A lighthouse keeper’s life was pretty interesting. Did you know they used to have to crank the turntable for the light once every four hours to keep them running? I didn't. The docent said they slept through the days, and were up all night in order to keep them operational. They had pictures, and information about the local wrecks, even had a fog horn. It was fascinating how tiny the light bulbs actually are but because of the way the lenses are made they can throw out light miles away. Anyway, it was...enlightening.
Point Pinos is the oldest continuously operating lighthouse on the West Coast. Since February 1, 1855, its beacon has flashed nightly as a guide and warning to shipping off the rocky California coast. Alcatraz Island Lighthouse preceded Point Pinos by 8 months, but was replaced in 1909 by the expanding military prison.The light is a third order Fresnel with lenses, prisms and mechanism manufactured in France in 1853. A larger, second order light had been planned, but delay in shipment caused the present light, originally destined for the Fort Point Lighthouse in San Francisco, to be installed instead. The first light source was a whale oil lantern in which the oil was forced up from a tank by a gravity-operated piston. A falling weight mechanism rotated a metal shutter around the light causing the beam to be cut off to seaward for 10 out of every 30 seconds. Lard oil soon replaced whale oil, and in turn was replaced by kerosene in 1880. At the turn of the century, an incandescent vapor lamp was used, followed by electric lights in 1915.
The pictures above are of the parlor on the main floor of the lighthouse.
This room is, of course, the kitchen complete with a wood burning stove. This room is in the front of the house and faces the seacoast. What a beautiful view! There is an entrance to the basement off to the left and I assume that it was used for storing food and other items essential to life at the lighthouse. However, now it is a museum of sorts with the actual old lenses, a fog horn and photographs of shipwrecks that occured along the coast in days past.
This is one of the bedrooms on the second level of the house, and the pictures below are of the other bedroom which is now set up to demonstrate what it may have looked like if it was used as a radio room.
Point Pinos was named by the Spanish explorer Sebastian Vizcaino in 1602 during an exploration of the California coastline for the Count of Monterrey, the acting Viceroy of New Spain (Mexico). The name Punta de los Pinos translated to "Point of the Pines", an appropriate designation for the thickly wooded northern tip of the Monterey Peninsula where the pines grew almost to the water's edge. The Franciscan missionaries explored the point from their camp near the Carmel River in 1769.The diaries of Father Crespi mention a freshwater pond located on the point which is now considered to be Crespi Pond, situated on the edge of the golf course just past the lighthouse. The point was originally part of a large parcel of 2,667 acres granted to Jose Maria Armenta in 1833 by the Mexican government, and regranted to Jose Abrego in 1844. In 1850, after the Mexican War and the American acquisition of Alta California, Congress appropriated funds for the construction of lighthouses on the West Coast. In 1852, the Secretary of the Treasury ordered the building of seven beacons along the California coast, one of which was to be located at Point Pinos, the dangerous southern entrance to the Monterey Bay. The government purchased 25 acres of the Rancho Punta de los Pinos for this purpose, with an additional 67 acres being purchased later on. Construction began in 1853, but difficulties with the delivery of the lenses and prisms from France delayed the opening of the lighthouse until 1855.
To get a full history of the lighthouse and it keepers check out their website at http://www.pgmuseum.org/Lighthouse.htm. The information that I have provided on my blog came from this website.
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