Middle Island Lighthouse, Alpena Michigan

Date added: November 29, 2024

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Michigan
Lighthouse

Light tower and light station keepers' dwelling (2004)

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Middle Island Lighthouse resulted from the efforts of the federal government to provide an integrated system of navigational aids throughout the United States and to provide for safe maritime transport in Lake Huron and throughout the Great Lakes. The construction of a permanent lighthouse on Middle Island was the final stage of a system of lights along the northeastern shore of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. It provided a light signal for the hazardous area between Presque Isle to the north and Thunder Bay Island to the south. The lighthouse on Middle Island remains in its original location. Its basic architectural design is unaltered from when it was built, although the daymark has been altered through time. The lighthouse has been separated from the light station buildings through changes in ownership. Those other buildings are no longer within Coast Guard-owned property. This structure continues to stand as a prominent landmark and beacon with the open waters of Lake Huron on one side and the forested land of Middle Island on the other.

The Great Lakes have served as a transportation route for waterborne commerce since prehistoric times. The size of vessels and volume of cargo transported remained small from then through the region's colonial period. In the aftermath of the American Revolution, the region's southern lands were incorporated into the United States during the late eighteenth century as the Northwest Territory. American settlement expansion into the region was limited until the decades following the end of the War of 1812. Following 1820, however, the number of settlers began to swell as transportation from the Atlantic coastal region became better established. This increased substantially in the decades following the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825. The remainder of the nineteenth century was characterized by tremendous development in the Great Lakes region's agricultural, mining, and manufacturing industries. During the first half of the nineteenth century, the vast open waters of the interconnected lakes became the principal means for moving commercial goods and passengers across long distances. The region's maritime transportation system grew through this process, soon becoming an essential component of the region's economy. Threats to its safe functioning, such as dangers from shipwrecks and collisions, were issues of great importance that required a comprehensive and sustained response.

The Federal government became directly involved in the development of maritime commerce in the Great Lakes during the early nineteenth century. As the region's population, settlement, and economy expanded, the volume of shipping increased in tandem. Three of the several Federal programs developed to promote this were construction and maintenance of harbor and shipping channel improvements, establishing and expanding a system of navigational aids, and instituting stations with personnel and equipment for saving lives from vessels in peril. All three of these were manifested in the Alpena County area, and the last two in particular relate directly to Middle Island.

The United States Life-Saving Service (USLSS) was established in 1878 to improve and expand Federally funded facilities for rescuing persons from vessels in distress. A loosely organized coastal lifesaving system with stations equipped at government expense had existed in the United States since the 1840s. The establishment of the USLSS realigned and upgraded this program, and expanded it across the nation. The need for improving lifesaving services in the Great Lakes was recognized and several new stations were soon established throughout the region. This included the construction of a USLSS station on Middle Island's western shore in 1881.

Middle Island is located in the Thunder Bay area of northeastern Lake Huron. A substantial number of shipwrecks and other maritime accidents occurred in this vicinity during the nineteenth century. Federal efforts to improve maritime safety in this part of Lake Huron during the second half of the nineteenth century included establishing lighthouses at Presque Isle, north of Middle Island, and Thunder Bay Island, to the south. By the late nineteenth century it had become apparent that the area around Middle Island remained dangerous to vessels. It was decided that a lighthouse should be built there. It was to be one of the final links in a chain of coast lights along Lake Huron's western shore.

In 1896 the U.S. Lighthouse Board's annual report included a request to Congress for $25,000 to establish a light station on Middle Island. No funds were forthcoming, and the request was repeated in each of the subsequent six years. An appropriation was finally authorized in March 1902, and work began on identifying an appropriate site and designing its facilities.

A location for the light station on Middle Island was selected. The island was privately owned at the time, so the land for building the light station had to be purchased. This was a parcel amounting to about 10.2 acres. It was bought from Elizabeth Moss Mills Anketell in 1903.

The site was surveyed, and the construction contract for the tower, keepers' dwelling, and fog signal was awarded in early 1904. The lighthouse tender Amaranth delivered a work party and materials to the island in June 1904. Construction work in 1904 continued until winter weather forced it to shut down. The Amaranth brought the workers back in 1905. The dwelling was completed in April 1905. The fog signal building and tower were completed in May and the light first exhibited in June 1905. The cost of building the light tower had come to $2,602.

Middle Island Lighthouse is a brick masonry tower erected atop a concrete foundation about 100 feet inland from the island's northeast shore. It embodies the distinctive characteristics and methods of construction employed for onshore lighthouses in the Great Lakes during the late nineteenth century and early to mid-twentieth century. The Middle Island Light Station was manned by U.S. Lighthouse Service personnel until 1939, when that agency became part of the U.S. Coast Guard. It continued to be operated as a manned installation by the U.S. Coast Guard until 1961 when the light was automated. The third-order Fresnel lens that was in the light tower in 1961 was subsequently vandalized. It was replaced with a modern optic manufactured by Amerace Corporation, Signal Products Division, of Niles, Illinois. This was replaced in 1997 with the existing VRB-25 marine beacon. The Amerace Corporation optic is presently on display at the Great Lakes Lighthouse Festivals Museum, 7406 U.S. 23 North, Alpena, MI. The existing VRB-25 optic is powered by batteries recharged with a solar array mounted on a framework about 10 feet south of the lighthouse's equipment building.

The original equipment installed in the fog signal building was a steam-powered fog whistle powered by a coal-fired boiler. This was upgraded by 1928 to a compressed-air diaphone fog signal powered by electricity. The fog signal was discontinued and no longer operates.

Its distinctive white tower with a band of orange around its middle one-third has been the lighthouse's daymark for over 100 years.

Site Description

Middle Island Light is a brick tower lighthouse with an integral equipment building attached to its base. It was built from 1903 to 1905 and formally established in June 1905. The lighthouse stands near the eastern shoreline of Middle Island, located in northwest Lake Huron about 2 miles east of Rockport in Alpena County. This 76-foot tall light tower rises from a concrete foundation 18 feet in diameter. The tower's wall is 5 feet thick at the base. A one-room, one-story equipment building is attached to the light tower by a hyphen. The tower is painted white with an orange band around its middle one-third. The watch room gallery, lantern gallery, and lantern metalwork are painted black. This lighthouse is an automated U.S. Coast Guard aid to navigation. It marks Middle Island and the hazardous area of rocky reef and shallows that surround it. This vicinity has been an important Great Lakes shipping route since the nineteenth century. The property owned by the U.S. Coast Guard consists of a parcel of about 2.8 acres, containing the light tower and integral equipment building. The remainder of Middle Island is privately owned, including most of the property and buildings originally associated with the former Middle Island Light Station.

This lighthouse structure includes a light tower with an integral equipment building connected by a hyphen enclosing a passageway. The property owned by the U.S. Coast Guard is a 2.8-acre parcel on Middle Island's eastern side where the lighthouse is situated. The light tower is about 70 feet inland from the Lake Huron high water mark.

Middle Island is about 263 acres in area. Except for the lighthouse parcel, the island is privately owned. It is accessible by boat from the small harbor of Rockport, which is located on the mainland about two miles west. Permission is required from the island's owner to use the boat landing on Middle Island's western shore, and to traverse the island to the lighthouse. The light tower is about one-half mile from the boat landing. It sits at the southern end of a group of buildings associated with the former Middle Island Light Station. Except for the lighthouse, these buildings and their property are also privately owned, and visiting requires the owner's permission. The former light station buildings are the focus of rehabilitation work undertaken by the island's owner and the Middle Island Lighthouse Keepers Association (MILKA).

There are several buildings nearby to the northwest associated with the former Middle Island Light Station. These include, from northwest to southeast, a fog signal building, keepers' dwelling and two privies, and an oil house. A concrete sidewalk extends southeast from the fog signal building, past the dwelling, and ends at the entrance of the lighthouse's integral equipment building. This sidewalk is oriented northwest-southeast, parallel with the island's shoreline at this location.

The existing lighthouse property contains a single structure, a conical light tower with integral equipment building. This structure is built of brick with a stuccoed exterior painted white. It sits on a concrete foundation that rises about 3 feet from the surrounding terrain and forms a water table about 5 inches wide around the structure's perimeter. The structure's long axis is oriented northeast-southwest, perpendicular to the island's shoreline. The tower is nearest the lakeshore.

The structure's attached rectangular equipment building measures 15 feet by 13.5 feet and is one story tall. The concrete walkway leading to the lighthouse ends at a flight of 6 concrete steps rising 3 feet to the equipment building doorway. This entrance is on the building's northwestern facade and holds a modern metal door. The equipment building's roof is hipped, with a small, front-gabled projection surmounting the doorway. The roof and projection are covered by red asphalt shingles. The eaves are painted black. There is one window opening on the building's southwest facade and two on its southeast facade. These are rectangular and have sills, but are otherwise plain. The window sills are 2 feet 9 inches above the water table. All three are closed off with metal covers painted white.

The equipment building is connected to the base of the light tower by a short hyphen that encloses a passageway between the two. The hyphen's exterior wall is 4 feet 9 inches long. It is the same height and construction as the equipment building and has a gabled roof with red asphalt singles. The exterior walls are stuccoed and painted white. A single window pierces the hyphen's northern side. Its characteristics are the same as the equipment building's windows. This window is also closed off with a metal plate painted white.

The conical light tower at the northeastern end of the hyphen is built of brick and stands 76 feet tall to the ventilation ball atop the lantern roof. Its base is 18 feet in diameter. The thickness of the tower's surrounding wall is 5 feet at the base and narrows towards the top. The tower's exterior is stuccoed except for its fifth story near the top. There, a band of brickwork painted white surrounds the fifth story where the upper landing of the interior spiral stairway is located. This brickwork band has four windows and is bounded top and bottom by masonry belt courses. The watch room above this is also not stuccoed. The tower's exterior is pierced with multiple drain pipes where its base meets the water table, around its upper level, and at various places in between.

The tower is painted white except for the middle one-third which is painted orange. The watch room atop the tower is surrounded by a gallery with a black-painted floor and handrail. The metalwork of the lantern atop the watch room is also painted black. This includes its mullions, metal roof, and the lantern room gallery and railing.

The tower has seven rectangular window openings. These are 5 feet tall by 2 feet 8 inches wide, with a projecting sill. The single window opening in the tower's first story is closed off with brickwork. The windows above this have had their original framing and sashes removed and now contain translucent glass blocks arranged in rows, 3 across and 4 high. Two windows are arranged in a staggered position at the tower's second and fourth stories. The fifth story has four rectangular windows spaced evenly around its perimeter.

The tower is 12 feet 8 inches in diameter at the top. It is capped with a circular metal platform that forms the watch room floor and gallery. The watch room gallery and its encircling guardrail are painted black. The lantern atop the watch room is also surrounded by a circular metal gallery with a railing, both painted black.

The lantern has ten sides, metal mullions, and a domed metal roof. Nine of the lantern's sides are glazed with Plexiglas and Lexan. The tenth is a metal door that provides access to the lantern gallery. A modern steel pipe support is affixed to the lantern gallery's western side. It appears to have supported an emergency signal light which is no longer present.

Outside the lighthouse, a modern solar array is mounted on a free-standing steel pipe framework on the ground about 10 feet from the equipment building's southeast side. It is used to charge the batteries that operate the lighthouse optic. The solar array is 12 feet 6 inches tall by 2 feet 6 inches wide by 16 feet long. Electrical cables run from it into the equipment building through an opening in one of the covered windows.

The equipment building's interior is a single room that measures 12 feet long by 10 feet 2 inches wide. The room's walls are plastered and painted white. The paint has peeled substantially. A 7-inch high wooden baseboard painted gray is affixed to the walls just above the concrete floor. This baseboard is missing from the room's northern wall. The concrete floor is at its original level in the eastern part of the room but has subsided four inches in the southwestern part. There are three window openings. These are 3 feet tall by 1 foot 7 inches wide inside the frame, and positioned 3 feet above the floor. Each is wood-framed, painted gray, and holds one-over-one, double-hung sashes. These appear to be original to the building. Some sashes still hold their glass light. These lights are 1 foot 4 inches square. The room is vacant except for two electrical panels attached to the walls and a free-standing shelving unit of recent vintage made of 2x4 lumber. The ceiling has been removed, leaving the roof rafters visible. When it had been present, the ceiling height was 7 feet 10 inches. The opening to the passageway leading to the tower is in the room's northeastern wall. This doorway is 3 feet wide by 7 feet tall and framed by a metal segmentally arched surround with metal pintles for door hinges. The door is missing.

The passageway's interior walls and ceiling are painted white. The passage is 5 feet wide by 10 feet long and composed of two segments. The first segment is 5 feet long and has a flat, plastered ceiling with a deteriorated section where wood lathe is exposed. The ceiling is 7 feet 9 inches above the concrete floor. There is one window opening to the left on the northwest wall. It is identical to those in the equipment building. Wood-framed and painted gray, it still holds its original one-over-one double-hung sashes. This window opening is sealed on the outside with a metal plate. A bank of batteries sits on the passageway floor to the right against the southeast wall. An electrical panel attached to the wall above the batteries is connected to electrical wiring and conduit extending both to the equipment building and the light tower. The passageway's second segment is a vaulted opening in the light tower wall. It is three feet wide by 7 feet 6 inches tall and leads to the tower's first story.

The light tower's cross-section consists of its brick exterior wall and an interior lining, also made of brick. There are six air shafts between its exterior and interior walls. These extend from the top to the bottom of the tower and provide drainage and ventilation. One was designated as a weight shaft for the lighthouse's original optic mechanism. A rectangular opening in the first story's interior wall near the floor provides access to this shaft, allowing a view upward towards the top of the tower. The window openings inside the tower are in the form of alcoves with segmentally arched tops. Each window exterior in the tower's outer wall has a sill.

The space within the tower's interior wall is 8 feet in diameter. The brickwork lining is stuccoed and painted white. A cast iron spiral stairway occupies the tower's interior space. It is supported by a central column that holds the inside flange of each individual step. The outer flange of each step is bolted to the outer flange of the step below. This stairway lacks risers. The tread of each step is a grating with curvilinear decorative pattern pierced with multiple openings. A metal pipe handrail accompanies the stairway upward. It is attached to the interior wall 3 feet above the stairway.

There are 18 steps from the tower's first story to the second story landing, where there is a window opening. Another 24 steps lead to the third story landing where there is another window. These window openings are filled with translucent glass blocks arranged 3 across by 4 high. An additional flight of 24 steps leads to the fourth-story landing.

Each of the tower's three landings has a floor made of four or five cast iron plates. Each plate is a pie-slice shape that is one-eighth of a circle and made of grating with the same design as the stair treads. The second-story landing's four-plate floor spans one-half of the tower's interior at that level. The third-story and fourth-story landings each have a five-plate floor spanning five-eighths of the tower interior.

The fourth story is lighted with four windows spaced evenly around the perimeter. These are filled with translucent glass block lights. Near the ceiling on the southeastern side of the surrounding wall, there is a 14-inch wide by 2-foot tall rectangular opening to one of the tower's air shafts. Electrical conduit for the lighthouse's optic emerges from this opening and continues upward to the lantern.

The spiral stairway's final flight of 16 steps leads from the fourth-story landing to a trapdoor opening in the ceiling capping the tower. This ceiling is a metal platform supporting the watch room. The opening providing access to the watch room is 3 feet, 3 inches long by 2 feet, 1 inch wide. The trapdoor is metal.

The watch room has an interior diameter of 8 feet. Its ceiling is 6 feet, 7 inches above the cast iron floor. The wall surrounding it is 1 foot, 6 inches thick. A metal ladder with 8 steps stands next to the wall and leads up to the lantern. The surrounding wall is pierced with five round ventilation ports that are 8 inches in diameter. These openings are covered with screening and open to the air space between the tower's inner and outer walls. The vent openings are 3 feet, 9 inches above the floor, and spaced 4 feet 6 inches apart. A doorway with a metal surround on the watch room's northwestern side holds a single-leaf metal door that is 5 feet, 6 inches tall by 1 foot 10 inches wide. It provides access to the watch room's outside gallery.

A pedestal is affixed to the center of the watch room floor. It supports a circular metal platform 3 feet 6 inches wide. The platform's top is 5 feet, 11 inches above floor level, and 10 inches below the level of the lantern room floor above. The watch room's ceiling is open to the lantern room above this platform. The platform supports a metal pedestal that is bolted to its top surface. This upper pedestal is 2 feet, 3 inches high and has a circular base 1 foot, 5 inches in diameter. The upper pedestal extends up into the lantern and supports the lighthouse's optic, which is presently a modern VRB-25 marine beacon. The focal plane of this optic is 78 feet above lake level.

The lantern's interior floor is made of cast iron and open in the center. The center opening is 4 feet, 3 inches wide, and partly filled by the platform supporting the optic's pedestal. The floor surrounding the center opening is 22 inches wide. It extends almost completely around the lantern's interior periphery except for a section open to the watch room below where the step ladder is attached.

The 10-sided lantern has an inside diameter of 8 feet. Each of its 10 side panels is 6 feet, 3 inches high by 2 feet, 6 inches wide. Nine of the sides are glazed with Plexiglas and Lexan. The panel on the lantern's southwestern (inland) side holds a metal door providing access to the lantern gallery. The gallery encircling the lantern's exterior is 21 inches wide, made of cast iron, and has an 18-inch high railing. The roof is dome-shaped and braced on the interior with metal rods.

Middle Island Light was built from 1903 to 1905. It was originally part of the Middle Island Light Station that operated from 1905 to 1961. The overall light station property amounted to about 10.5 acres. It included the lighthouse, keepers' dwelling, fog signal building, oil house, two privies, and a wood shed. In 1961 the light was automated and the light station was deactivated. In 1972, 7.7 acres of the light station parcel including the buildings, except for the lighthouse, were released by the U.S. Coast Guard to the General Services Administration (GSA) as excess property. This 7.7-acre parcel was eventually sold by GSA to a private owner. The property retained by the U.S. Coast Guard amounts to about 2.8 acres and contains the light tower and its integral equipment building. The buildings of the former light station are presently being cared for by the Middle Island Lighthouse Keepers Association (MILKA) of Alpena, Michigan. The fog signal building is now operated as rented lodging. The keepers' dwelling and other buildings have been or will undergo rehabilitation, also.

In 1905, the lighthouse looked the same as today except for its coloration. At that time, the tower's daymark was unpainted with a buff to beige-colored brick exterior. In the 1930's the decision was made to paint the tower white with a black band around its middle one-third. By the 1970's the middle band's color had been changed to orange. From then to the present, the light's daymark has remained white with an orange band around its middle one-third, and a black-colored lantern.

Other changes relate to the equipment installed in the lighthouse. Its optic was originally a fixed red fourth-order Fresnel lens lighted by a 3,700 candlepower lamp and visible for 17 miles. This was upgraded by 1928 to a green third-order Fresnel lens with an isophase characteristic of alternating 5-second periods of light and dark. The lighthouse was automated in 1961. Its third order Fresnel was later vandalized. At least one panel of the third-order lens was removed and taken away. This panel was eventually returned by the person who took it and appears now to be in the custody of the Middle Island Lighthouse Keepers Association. The whereabouts of the other sections of this third-order lens and the original fourth-order lens are unclear. The vandalized third-order Fresnel lens was replaced with a modern optic manufactured by Amerace Corporation, Signal Products Division. This was changed in 1997 when the existing VRB-25 marine beacon optic was installed. The existing signal light's characteristic is a white flash every 10 seconds. It is visible 17 miles in clear weather. The existing optic is battery-powered. Its batteries are recharged using the solar array mounted outside the southeast wall of the equipment building.

The equipment building formerly contained furnishings and equipment for operating the original lighthouse optic. Fuel for its lamp was stored nearby in the oil house. The original optic's oil lamp was replaced with an electric lamp by the 1920s.