1829: The Debut of a Lighthouse that Helps Protect Vessels Traveling to and from Rio de Janeiro

July 31, 1829

In southeastern Brazil, a lighthouse on the island of Rasa (“Ilha Rasa” in Portuguese) was inaugurated. This island serves as the entrance to the Port of Rio de Janeiro, which is located in a cove on the western shore of Guanabara Bay. (At the time of Ilha Rasa Lighthouse’s debut, most of the territory comprising the present-day Federative Republic of Brazil was instead part of the Empire of Brazil.)

Work on Ilha Rasa Lighthouse began in 1819. The engineer in charge of this project was João de Souza Pacheco Leitão. The 85-foot (26-meter)-high Ilha Rasa Lighthouse remains in operation today. It is managed by the Brazilian Navy.

Photo Credit: Luiz Flavio (https://www.flickr.com/people/24948567@N07) – licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en

Additional information on lighthouses in southeastern Brazil is available at https://www.ibiblio.org/lighthouse/brse.htm