N -N -E
-A -G -O -N. Why would they change it up? What's
with the switch up? So there's bi, tri, quint,
quad, quint, hex. Yeah, hectagon. Seven, I think.
I thought it was five. No, that's penta. Oh.
Hecta. Penta. Octagon. Enagon. Nonagon. Regardless,
I have not seen a 10 -sided. Why would they even
do it? You know, 10 -sided. Yeah. He's measuring
out with his hands. Because we always see six
-sided or eight -sided, you know, octagonal or.
Why would you do 10? I don't know. Maybe it's
the lantern room drove it. I don't know, but
it's very special. Maybe they just wanted it
to be special. I'm guessing it too many things.
So it's kind of a fun. Oh, and then at that same
time, they got a third order lens, still fixed
white. And then two 10 inch steam whistles were
added for stormy or foggy weather. One in 1872
and another that matched it perfectly in 1876.
So we just like double punched. Yeah. Like that.
I would have liked a dual tone, honestly, but.
You think that they harmonized or no? No, not
the same. But there are biphonal foghorns, remember?
Yes. Oh, didn't you show a video of one that
was... That we played the sound. Yeah, I like
that. Very satisfying. But I wonder what the
purpose... Do you think it's twice as powerful
to have two of the exact same? Or do you think
you just point them in opposite directions and
now you're... I'm going to base this on what
I do at work. If there are two air handling units,
which are air conditioning boxes, and you put
one of them outside of the building, there's
a certain pattern you see of the noise dispersion.
Noise pollution, we have to monitor at certain
distances. And if you were to put two side by
side, it's not double the sound power. It's less
than double, actually, but they are additive.
So they're not additive one plus one. But there's
an effect that happens. And there's a factor
that comes in. Okay. All right, good. I mean,
I'm sure that they knew what they were doing,
but that was an interesting fact. Totally matching.
Summer of 1893. So we're still in the 1800s.
Shockingly, the fixed white characteristic was
changed to a fixed white with an intermittent
red flash. So we're still not revolving, but
we added rotating flash panels around the Fresnel
lens. So just every once in a while, there was
a red. that would pass, you know, around the
Fresnel lens. So you would perceive a red flash
even though it was a fixed lens. Cool. Two years
after that, the day mark was changed to white.
So all this time we had a brown lighthouse. And
then finally they changed it to white, which
you can see in this picture, the background's
very open. Not a lot of trees happening. I think
today there's trees, but so I don't really know.
Like at what point did the brown blend in too
much with the blue sky? Well, why was it brown?
Was that the base metal? Bare metal was brown
because iron? I was trying to find out if it
was rust or if it was painted, but I couldn't.
I just saw that it was brown. I'm guessing it
was just bare iron, which would be rust. Yeah.
Okay. That makes sense. But also, what about
like Bolivar Point Lighthouse, which was black
because of rust? I think it was a different type
of deterioration. Okay. Plus, Bolivar's on the
coast of the sea. Oh. So saltwater is, I think,
more aggressive when it comes to deterioration.
Agreed. And oxidation. Yeah. Of iron. Ferrous
metals. Smort. Smort. Smort. We're so weird.
My mom's probably listening to us from upstairs
like, what a bunch of weirdos. Weirdos. Has anybody
listed this garbage? So yeah, they changed it
to white. And at the same time, they added a
second assistant keeper position. And that was
due to the workload of having a now rotating
panels and the steam whistles that were added.
So they had a first assistant keeper and a principal
keeper, but now they added a second assistant.
And the attached dwelling was changed into a
duplex. So at that time, the first assistant
and the principal keeper were sharing a house,
like a normal house. And then they changed it
to a duplex for them and built another house
that was for the second assistant next door,
which you can see in this current photo. That
house is off to the side. Very secluded. I'd
be like, actually, as the principal keeper, I
think I should get first pick of a solitary house.
Yeah, but you'd have to walk in the weather to
get to the work. Yeah, I guess that is kind of
a downside. Plus, it's kind of small. Like, look
how big, unless it has a giant porch. But the
porch is like half or a third of the house. Yeah,
it's a little house. It's not like they built
another one of the duplexes or something. Yeah,
it's a little house. It's still nice to have
a spot. 1896, still in the 1800s, the light characteristic
was changed to a white flash every five seconds,
then to every 10 seconds, then to off one second
and on one second. So this was the span over
like a decade that they changed it. But changed
it a lot, probably because around this time there
was a lot more lighthouses popping up on the
Great Lakes. Had to do some shuffling of characteristics.
Do you know any statistics regarding the sinking
of boats in that area during that time? No. I
wonder if anyone was confused due to any of those
switches. Oh, I bet. Two years ago, I was coming
through here, and I swear to God, it was a solid
white. Because they would have books. They were
shipkeeper books that would say which lighthouse
was which. If you miss getting your new edition
of your book, then it's not going to have an
updated light characteristic in there. Honestly.
Heck. Heckin' problems. Hey, that would be a
good history buoy. Shipkeeper books. Yeah, it'd
be good. If I could find any information. I don't
really know how to describe. I bet you could.
Maybe I'll try then. Maybe I will. 1923. So we're
jumping ahead a little bit. 1920s. The Coast
Guard established a lifeboat. Saving station.
So we're going back to our history buoy at Whitefish
Light Station. And the light keepers often participated
in rescues. There was a lot of cool stories,
but I didn't go too deep into it. So pulled up
a couple pictures of what this lifeboat station
looked like. The big boat? Yeah. In the background,
I believe that is where the people, the crew
for the lifeboat station lived. So it's weirdly
far away. I think that's the... It's super dark
back there. Yeah. But then in the forefront of
the photo, you can see the actual boathouse with
the tracks leading away from it. And in the photo
next to it, you can see one of the boats on the
track that leads to the water. So it's like a
boat on a... Like a train track. A rail car.
What are those things that are in like every
Indiana Jones film? Oh. Where they're like in
a mine? Yeah, the mine carts. Yeah. Except instead
of a cart, it's a giant boat. Every 90s game
ever had some sort of mine cart in it. It's awesome.
It's kind of a beloved. I like it. But you're
right. That's what it looks like. Some ropes
on the bottom. Comes right out of the house.
Slides right out of there. But the picture kind
of shows you how big that boathouse actually
is. Because from the top angle, it's like, oh,
it's small. But then you see that the guys are
half the size of the door. Yeah. Big garage.
Yeah, exactly. That would be a great shop. Oh,
yeah. I feel like we visited the life -saving
station in Cape Cod. Race Point, is that right?
Yes. I think it was at Race Point. And they had
some huge doors in the boat area. But I don't
remember tracks being there. I don't think they
had tracks. They still had to get the boat out
of the house, though. It was East Coast, so I
think it was... I wonder why. I mean, the weather
must have been bad enough to where they wanted
to store it inside. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I think
anything on... They still had boathouses for
the life -saving stations, but because of the
fact that the sand is constantly shifting, you
can't have a track. Oh, that's interesting. Yeah,
they had no choice but to hoof it. You know what
I'm saying? That's good. But they closed this
lifeboat station. In 1951, so less than three
decades, but I think there were some really good
stories about them working together with the
lighthouse keepers and making it happen. In 1936,
the sea had worn away enough of the coast to,
well, the coast, the shore, is it the coast?
Coast of a lake? Shoreline of a lake? Shoreline,
I think, would be good. It's crazy. The coast
may work as well. I'm not sure. I know. I don't
know if those are specifically beachy terms or...
Let's see. Oh, I skipped something. Oh, no. This
needs to be touched on. 1926, which was three
years after they established that lifeboat station,
Whitefish Point Lighthouse had the most navigational
aids of any light station because in 1926 it
had a submarine oscillator. an air diaphone,
and a radio beacon. And all of these were to
help ships navigate around. Cool, what's a submarine
isolator? I don't know. I think it was like a
foghorn, but underneath. It like high -pitched
where you can hear it going through the water.
That's cool. Yeah, so. Okay, now I'm going to
go back to what I was saying earlier. 1936, the
sea had worn away enough of this coastline to
threaten the fog signal building. And so they
built a new one north of the lighthouse. So a
little different spot than where it used to be.
And in the same year, they added five wooden
pile groins to stay erosion, which I've never
heard before. A groin? Long, like... I've seen
those before. Yeah, wood posts back to back leading
from the shoreline into the water. Like a fence.
So they added, yeah, like a... long wood fence
that disappears into the ocean um they added
five of those and this is actually a picture
of the one from at whitefish oh wow yeah so it's
definitely taken a beating but i don't think
that they were perfect when they were first put
in there anyway like if they're just for erosion
but i guess also that was almost 100 years ago
that they did that so it's a cool photo i've
never heard that term i know groins i've seen
it i've seen it um Spelled as groins and also
G -R -O -Y -E -N -S, I think. I've never heard
it before. Yeah. The more you know. A little
tidbit there for you. A little couple of history
buoys. 1968, the Fresnel lens was replaced with
an aero beacon. And in 1970, the lighthouse was
automated and all personnel were removed from
the station. Tale as old as time. It's a shame.
The station was placed on the National Register
of Historic Places in 1973, so three years after
it was automated. But there was no money to upkeep
or do any sort of renovation on it. And eventually
the Whitefish Township reached out to the brand
new Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society
in 1980 asking that they take on the task of
restoring the lighthouse, which is a lot to ask
of a brand new historical society. I wonder if
it wasn't founded for that reason. It sounded
like they were requested to do it. Can you imagine
they opened like a little gift shop and someone
was like, hey. Would you mind taking on one of
the hardest things in modern day history? We
just turned a beach cabana into a shop. What
are you talking about? But, of course, they said
yes. And the Shipwreck Society got a lease from
the Coast Guard in 1983 and had museum exhibits
open within two years. So that's kind of crazy
fast. That is cool. They absolutely killed it.
Took a picture of what it looks like today. Isn't
it just so... Beautiful. Darn it. I hate when
it's hard to choose my cover photo for YouTube.
I thought of you when I picked this one. I was
like, oh, this would be a good one. Either this
or it's the black and white. You like them both?
Yeah. Shame. It's a shame, Matt. So we're looking
at a really pretty photo through some pine trees,
I think. Some evergreens. Fully restored grounds
with white paint. White paint, red roofs. Same
for the lighthouse. Tower looks good. Really
high quality photo, too. It's beautiful. Do you
know what's going on these days with the tower?
Is there a beacon at all? Yes. It's still flashing.
So I'll mention that in a second. They turned
it into a museum. This is really cool. In 1970,
the lifeboat station was like closed off and
the station house and the boathouse were sold
in a government auction and taken off site, which
I always think is so funny is that in history,
buildings are moved a lot. that they're like
i want to buy this one i want to buy that big
boathouse and then they ship it you know yeah
from one place to another like it can't be cost
effective no and a lot of times we've seen people
just destroy stuff that nowadays would be like
oh the history but what about the history or
sell pieces and parts of things for a dollar
yeah yeah an ode to one of our past episodes
In 1990, so 20 years after the station house
and the boathouse were taken off into private
ownership, the society acquired the station house
and returned it to the light station. So the
station house for the lifeboat was reacquired
20 years later from a private owner and put back
on the light station. So weird. I don't know
how it's possible. How do you hunt down? Someone's
shed probably. Oh, I bet somebody's house because
it was a full station was a full house. It was
so crazy. But like the boathouse was a different
story. It wasn't until 2013 that the boathouse
was bought and it couldn't be placed in its original
location because that part was now underwater,
which is pretty crazy. And so they placed it
next to the cruise quarters building, which both
of those were renovated and now holds an exhibit
for the early Coast Guard era. And the station
house was turned into guest housing. So you can
rent it if you go and visit like an Airbnb. Heck
yeah. Yeah. A little bit of history. Who owns
it today? The Shipwreck Society. Okay. Yeah,
they own it all. So the USLHS, for those of you
who don't know, also has two Airbnb properties.
Maybe they don't call them Airbnbs. Point No
Point. Yeah, Point No Point. And I forget the
other one. It's up in Washington. Those are beautiful
properties as well. It's always fun to stay in
a bit of history. I didn't know about this one.
Yeah. An act of Congress officially transferred
the light station of the Shipwreck Society in
1996. So yeah, they own it now. Cool. The Great
Lakes Shipwreck Museum operates out of the light
station with a brand new observation deck built
in May. What? No. Oh, sorry. Hold on. The laugh
soundtrack is probably the worst sound effect
we have on here. It bugs me every time. Which
is funny because I listen to Friends every night.
Yep. The show Friends. Okay, so they have a brand
new observation deck. Yes. And obviously from
the picture you can see it's very well upkept.
It's nice. The lighthouse has actually been in
continuous operation since 1961 when it was first
built, making it the oldest operating lighthouse
on the Great Lakes. 1861. What did I say? 1961.
1861. Yeah. Add a decade. Add a decade. Add 10
decades. What is wrong with us? It's Thursday.
Yeah. We're going to the pub next. Oh, yeah.
We are going to an Irish pub. So maybe that's
what's wrong with us. We're just ready for some
sausage in pastry. Flaky pastry. With some mustard
dip in. I would like to visit this place. Yeah,
and also, I'm not done. The light still flashes
to this day, like we were talking about. Two
quick flashes separated by 4 .8 seconds. And
then there's 20 seconds of darkness before the
next set of two flashes. So an interesting pattern,
which is not similar to what it had in the past.
No. Very cool. They have a live weather cam on
their website. I love it when they have live
weather cams. So you just get to watch the trees
sway and the people walk and the lighthouse flash.
It is nice. I'm really selling it. Yeah. I got
one more picture to pull up. This is down on
the ground of all the buildings that are included.
It's like a lighthouse village. It's like a little
village. Little white houses and red roofs. I
love it. And it didn't used to look like this
either. They kind of, as they brought buildings
back and everything, they've collected them into
this little village, little society. It's nice.
Yeah. Looks like a great, great visit. Yeah,
so everything's been painstakingly restored.
And we have the Keeper's Count. Quarters, the
lighthouse, fog signal building, and oil houses
associated with the lighthouse service. And then
for the lifeboat station for the Coast Guard,
we have the cruise quarters, surf boat house,
and lookout tower. And it also has the White
Shoal second order lens on display, which is
probably something I said in our White Shoal
lighthouse episode. And I just forgot. Or I didn't
know when I say Great Lakes Shipwreck Society.
I don't know that that's referencing this specifically.
Interesting. I think White Shoal is our number
one viewed episode on YouTube. That's the one
that's falling apart, right? That's right on
the brink of destruction. I have to revisit it
probably. Yeah, it's out. Red and White Candy
Stripe, I think. Yep, that's it. Yeah. The cover
photo is in Glacial Ice. Not Glacial Ice. I also
think this is the one that had... Floating Ice.
The mercury float that degraded the inside of
the lantern room. White Shoal? Yeah. Let's go
check out our number one episode on YouTube.
Plug, plug, plug. So they have that second order
lens built in this museum in a way like the museum
that we saw at Martha's Vineyard Haven. Yeah.
So that museum. That was really cool. Yeah. So
it's kind of in that same. Nice. You know, depends
on that same way. Yeah. Second order clamshell.
Very cool. And that museum's open May 1st through
October 31st from 9 a .m. to 5 p .m. daily. Cool.
Yeah. And that's what I got on Whitefish Point
Lighthouse. Whitefish Point Lighthouse in Whitefish.
On Whitefish Point. On Whitefish Point. Whitefish
Bay in Michigan. Nice. So yeah. If you want your
whitefish. I don't know what whitefish is specifically.
I'm not sure. We probably don't have it here.
I wonder if it's like a classification. Maybe
it's like a general term for like tilapia. Red
meat. Not salmon. Tilapia. Oh, yeah. I see what
you mean. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep. No idea. We're
jonesing for some Irish cuisine. So we better
wrap this up. Wrap it up. Hope everyone enjoyed
this episode. Another Michigan lighthouse coming
at you. And another listener lighthouse. So continue
to send us lighthouses you want to hear about.
We'll recover them best we can with our limited
knowledge. Yep. We love the support. We love
the comments. Keep them coming. Yeah. Check out
our YouTube. And you can also leave us a review
on our website, thelighthouselowdown .com, which
we just renewed. So we definitely have it for
another year. And hope to catch you next time
on... The lighthouse? Whatever. That's not good.
Sorry.