Finding the unexpected in the everyday.
After more than a half-century of service for vessels sailing through that region of the North Atlantic Ocean, the Lighthouse of Ponta dos Capelinhos on the Portuguese archipelago of the Azores ceased operations altogether. This lighthouse, specifically located on the peninsula of Ponta dos Capelinhos and Costa Nau at the western tip of the Azorean... Continue Reading →
A new lighthouse began operations on a shallow sandbank that is about seven miles (11 kilometers) off the coast of Ireland’s capital of Dublin. The Kish Lighthouse – located on the sandbank known as the Kish Bank in Dublin Bay-- has since become a familiar landmark for those sailing through this region of the Emerald... Continue Reading →
Sometime around 1824, Juan Andreu of the U.S. Revenue Cutter Service (forerunner to the U.S. Coast Guard) was appointed keeper of the St. Augustine Lighthouse on northeast Florida’s Atlantic coast. (The future state had become a U.S. territory in 1821.) Andreu, whose parents had been born in on the island of Minorca (off the eastern... Continue Reading →
The Lindau Lighthouse in the then-Kingdom of Bavaria began operations. The 108-foot-tall lighthouse, which took three years to build, is in the town of Lindau on Lake Constance. The structure is the southernmost lighthouse in present-day German; it is also the only lighthouse in the German federal state of Bavaria. The lighthouse has been automated... Continue Reading →
La Vieille lighthouse on the northwest coast of France was first lit. The stone tower is specifically located on a rock known as Gorlebella (meaning “farthest rock” in the Breton language) at the commune of Plogoff. (That commune is the department of Finistère, an administrative division of France’s Brittany region; Finistère is the Breton phrase... Continue Reading →
A new lighthouse was first lit in northwestern Ireland just before being completed. Rotten Island lighthouse remains in operation today as a key navigational aid for vessels making their way from St. John’s Point to Killybegs Harbour in Donegal Bay. The origins of the lighthouse can be traced to the spring of 1832, when the... Continue Reading →
A new lighthouse made its formal debut in Western Australia. Woodman Point Lighthouse (originally called Gage Roads Lighthouse), which is located on Woodman Point in the City of Cockburn, was built to help safely guide vessels sailing into the area’s large and busy port of Fremantle Harbour. “The light will be visible from the bridge... Continue Reading →
On Australia’s southeastern coast, a new lighthouse made its debut on the headland of Barrenjoey in the colony – and present-day state – of New South Wales (NSW). The first light for the sandstone structure was kerosene-fueled. The Barrenjoey Lighthouse was built in response to longtime demands for stronger safeguards for vessels, particularly the steady... Continue Reading →
In New Zealand, Bean Rock Lighthouse in Auckland’s Waitematā Harbour made its debut when keeper Hugh Brown lit a kerosene lamp in the new structure. (Brown served as the lighthouse’s keeper until retiring in 1890.) Bean Rock Lighthouse had been built in response to ever-increasing maritime traffic in this area of New Zealand; one of... Continue Reading →
Tsuru Shima Lighthouse, which can be found on the island of Tsuru Shima in southeastern Japan and remains in operation today, was first lit. This lighthouse was one of 26 in the Land of the Rising Sun that were designed by Scottish-born engineer Richard Henry Brunton during the early years of the Meiji era, a... Continue Reading →
Transportation History 