All Rights Reserved. While walking the shore, William C. Williams of Kittery, later a keeper at Boon Island, found letters and books that had belonged to the crewmen. Restaurants near Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse: (0.18 km) Henry's Market & Cafe (1.53 km) Salt Kitchen & Bar (1.67 km) Latitudes Restaurant (2.91 km) Lil's Cafe (3.55 km) Beach Pea Baking Co; View all restaurants near Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse on Tripadvisor More wrecks followed in the ensuing years, including that of the Maine schooner Fame in October 1827. (Note: at times the entire site may be closed for security reasons), Visitors are not allowed into the area near the lighthouse, except during open houses held by the Friends of Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouses. Inside the tower were four rooms of living space on two levels, with a cellar. The lens rotated atop a new pedestal, on a groove filled with mercury. He is the president and historian for the American Lighthouse Foundation and founder of Friends of Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouses, and he has lectured and narrated cruises throughout the Northeast and in other regions. The new tower, which was designed by Army Corps Officer James C. Duane (Lighthouse Board Engineer for Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, 1868-1879), held a fourth order Fresnel lens. His first assistant keeper for most of those years was John Wetzel of Portsmouth, who held the position from 1897 to 1924. I want to go to heaven,” just before she lost consciousness. A wooden lighthouse was soon established at Fort William and Mary on Great Island, in what is now the town of New Castle in Portsmouth Harbor, about a mile from the mouth of the Piscataqua River. Snow reported that years later Clark still had the book that was in the package, Snow’s Storms and Shipwrecks of New England. White of New Castle, New Hampshire, son of the former keeper Leander White, succeeded Amee as principal keeper in 1921. Both sent their beams across the water. It was said that up to that time, Amee had spent only 11 days out of sight of the lighthouse in 18 years. The contractor was Benjamin Clark Gilman, a native of nearby Exeter, New Hampshire, who was said to have “remarkable mechanical ability.” The keeper had a difficult time with soldiers stealing his supplies and the sound of cannon fire from the fort breaking the dwelling’s windows. That didn’t last, because their tastes were all different. Henry Cuskley. When the Coast Guard took over operation of the nation’s lighthouses in 1939, keepers were given the option of joining the Coast Guard or serving out the remainder of their careers as civilians. Copyright © 2013 Friends of Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouses. The assistant keepers, working in the lantern room, couldn’t hear each other speak during the gale because the shaking of the apparatus was so violent. Engineer I.W.P. It was reported that the lighthouse keeper looked out the window of the tower at 5:00 a.m. and saw a piece of the wreck, along with three men. You must anticipate trouble and have spare parts on hand at all times.” Flint noted that the tower’s ten windows—with the glass a half-inch thick—were screened to keep out the houseflies that sometimes arrived in swarms. Nearby Wood Island was utilized as a base for the construction project. The bell tower was described as a “frame structure, 25 feet high, whitewashed, standing upon the Light House pier, and attached to the southerly part of the Light House tower.” When needed, the bell was struck by machinery four times every minute. . At the end of the film, Apse is heard taking about Whaleback Lighthouse in Kittery, one of his favorites, and the work Friends of Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouses is doing to maintain and preserve it. . Located behind the Coast Guard HG just a short hike from where you park. Keeper Joshua K. Card. Storms in 1869 caused cracks in the tower and foundation, and a report stated, “The station should be rebuilt as soon as possible.”A new lighthouse tower was finally erected in 1872 for $75,000. Arnold White with his daughter Muriel at Whaleback. That schedule was often disrupted by rough weather and sea conditions. Two Kittery resident, Walter S. Amee and Samuel Blake, reached Whaleback as the storm abated. When people would ask Keeper Card what the letter “K” on his uniform stood for, he’d tell them, “Captain.”, In all his years at the lighthouse, it was reported that Keeper Card left the station for an extended period only once. The crew of a passing schooner heard Rand’s cries for help. The 1903 oil house was abandoned for some years, but it was renovated in May 2004. foggy stretch in 1961. The U.S. Treasury Department paid $20 to the company for replacement of their fire-damaged clothing. In the early hours of February 15, 1863, the British schooner Rouser, on its way to Boston from St. John, New Brunswick, was wrecked close to Whaleback Ledge. Funds for the recommended breakwater were appropriated in 1837–38. Another wave righted the boat and threw the pair into the ocean; again, Rand pulled his daughter to safety. Portsmouth Harbor Light — also known locally as Fort Point Light — is the only mainland lighthouse on New Hampshire’s 18-mile seacoast. The tower was shortened to 55 feet in 1851, and the lighthouse was fitted with a fourth order Fresnel lens three years later. The li ghthouse was erected on a conical granite pier, 42 feet in diameter at the bottom and 32 feet at the top. . Before they reached land, the apparently lifeless Elizabeth was revived. While one of the assistant keepers blasted the foghorn repeatedly in an attempt to get the attention of the men at a nearby lifesaving station, Amee launched the small lighthouse boat and managed to haul the drowning men aboard. This is considered by some to be one of the first battles of the American Revolution. …At the center of the harbor was Whaleback Lighthouse, and ten miles out to sea from that was the lighthouse on White Island, part of the Isles of Shoals. The jagged ledge known as Whaleback lurks menacingly on the northeast side of the entrance to the Piscataqua River, approximately a half -mile south of Gerrish Island, part of the town of Kittery. It was the first light station established at a military installation of the British colonies of the present United States, the 10th of 11 light stations established in the colonies before the American Revolution, and the first lighthouse in the American colonies north of Boston. The vessel broke apart and the crew was lost. Cuskley lived at the lighthouse with his wife and two daughters. He would be the station’s last civilian keeper. Sunset Lighthouse Cruises from Rye, NH, on June 21 and 28, Five Lighthouse Cruise – September 24, 2016, Old Word Accordions: Gary Sredzienski in the Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse, Spring Fling at the Kittery Lions Club on Saturday, April 4, 2020 – POSTPONED. In February 1871, a Nova Scotian schooner ran onto the ledge in a blinding snowstorm. “This rock is favorable for erecting a breakwater in it,” they concluded, “in the most permanent manner, and, if so built, would entirely protect the foundation of the light-house from any exposure from the effects of the sea, and remain for ages to come.”. Two of the five men on board drowned; the Boston Newsletter reported that the other three, “tho’ much chilled with the Cold,” were likely to survive. All Rights Reserved. The horn once ran for 18 straight days during a …We could look up the Piscataqua River to Portsmouth, with its gleaming white belfry of North Church, a landmark for sailors, silhouetted against the sky. In December 1774, Paul Revere rode to Portsmouth from Boston to warn the colonists of British plans to reinforce Fort William and Mary. custom house in Newburyport, Massachuestts. The Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse was automated in 1960. The fortifications became known as Fort Constitution after the Revolution. The American Lighthouse Foundation and its chapter, the Friends of Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse, submitted an application. It was painfully clear that the tower had been poorly built; it leaked badly in storms and heavy seas. Since 1906 it has been within the granite Civil War-era walls of Fort Constitution. In 2007, under the provisions of the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act of 2000, the lighthouse was made available to a suitable new steward. William H. Caswell was the principal keeper when the new tower was completed, and his son, Frank, was one of his assistants. The new 50-foot tower, 27 feet in diameter at its base, was constructed of granite blocks dovetailed together in similar fashion to Minot’s Ledge Light in Massachusetts and England’s Eddystone Light. Amee went on to captain fishing schooners out of Salem, Massachusetts, and Portsmouth, New Hampshire, before brief stints as an assistant keeper at Boon Island, Maine, and White Island, New Hampshire. All contributions are tax deductible to the full extent allowable by law. The keeper swam to his daughter and pulled to her to his side as he clung to the bottom of the boat. If you’re interested in being part of the effort to restore and preserve this lighthouse, email info@portsmouthharborlighthouse.org. According to a newspaper report, a “signal of distress was made from the light-house by his children, who were alone at the time, the mother being in this city, and though the watchman at the U.S. Hospital on Wood Island, Mr. James Andrews, and a fisherman named Wallace, went to the rescue, it was too late, as the unfortunate man had disappeared.” Keeper Barr was said to be a Prussian by birth. A new revolving fourth-order lens was installed in 1898. Open for public open houses on Sunday afternoons, 1 to 5 p.m., from Memorial Day weekend in late May to Columbus Day weekend in October. The 1871 annual report of the Lighthouse Board announced that the masonry had been completed to a height of 20 feet above the low water mark. The keeper who served the longest at the station was New Castle native Joshua K. Card, who retired at age 87 in 1909 after 35 years at the station. 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