Lighthouses of the Great Lakes by Ray Jones

Author:Ray Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Globe Pequot
Published: 2022-12-31T00:00:00+00:00

How to Get There

Charlevoix is a delightful coastal village just off US Highway 31 about 50 miles north of Traverse City and about 16 miles southwest of Petosky. The lighthouse is on the south side of the channel drawbridge near Grant Street. A nearby parking area provides access to the pier, the lighthouse, and an adjacent beach. For more information visit chxhistory.com.

Grand Traverse Light

North Port, Michigan

1853

Established in 1853, well before the Civil War, the Grand Traverse Lighthouse served generations of lake sailors before being decommissioned in 1972. After casting its powerful beacon out across Lake Michigan for well over a century, the old lighthouse was retired, its duties taken over by a simple skeleton structure with relatively little character. But fortunately for those of us who love historic architecture, the original buildings have been preserved and are exceptionally well maintained.

Indeed, the old lighthouse has quite a history. Intended to guide shipping into and out of Grand Traverse Bay, the lighthouse was built on Cat Head Point. Here, with its powerful fourth-order Fresnel lens, it could command the entrance to the bay. The lens beamed out toward the lake from atop a square tower and lantern room rising through the pitched roof of a large, two-story brick dwelling. Even in this isolated location, keepers and their families could live comfortably in the ample dwelling.

The station’s first keeper was Philo Beers, who also served as a US deputy marshal. Apparently, the station had need of a lawman. While still under construction in 1852, it was raided by Mormon followers of a the very same King James Jesse Strang described in the introduction to this chapter. Not overly literal in their reading of the Ten Commandments, these religious raiders stole everything they could lay their hands on, including some of Beers’s lighthouse equipment. Fortunately, the deputy marshal managed to drive off the king’s men and save the station’s all-important Fresnel lens.

Today the lighthouse is a museum filled with exhibits and mementos offering visitors a glimpse of life in a turn-of-the-twentieth-century lighthouse. Among its exhibits is the station’s original Fresnel lens.

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