In Their Footsteps: Cape Cod History - The Nantucket Lightship Station

    Lighthouses guide passing vessels from the potentially hazardous shorelines of the world. These stoic giants have been protecting ships for centuries. Many of them are historic attractions, uniquely designed and lending themselves toward spectacular photograph opportunities. Although today the world’s lighthouses sit on exclusively on solid ground there was a long period of time when some sat in the water. These protected passing vessels from sandy shoals that can sneak up on boats and wreak havoc. The beacons that once guarded the shoals were called lightships. Perhaps no lightship station is more well known than the Nantucket. Painted bright red with Nantucket in white on its sides this icon has a history extending for more than a century and a half. Here is its story.

    The first lightship was the Nore constructed in 1732 and situated in the River Thames in England. The first lightship in the United States came in 1820 sitting in the Chesapeake Bay in Virginia to mark the Willoughby Spit. Around Cape Cod and its islands are many dangerous shoals. Though some can be easily navigated one in particular caused the creation of the Cape’s first lightship.

    In the mid-19th century dangerous shoals south and east of the island of Nantucket were cause of much destruction of passing vessels. The route south of the island was important to trans-Atlantic shipping and thus a ‘light boat’ was deemed necessary for the area.

    On May 13, 1854 Samuel Knox, Superintendent of Light Houses and Light Boats, announced the construction of the first light boat station in America. The wooden boat, designated LV-11, was 104-feet long with two yellow masts adorned with day-marks and lanterns for night and inclement weather. The lights could be seen from up to thirteen miles away.

    It cost $13,462 ($416,000 in 2020) and was built in Baltimore, Maryland. The hull of the light boat was red with ‘Nantucket South Shoal’ painted in large white letters on either side. Appropriately it was positioned at the southern end of Nantucket’s New South Shoal giving a wide berth to passing vessels. The water surrounding the shoal could be as shallow as three-feet making a light boat essential.

    The boat was sailed north and moored at its location two miles south of the shoal on June 12, 1854 in 14 fathoms (84 feet) of water. The first ‘keeper’ of the light boat was Captain Samuel Bunker who left his job as keeper of Nantucket’s Sankaty Head Lighthouse. The job of the keeper and crew was basically just to keep the lanterns clean and operational. Thus the crew had a lot of free time and took to weaving baskets to keep from growing bored.

    The tenure of LV-11 was a short one. In January 1855 Capt. Bunker sent some of his crew ashore as they were short on water. A tremendous storm on February 5, 1855 drove the LV-11 of its mooring and sent it drifting away. When the crew that had gone ashore returned to where the LV-11 had been aboard the vessel Nebraska they were shocked to find it missing. Luckily Capt. Bunker sent his wife a letter to let everyone know the ship had crashed ashore on some rocks at the east end of Montauk Point on Long Island approximately one hundred miles west. The light boat was towed into New York and declared a total wreck.

The LV-1 Lightship (Flickr Commons) 

    The second boat, named LV-1, was built in Kittery, Maine near the end of 1855 at a cost of $30,000 ($896,000 in 2020). It was roughly the same size and decorated the same as the LV-11. The look of the Nantucket Lightship did not change much during the entire century-plus tenure of the station. The new ship was placed in the same spot as the first on January 28, 1856. This vessel had a much longer time in action than the LV-11 though it was not without its own peril.

    Within a few months the new lightship was already having trouble with its moorings due to the rough seas at New South Shoal. During its first decade in service the LV-11 broke from its moorings no less than a dozen times. The longest period was nearly three weeks where the lightship was adrift at sea. Each time it was towed back to New South Shoal, sometimes after needing repairs though.

    A significant change came in October 1891 when the Lighthouse Board designated $70,000 ($2 million in 2020) for a third lightship to be built for New South Shoal. This ship maintained the overall look of the first two, however it had a pair of major upgrades. First it was made of iron, allowing it to be more securely moored at the shoal. Second it came equipped with a steam powered fog whistle, this would make it easier to find if by chance it did break from its moorings. The whistle also sought to curb the number of vessels that would crash into the lightship in foggy conditions, something that happened from time to time. The new ship LV-54 went into service early in 1893.

    In 1896 New South Shoal was renamed Nantucket Shoals which is how it would be known for the next century. By the turn of the 20th century lightship service had peaked in the United States. The highest total in use at one time was in 1909 when there were fifty-six across America.

    At that time there were twelve lightships dotting Cape Cod's coast. Some of the more well known included: Pollock Rip Lightship east of Monomoy Point in Chatham, Handkerchief west of Monomoy in Nantucket Sound, Stonehorse also near Monomoy, and Hen and Chickens at the entrance to Buzzards Bay.

An antique Nantucket Lightship basket c.1900 on sale on eBay for $1,975 (Paul Madden Antiques)

    As the 20th century progressed the era of the lightship winded down. Buoys and fixed towers on the water proved safer for marking travel lanes. It meant that crews no longer had to be exposed on manned lightships anymore. Stonehorse was the last Cape Cod lightship, being officially decommissioned October 5, 1963. The final Nantucket lightships, LV-112 and WLV-612(they would alternate at the site), would remain in action much longer though. In fact upon the retirement of the Columbia River Lightship in Oregon in 1979 Nantucket became the final lightship station in service in the entire country.

A model of the LV-112

    The LV-112 was decommissioned in 1975. At the time of its retirement this vessel been the longest tenured at the Nantucket Shoals station, there for 39 years. The National Park Service declared it an historic landmark in 1989. However after being towed from its spot off the shoals to Straight Wharf on Nantucket it has come close to being scrapped. It has been moved to several ports and been used as a museum and tourist attraction in the decades since.

The LV-112 in 2017 (Beyond My Ken) 

    The WLV-612 was the last surviving lightship in America, being officially decommissioned in 1983. It was saved from the scrap heap in 2000 when former Massachusetts senator Bill Golden bought the vessel on eBay for $126,100 ($190,000 in 2020). The former lightship was redesigned into a spacious yacht for his family and has remained in his ownership since. In 2020 the WLV-612 is docked in Boston Harbor and is up for sale as of September. The asking price? $4.95 million. The floating home is two levels, six bedrooms, and 4,000 square feet.

    If the asking price is too steep for the lightship the ever-collectible Nantucket Lightship baskets are somewhat more affordable and can be found for sale on eBay as well. There are replicas also that range from about $45 and up.

The WLV-612 real estate listing for those interested: Elliman.com - Nantucket Lightship for Sale

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My first eBook in 10 years, In Their Footsteps, featuring the interesting stories of Cape Cod's history, is on sale at Amazon.com. 

View my previous blog posts: 

In Their Footsteps: Bill and Thelma's Restaurant

In Their Footsteps: Cape Cod History - Bill Cox's Sea Grill

Photo Prints available here: Smug Mug.com

Be sure to check out my website: Christopher Setterlund.com

Road Trip Day 5 - Wright Brothers, Piers, and Lighthouses on the Outer Banks

     This was the best day wall to wall of the entire road trip.  It began just after 6am. I stumbled out of bed and was able to walk only a few yards outside and was right on the beach to watch the sunrise.  I tried to go back to sleep after but didn't succeed, I was already too hyped up from sunrise.  I was up and out to have breakfast early.  Just down the street was a spot called Bob's Grill - Eat and Get the Hell Out, yes that's on their sign outside.  The food was great, the surf motif was great, I was glad I went.  
     One thing about the Outer Banks, at least the more northern part, is that it was way more developed with more people than I thought going in.  I was worried when I was driving there that I'd need to stop off and get any supplies I needed before getting to the Outer Banks and was surprised when I saw so many malls and restaurants, and tons of souvenir shops.  As I had said before I visited a Publix grocery store and now wish we had one on Cape Cod, it's like Market Basket and Whole Foods had a baby.
     Seeing that NC-12, the road which travels down the Cape Hatteras Seashore, was closed for most of the day due to sand and water from the recent storms this meant I had to wait and take my time enjoying the sites on the Outer Banks.  Gee, what a shame.  Right after breakfast I crossed the street to the Wright Brothers Memorial.  At the top of the 100-foot tall Big Kill Devil Hill is a monument to the brothers and their first flight.  I met a man named Steve from Ohio up there and we took photos for each other, nice guy.  There was also a memorial to the moment of the first flight, along with the markers denoting the flight attempt and stats about it located on the field below the hill.

The monument on Big Kill Devil Hill and the marker where the first flight ended.

     After checking out of my hotel I visited a pair of piers.  Kitty Hawk Pier and Avalon Pier, usually one of them gets shown on the Weather Channel when a hurricane is coming.  The waves were still big even a few days since the storms passed through making for some good photo ops.  Avalon Pier was being worked on so I couldn't walk out on it.

     Next was a little side track to Roanoke Island.  It was here that the first attempt at an English colony in America happened in 1587.  The first English child born in America was Virginia Dare born to this group, the highway that runs much of the Outer Banks is named for her, as is Dare County itself.  The colony vanished and it is still one of America's greatest unsolved mysteries.  Archaeologists found and reconstructed an earthen fort but have yet to find the remains of the actual fort where the 115 settlers would have lived.  Every summer they do a play at the outdoor waterfront theater about this colony.

     It was about 1pm by this point and I decided to go over the the entrance to Cape Hatteras National Seashore and check if maybe they had opened the road early.  By luck they had, although with a warning that they were still working on it so beware sand and water.  I knew it was quite a hike from the entrance south to Cape Hatteras Light, but once you're on the road it seems to go on forever.  It is nearly 50 miles on a beach road, with only pockets of civilization, before reaching the lighthouse.  

     I missed the entrance to Bodie Island Light on the way out, that one is only 6 miles or so from the entrance, but that would be to my benefit later.  They weren't kidding about the road conditions either.  Only a few miles out were front-end loaders removing buckets of sand, so the long trip was made longer when I had to slow down or stop.  One fun little side note is the Bonner Bridge which crosses the Oregon Inlet about 10 miles south of the entrance, both times I drove it there was a flock of pelicans hovering just above my car.  I didn't hit any but the bridge at the top was littered with dead pelicans.

     It took about an hour to reach Cape Hatteras Lighthouse.  At 210-feet tall I could see it from a mile away.  The black and white candy cane striped structure is one of the most well known lighthouses in the world.  This was the southern most point of my journey.  It was the top site for me on my road trip, I'd wanted to visit it for years and it's matched only by West Quoddy Head Light as my favorite I've seen.  I tried to soak it all in, shoot as many photos and videos as I could but also be in the moment there.  I had one more spot to see before beginning the long trek north, this time I plugged Bodie Island Light into my GPS.

Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, reaching higher than the sun.

      Bodie Island Light and the amazing sunset I saw there were happy accidents.  Missing it on the way out, then when I got there I had to wait ten minutes at the entrance.  The road out to it is being repaved and there is a truck that basically leads you out one by one to the lighthouse.  It was worth it.  This lighthouse is also black and white striped and also very tall, 156-feet to be exact.  The lighthouse was bathed in an orange glow when I got there so it was easy to get great photos.  The topper was walking on a boardwalk to an elevated pavilion behind the lighthouse.  It's a boardwalk the entire way due to warnings about venomous snakes located in the marsh.  

Sunset at Bodie Island Lighthouse

     The sunset was amazing but once it was done I knew I had to get to driving.  From Cape Hatteras it was just under 14 hours back to Cape Cod.  I figured the more I drove Wednesday night the less I'd have to do Thursday.  Along the way I got to drive through the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel.  It is 17-miles of bridges and tunnels and also cost $14 in tolls to cross.  By the time I made it across I was ready to stop of the night.  The Eastern Shore of Virginia is more along the lines of what I thought the Outer Banks would be, desolate and sparsely populated.  I managed to find an ok hotel in the town of Onley, not as good as my Outer Banks hotel but whatever.  

     So Thursday begins the long trek home, it is over 9 hours, with a few stops along the way still to see.  When I pull back into my driveway I expect to have put about 2,200 miles on my car.  Nearly 400 were put on it Wednesday but the experiences are worth the highway hypnosis.