“The rocky ledge runs far into the sea,
And on its outer point, some miles away,
The Lighthouse lifts its massive masonry,
A pillar of fire by night, of cloud by day.”

The Lighthouse, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Let There Be Light

Located in Montauk Point State Park at the easternmost tip of Long Island, the Montauk Point Lighthouse began alerting sailors to the shoreline in April of 1797.

In years prior, and by the late 1700’s the eastern seaboard had become a hotbed of marine activity. The Atlantic Trade Line quickly became the primary route of cargo ships making their way from abroad with various sundries, spices, and the latest French fashion-exports. The coastline, however, was indeed quite hazardous. It became abundantly clear that something would need to be done to assure European trade companies that they would not risk their cargo, or their men, by sending them toward ports in New York, Philadelphia or Boston – as constituents within all of these locales were rumored to have surveyed ‘yes,’ with regard to ‘would you really lose it if we said no more spices?'

A solution was needed to keep ships delivering goods and more importantly to maintain calm kitchens in the northeast.

GW Votes ‘Yes’

On April 12th, 1792, President George Washington authorized the Montauk Point Lighthouse as the first public works project in the United States.

Construction began a little more than four years later on June 7, 1796 and it would take a crew of fifty men nearly five months under the watchful eye of master New York bricklayer John McComb to complete both the tower and a modest keeper’s dwelling nearby.

Up She Goes

The building was constructed of exotic sandstone blocks from Connecticut. Each block was, ...