newjerseynewsroom.com

Share this Twitter Myspace Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Slashdot Furl Yahoo Technorati Newsvine Facebook Export PDF Print E-mail Tags light lighthouse located hook built sandy jersey york north tower barnegat lighthouses river state bay delaware cape channel point lights

BY ERIC MODEL

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

JOURNEYS INTO NEW JERSEY

Back in an age before GPS and satellite imaging, lighthouses served as guides to sailor and citizen alike. They offered a comforting symbol – a sign of a return to safe harbor.

Today lighthouses remain important -- but mostly as an inspirational guide to our past.

As a coastal state, New Jersey boasts a number of lighthouses (Many open to the public). They are a draw to lighthouse enthusiasts from around the world.

They have stories to tell the rest of us as well.

Absecon Light – Located in the north end of Atlantic City overlooking Absecon Inlet, this is the second-tallest lighthouse in the state of New Jersey and is the third tallest in the U.S. Construction began in 1854, with the light first lit on January 15, 1857. The lighthouse was deactivated in 1933 and although the light still shines every night, it is no longer an active navigational aid.

Barnegat Light – Known to many as "Old Barney," this light is located at the northern tip of Long Beach Island on the south side of Barnegat Inlet. Its beacon remained a navigational light until August 1927, when the Barnegat Lightship was anchored 8 nm off the coast. This prompted the automation and the replacement of the first-order lens with a gas blinker, reducing the tower's light by over 80 percent. The gas blinker was replaced several weeks later with a 250-watt electric bulb, though the gas apparatus can still be seen at the top of the tower.

The light was deactivated in January 1944, and given to the State of New Jersey. Four years later, in 1948, the local municipality, Barnegat City, renamed itself Barnegat Light. In 1954, the lens was returned to the borough of Barnegat Light and is now on exhibit in the Barnegat Light Museum. The area around the lighthouse was declared a state park and dedicated in 1957. The lightship was removed in 1969.

The Barnegat Lighthouse Interpretive Center has a display area and a desk where you can talk to park staff. The displays inside the center focus on maritime history associated with the lighthouse, lighthouse cultural history and the efforts that have been taken to over the years to try to keep the lighthouse from getting washed away.

Cape May Lighthouse – Located at Cape May Point, it was built in 1859. It was automated in 1946, and continues operation to this day. It is the third fully documented lighthouse to be built at Cape May Point. The first was built in 1823; the second in 1847. The exact locations of the first two lighthouses are now underwater due to erosion. There are 199 steps to the top of the Lighthouse. The view from the top extends to Cape May and Wildwood to the north, Cape May Point to the south, and, on a clear day, Cape Henlopen, Delaware, to the west.

East Point Light – Formerly named Maurice River Light, this light is located in Heislverville on Delaware Bay at the mouth of the Maurice River. Initially known as the Maurice River Light, the name was changed to East Point Light in 1913. The light was inactive from 1941 and was nearly destroyed by fire in 1971. The Coast Guard reinstated the light in 1980. Exterior restoration was completed in 1999.

Finn's Point Rear Range – Located just east of the Delaware River, it was part of Range light pair that guided ships into the Delaware River. It is deactivated and its lamp has been removed, but the lighthouse is open to the public as part of a National Wildlife Refuge. It was designed and built in 1877 and is a classic example of a skeletal cast iron prefabricated lighthouse. Its companion Front Range light was demolished in the 1930s but restored as a smaller automated light in 1983.

Hereford Inlet Lighthouse – Located in North Wildwood along Hereford Inlet, this 50-foot (15 m) tower and its beacon are visible for up to 13 nautical miles (24 km). The inlet had sunk many ships before, so the U.S. Lifesaving Service built a small station there in 1849, which was replaced in 1874 by this lighthouse. The light was decommissioned in 1964 after a more modern navigational aid was installed nearby. Now owned by the town of North Wildwood, it has reopened to public tours of the light and its gardens.

Navesink Twin Lights – Though these days a non-operational lighthouse and museum, it still remains an impressive structure. Located in Highlands overlooking Sandy Hook Bay at the entrance to the New York Harbor and the Atlantic Ocean, the Twin Lights, as the name implies, are a pair of beacons located 246 feet above sea level on the Navesink Highlands. In 1962, the State of New Jersey acquired Twin Lights. At the current museum facility, tours of the lighthouse, a climb of the North Tower and its ocean view, and a view of the lighthouse equipment, await visitors. Twin Lights is listed on the State and National Register of Historic Places.

Sandy Hook Lighthouse – Located about one and a half statute miles (2.4 km) inland from the tip of Sandy Hook, it is the oldest working lighthouse in the country. It was designed and built in 1764. The light was built to aid mariners entering the southern end of the New York Harbor. It was originally called New York Lighthouse because it was funded through a New York Assembly lottery and a tax on all ships entering the Port of New York. Sandy Hook Light has endured an attempt to destroy it (as an aid to British navigation) by Benjamin Tupper, and a subsequent occupancy of British soldiers during the Revolutionary War. Perhaps most impressively, it has endured exposure to the elements on the end of Sandy Hook. When the lighthouse was built in 1764, it stood only 500 feet (150 m) from the tip of Sandy Hook; however, today, due to growth caused by littoral drift, it is almost one and a half miles (2.4 km) inland from the tip. Sandy Hook Lighthouse is part of the Sandy Hook Unit of Gateway National Recreation Area. The Sandy Hook Lighthouse was restored in spring 2000.

Sea Girt Light – Marking the inlet leading to the Wreck Pond, this light has the distinction of having hosted the first radio beacon mounted in a shore installation in the U.S. At the start of World War II, the light was deactivated and the lens removed; the house was remodeled to serve as a dormitory for a Coast Guard observation post. After the war, an aerobeacon was mounted atop the tower; but in 1955 the light was decommissioned and a beacon on a steel tower was erected on the lawn. The lighthouse was offered to the state, but when they declined, the borough of Sea Girt purchased the lighthouse instead. It was used for the town library and for meeting space for many years, and in 1981 care of the building was taken over by the Sea Girt Lighthouse Citizens Committee.

Tinicum Island Rear Range Light – Located in the town of Billingsport, is the rear of a pair of range lights marking a section of the channel in the Delaware River south of Philadelphia.

Tucker's Island – What was probably New Jersey's first summer resort was on Tucker's Island off shore from Little Egg Harbor. The island sported boarding houses, private cottages and a school. In 1848 a Lighthouse was erected there. A replica can be found at the Tuckerton Seaport.

These are New Jersey's best-known lighthouses. But there are others less known.

For example, the Robbins Reef Light Station is a sparkplug lighthouse located off Constable Hook in Bayonne along the west side of Upper New York Bay's Main Channel. The tower and keepers quarters were built in 1883. It replaced an octagonal granite tower built in 1839. The U.S. Coast Guard owns and operates the light station.
The light is located at the entrance to the Kill van Kull, the strait that connects to the Newark. The waterway is one of the busiest in the port as it accesses the Port Newark-Port Elizabeth Marine Terminal.

There is also the Miah Maull Shoal Light, a lighthouse on the north side of the ship channel in Delaware Bay southwest of the mouth of the Maurice River.

The Great Beds Light, a sparkplug lighthouse which sits in Raritan Bay in South Amboy, has become the symbol for the city of South Amboy. The Ship John Shoal Light marks the north side of the ship channel in Delaware Bay, near the Bombay Hook National Wildlife Refuge. Its cast iron superstructure was exhibited at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia.

Romer Shoal Light, another sparkplug lighthouse in Lower New York Bay, on the north edge of the Swash Channel, about ¾ nm south of Ambrose Channel and 2½ nm north of Sandy Hook, in the entrance to New York Harbor. It is in New Jersey, very close to the border with New York and several references list it, incorrectly, as being "in New York."

Unlike those listed above, none from this group of lights are open to the public.

In all, each lighthouse is different from the next. So is its story. It's worth a look – should you get past the beach or the Turnpike.

For more on the respective lighthouses and for information about when they are open to the public, see: The New Jersey Lighthouse Society or Lighthouse Friends.