Cape Canaveral Light

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Please help improve this article or section by expanding it.
Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (January 2007)

Cape Canaveral Light
The Cape Canaveral lighthouse in 1995
Location:	one mile inland from Cape Canaveral
Year first lit:	1868
Automated:	1960
Foundation:	brick
Construction:	cast iron plate with brick lining
Tower shape:	conical
Height:	137 feet (42 m)
Original lens:	first-order Fresnel lens

The current Cape Canaveral Light was not the first lighthouse on Cape Canaveral. A 60-foot (18 m) tall brick structure was built on the Cape in 1848. The light consisted of 15 lamps each with a 21-inch (530 mm) reflector. The first lighthouse keeper left the lighthouse during a Seminole War scare, and refused to return to his post. Sailors heavily criticized the lighthouse, with complaints that the light was too weak and too low to be seen before ships were on the reefs near the Cape. the government contracted for construction of a new lighthouse in 1860, but the start of the American Civil War stopped work. The lamps and mechanism for the light were removed from the lighthouse and buried in the lighthouse keepers orange grove to protect them from Yankee raids.

At the end of the war construction resumed on the lighthouse. It was completed in 1868, receiving a first-order Fresnel lens. Erosion of the shoreline threatened the lighthouse, and the United States Congress appropriated funds to move the lighthouse inland. The old (1848) was blown up and the rubble used to prepare a foundation of the lighthouse. The cast-iron tower was disassembled, moved and reassembled at the new location. The move took 18 months, and the lighthouse was re-lit at its new location in 1894. Ownership of the lighthouse was transferred to the United States Air Force in 2000 (the lighthouse is located inside the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station). It is the only fully operational lighthouse owned by the United States Air Force.