History of the Light Station
From lightships to permanent aid: the story of one of the last light stations built on the Great Lakes.
Maritime commerce on the Great Lakes
The Great Lakes provided an efficient means for widespread water transportation throughout the upper Midwest. River mouths and natural harbors attracted settlements whose prosperity depended on reliable shipping for transporting goods and passengers.
Settlement of the Great Lakes region increased substantially during the early nineteenth century. The opening of the Erie Canal in 1825 connected the Great Lakes with the eastern seaboard, followed by the Welland Canal in 1829, the Ohio and Erie Canal in 1832, and the Illinois and Michigan Canal in 1848. These waterways contributed enormously to the expansion of shipping traffic.
The population of the former Northwest Territory grew from about 800,000 in 1820 to more than nine million by 1860. In 1855, roughly four million tons of products worth $600 million moved through the Great Lakes, slightly more than the total value of all United States foreign trade at the time.
Maritime traffic continued to grow through the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. By 1910, the Great Lakes fleet represented more than one-third of America's entire merchant shipping tonnage. By the late 1960s and early 1970s, annual cargo had reached more than 200 million tons.
Lighting the Great Lakes
The region's immense maritime traffic made aids to navigation a matter of survival. Seven lighthouses were built on the Great Lakes between 1818 and 1822. The first two on Lake Michigan, at Chicago Harbor and the St. Joseph River entrance, were completed in 1832.
By the beginning of the twentieth century, the Great Lakes had 334 major lighted aids, 67 fog signals, and 563 buoys. Lighthouse engineers practiced and perfected the construction of light stations on isolated islands, reefs, and shoals from 1870 to 1910, most commonly on submarine crib foundations.
Lightships also served as substitutes for building expensive offshore lighthouses. However, harsh Great Lakes weather forced lightships to leave their stations before the end of the shipping season in mid-December, and ice often prevented them from returning until after the rush of spring shipping had already begun, leaving dangerous areas unmarked for weeks at a time.
Lansing Shoals timeline
Early aids to navigation
Lightship LV55 was one of three identical lightvessels authorized in a $60,000 congressional appropriation on 2 March 1889 and built by the Blythe Craig Shipbuilding Company of Toledo, Ohio. She began service at Simmons Reef on 24 October 1891. The three 103-foot, oak-planked vessels (LV55, LV56, and LV57) were each equipped with a single-cylinder steam engine, giving them enough power to get on and off station without a lighthouse tender. They departed the Detroit Lighthouse Depot under their own steam on October 19 and were met at Port Huron that evening by the tender Dahlia, which towed them north through Lake Huron and placed all three on their stations five days later. The following year, a lighthouse was established on nearby Squaw Island to guide mariners along the northern shore of Lake Michigan.
LV55 relocated to Lansing Shoals
Increasing iron ore shipments from Escanaba put pressure on the Lighthouse Board to improve navigational aids in the area. After the preferred shipping route shifted south of White Shoal, reducing the threat posed by Simmons Reef, the Board decided to replace LV55 with an acetylene gas buoy and reassign the lightship to Lansing Shoals. Because the Simmons Reef lightship had been established by an Act of Congress, a second Act was required to authorize the move. Congress approved the relocation by joint resolution on 3 May 1900, and after the Simmons Reef Gas Buoy was established on 19 July 1900, LV55 was anchored on Lansing Shoals. Mariners were instructed to pass south of the lightship to remain safely in the channel between the Straits of Mackinac and western Lake Michigan.
First request for a permanent station
The Lighthouse Board requested a $250,000 congressional appropriation to build a permanent light station on Lansing Shoals. By 1919, the Bureau of Lighthouses justified the cost by noting that approximately 5,000 vessels passed the lightship each season, and that a permanent structure would replace not only the lightship and its crew but also the fog signal on Squaw Island with its three keepers. The Bureau described Lansing Shoals as the "most important point on the northerly passage to and from the Straits of Mackinac." Congress did not act.
Soo Locks expansion
Since the first 350-foot lock at Sault Ste. Marie opened in 1855, lock size had been the limiting factor for vessel length on the Great Lakes. The twin 850-foot Davis and Sabin Locks, completed in 1918–1919, allowed vessels to grow to previously unimagined dimensions. Their increased size and weight meant they could break through thicker ice, extending both ends of the navigation season. But LV55's diminutive size forced her to leave station before the ice thickened and wait for near-complete ice-out in spring, leaving mariners to pass Lansing Shoals without a light during some of the most hazardous weeks of the year.
LV55 retired, LV98 takes over
During winter in the port of Cheboygan, Michigan, LV55's hull was discovered to have rotted beyond repair and was deemed unseaworthy. Its replacement was LV98, a 101-foot steel, whaleback-style lightship drawing an impressive 23 feet 6 inches, built by the Racine-Truscott-Shell Lake Boat Company of Muskegon, Michigan in 1914. LV98 had initially been assigned to Buffalo Harbor on 12 June 1915 before transferring to Lake Michigan relief service in 1918. Permanently reassigned to Lansing Shoals, she took up her new anchorage on 29 September 1920. Like her predecessor, she was still forced to abandon her duty station each winter.
Congressional approval
Eighteen years after the initial request, Congress finally appropriated $90,000 to begin work, far less than the $250,000 originally sought. A wharf and storage warehouse were built at Cozy Point on the north shore of Lake Michigan, near Scott Point, to stage the construction effort.
Construction begins
Four reinforced concrete caissons, each weighing 500 tons, were fabricated at the U.S. Engineer caisson plant in Milwaukee, using the same forms that produced the Milwaukee Breakwater Light caissons. The tenders Sumac and Hyacinth each took two caissons under tow and covered the 250 miles to the site at three miles per hour. Plank covers bolted to the open tops kept water out during transit, floating six feet above the lake. The caissons were sunk on 24 July 1927 in about 25 feet of water, positioned at right angles to form a 74-foot square. The self-unloading steamer T.W. Robinson delivered stone to fill the hollow foundation. The concrete cap slab was poured in October and November, and work was suspended on 3 December after a temporary light and fog signal were established on the incomplete structure.
Light station completed and first lit
Work resumed on 19 April 1928. The T.L. Durlocher Company of Detour, Michigan, built the foundation and concrete superstructure: a structural steel framework sheathed with reinforced concrete rather than the originally planned steel plating. A third order lantern by Wisconsin Ornamental and Bronze Company was installed atop the three-story tower. The light was first illuminated on 6 October 1928, and lightship LV98 was released from duty and reassigned to Twelfth District relief service. During the previous summer, the lightship had been struck twice by passing steamers in thick weather, and another vessel, the Sonora, had passed between the lightship and the new crib being built just 400 feet away. Interior finish work and the installation of the 200-watt radiobeacon were completed the following spring, bringing the total construction cost to $261,765 as of July 1929. A small gasoline-engine-powered generator served as backup to the main diesel units.
December ice storm
During a storm in early December, spray from the storm-tossed lake froze on the lighthouse, forming a coating of ice several inches thick that blocked all exits. The crew was sealed inside for three days but was well stocked with supplies. The men were typically taken off the lighthouse in mid-December, with an automated winter light displayed until their return in spring.
Distance finding station
Lansing Shoals Light Station began serving as a distance finding station, with its fog signal synchronized with its radio beacon. The radio signal had a reliable average range of 100 miles.
Coast Guard takes over
The Lighthouse Service was abolished as a separate federal agency and its duties were assumed by the U.S. Coast Guard. Civilian keepers were eventually replaced by Coast Guard uniformed personnel.
Armistice Day storm
On 11 November 1940, one of the worst storms in Great Lakes history struck Lake Michigan, claiming five vessels and the lives of sixty-six sailors. Winds exceeded 100 miles per hour. At the light station, portholes were blown out and the resulting flood of water knocked all machinery out of commission. The four keepers on duty, Guy L. Gordon, William A. Keller, Henry Richileau, and Paul Johnecheck, endured 27 hours without heat before managing to restart a stove. Seven inches of ice accumulated on the structure. A lighthouse tender arrived to assist on November 14.
April storm and rescue
On the night of April 19, powerful waves crashed over the seventy-five-foot-tall lighthouse, smashing out portholes on the east side and flooding the engine room and crew sleeping quarters. The five-man crew was left with only a gas stove for heat and an emergency radio. The cutter Sundew, recently returned from ice-breaking duties, recalled its crew in the middle of the night and set out for the crippled lighthouse. After standing by for about eight hours until seas subsided, the crew was successfully removed on the afternoon of April 20. An inspection found no structural damage to the lighthouse or its underwater crib.
Automation
In summer 1976, the Coast Guard cutter Buckthorn arrived at Lansing Shoals to automate the station. After removing anything of value and securing the structure, the final crew was carried back to Station Charlevoix. All windows were subsequently sealed with brick and mortar, and the walls were sprayed with a coat of gunite to reduce maintenance costs and help prevent vandalism.
Fresnel lens removed
The original third order Fresnel lens, which had remained in service after automation, was dismantled and replaced with a solar-powered 190-millimeter acrylic optic. The lens that had warned mariners off Lansing Shoals for fifty-eight years went on exhibit at the Michigan Historical Museum in Lansing, a city that shares the shoal's name.
Freighter collision
Early on the morning of September 9, the 1,000-foot iron ore carrier Indiana Harbor plowed into the light station at full speed in clear conditions. The collision ripped a fifty-square-foot hole in the vessel, requiring more than $1.9 million in repairs. Damage to the lighthouse was assessed at just over $100,000. The accident was blamed on the inattentiveness of those on duty in the freighter's pilothouse, and the Coast Guard revoked the mate's license.
National Register listing
The Lansing Shoals Light Station was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 6, 2005, under reference number 05000979, as part of the "Light Stations of the United States" Multiple Property Listing.
Declared excess
In May 2014, the Coast Guard deemed the lighthouse excess property. It was made available under the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act to eligible entities (federal, state, and local agencies, nonprofits, educational agencies, and community development organizations) for education, park, recreation, cultural, or historic preservation purposes.
Auction
When no custodian was found through the NHLPA process, the General Services Administration opened an online auction on July 25, 2017. It closed on November 9, 2017, and Lansing Shoals Light Station, Inc. was the successful bidder. The quitclaim deed was executed on May 24, 2018, conveying the building only. No land and no submerged land changed hands, and the Coast Guard retained the light.
References
The historical information on this page is drawn from the following sources. Acquisition dates come from the foundation's own records: GSA Invitation for Bids CHICA117006001 and the quitclaim deed of 24 May 2018.
National Register of Historic Places Nomination Form, Lansing Shoals Light Station (NPS Form 10-900-a), prepared by Karmen Bisher and edited by Jennifer Perunko and Daniel Koski-Karell, Maritime Heritage Program, National Park Service, 3 May 2005. NRHP Reference No. 05000979.
Annual Reports of the Lighthouse Board, the Commissioner of Lighthouses, and the Lake Carriers' Association, various years.
"Lansing Shoal Lighthouse," LighthouseFriends.com. Additional historical details on the lightships, construction, and automation of the station.
"Lansing Shoals Light Station," Wikipedia.