From collection Eastern Illustrating & Publishing Company Collection
LB2019.1.123242
Seguin Island Light Station seen from a distance across a boulder-strewn open landscape. Three men talk at the far left. Laundry flaps in the wind on a clothesline strung between the buildings. The station was the second to be built on the Maine coast, and the first on an island. The stone tower in the image was constructed in 1857, replacing an 1820 stone tower and before that, the original wood tower from 1795. It was the first station to be built by the federal government. In their book "Nineteenth Century Lights", J. Candace Clifford and Mary Louise Clifford include the transcript of a descriptive letter written in 1830s by Stephen Pleasonton to the Secretary of the Treasury: "Seguin Island Light-- Situated six miles from the mainland. The lighthouse, with the dwelling is located 300 feet above the sea. The ascent of the road from the landing is an angle of 45 degrees, up which all the supplies have to be conveyed. The island contains about 50 acres of rocky land. No wood and very little land fit for cultivation, but produces sufficient grass to support several cows and a few sheep." The 64-acre island is known for having the thickest fog on the Maine coast. The authors write: "A fog signal was installed in 1854, and the keeper's salary increased $100 annually for attending to the fog bell...The... cylindrical granite tower...was rebuilt in 1857 to hold a first-order lens -- the first Fresnel lens installed in Maine. A short enclosed passageway connected the tower to the new, one-and-one-half-story brick dwelling. The frame building beside the tower was built in 1880 for the storage of fuel for a steam fog signal installed in 1873. Drought in Maine in 1890 led to the use of sea water in the fog signal boilers and necessitated the building of a reservoir to collect fresh water. A tramway was built in 1895 from the boat landing to the dwelling and is the only one still operating in the state of Maine." [Clifford, J. Candace and Mary Louise, "Nineteenth Century Lights: Historic Images of American Lighthouses," Cypress Communications, 2000.] [No title.]
