Aerial view of Destruction Island Lighthouse Photograph courtesy U.S. Coast Guard

In 1775, while at anchor under the lee of the island, the Spanish explorer Juan Francisco de la Bodega y Quadra, commander of the schooner Sonora, sent seven men ashore for wood and water. Upon landing, the entire party was killed by Indians, prompting Bodega y Quadra to name the island "Isla de Dolores," Isle of Sorrow. The British ship Imperial Eagle visited the island in 1787 and dispatched a long boat to explore the nearby coast. During the exploration, the crew rowed some distance up a river where they too were massacred by hostile Indians. Charles W. Barkley, captain of the Imperial Eagle, named the river Destruction. The name was eventually transferred to the nearby island, and the river was called by its Indian name Hoh.

Construction on the Destruction Island Lighthouse began in 1888. The island was proposed as a site for a lighthouse years earlier, but a shortage of funds and shifting priorities delayed the project.

The 30-acre, tabletop island rises roughly eighty feet above the surrounding water and is bordered by steep bluffs. Lighthouse tenders transported the building materials to the island, where they were lightered into the narrow landing cove and either lifted to the top of the plateau using a derrick or hauled up manually.

Lens from Destruction Island Lighthouse

The stations' two dwellings, cistern, and barn were the first structures completed. The first principal keeper, Christian Zauner, arrived in 1889 when the tower and fog signal were still under construction. After the 94-foot conical tower was complete, it was wrapped in a skin of iron to protect it from the elements. A first-order Fresnel lens containing twenty-four bull's-eyes and 1,176 prisms was assembled in the lantern room. The fog signal made its debut in November of 1891 and eight weeks later on New Year's Eve, the five concentric wicks of the lamp were set afire for the first time.

Four keepers were typically assigned to the station. The small community held its own school for the younger children, and raised chickens, cows, and vegetables to supplement the lighthouse rations delivered to the island.

The Coast Guard assumed responsibility for the lighthouse in 1939. Those assigned to the station served for a period of eighteen months, alternating six weeks on the island with a two and a half week shore leave. The Coast Guard took steps towards abandoning the station in 1963, but protests from mariners stopped the closure. The lighthouse would see five more years of on-site keepers, before being automated in 1968.

The Fresnel lens continued its countless revolutions until it was removed in 1995 and replaced with an automated beacon. The two keepers' dwellings are no longer standing. The only remaining companions to the lighthouse are two oil houses and the fog signal building, which has been remodeled to serve as temporary housing for maintenance crews.

The Fresnel lens is now on display at the Westport Maritime Museum, where it is considered the finest first-order lens display in the world. The claim just might be true. A 70-foot Lens Building, constructed in 1998, houses the lens, and a ramp partially encircles the lens permitting views at various levels. A skylight above the lens lets natural sunlight dance on the prisms, while the lens slowly rotates, casting its twenty-four spotlights around the room. A backup lens that was formerly mounted atop the Destruction Island Lighthouse is also on display.

In April of 2008, the Coast Guard, citing that the beacon was no longer being used for navigation, switched off Destruction Island Lighthouse for good. Now with no need for upkeep, the remote lighthouse will surely soon start showing signs of neglect.

References

1. Umbrella Guide to Washington Lighthouses, Sharlene and Ted Nelson, 1990.
2. Lighthouses of the Pacific, Jim Gibbs, 1986.