Congress authorized funds for the construction of the Mispillion River Lighthouse on March 3, 1831, to help guide vessels to the inland port of Milford, where over the years more than 400 ships were built and christened. Prolific lighthouse builder Winslow Lewis signed a contract on August 26th of that year to build the lighthouse on land purchased from Governor Charles Polk and his wife Mary Elizabeth for the token sum of $5. Completed by October 19, 1831, the lighthouse consisted of a lantern, with six lamps set in spherical reflectors, which was shown from the top of the keeper’s dwelling.

During an inspection of the station in 1838, William D. Porter reported that the lighthouse, like so many of those constructed by Lewis, was “badly built and nearly in ruins.” Porter suggested that the “miserable building at this place may be pulled down, and one erected in its place that will answer the purpose, and at the same time be a good and substantial building.” As entering the Mispillion River at low tide could be problematic, Porter also proposed that “the tower be so constructed as to show at low tides two lights, and that at high tides the lower light may be extinguished or shut in; but this means vessels will know exactly at what time they may venture over the bar at night. I also recommend a day tide mark, that vessels may know the height of the tides at all hours of the day.”

Mispillion Lighthouse Photograph courtesy Milford Museum

A new lighthouse was subsequently built in the same configuration as the previous one, a keeper’s dwelling being surmounted by a lantern room. In 1855, a fifth-order Fresnel lens, shining through an arc of 180°, was installed in the lantern room. The Lighthouse Board recorded in its Annual Report for 1857, that the Mispillion River Lighthouse was “located at the mouth of Mispillion creek, which has at its entrance a depth of only one foot water at low tides. Only a few small flat bottomed vessels run in and out of this creek. For the general navigation of the bay this light is useless, and its discontinuance is respectfully recommended.” In 1859, the lighthouse was sold for $135 and relocated to Walnut Street in Milford.

Apparently the navigability of the Mispillion River changed over time, for the Lighthouse Board in its Annual Report for 1872 requested an appropriation of “$5,000 for re-establishing a small light-house” near the river entrance. By the following summer, the lighthouse was completed, and the light from the tower’s sixth-order Fresnel lens was exhibited for the first time on June 15, 1873. Just a year later, an additional $5,000 was allocated for the construction of a brick cistern and the addition of four rooms to the dwelling. In its final form, the lighthouse now consisted of a two-story, L-shaped dwelling with a square tower positioned in the intersection of the wings. The tower contained the structure’s staircase and rose an additional story to display the light from a height of forty-eight feet above the bay.

Even though the lighthouse was located on a bay, the beachfront property was subject to erosion during high tides and winter storms. The first record of the station needing a seawall or dike was noted in the 1877 Annual Report of the Light-house Board, but as the following annual report excerpts show, erosion was to be a recurring problem.

1877	This station has been surrounded by a well-constructed earth-bank, four feet high, to keep out the water at high tide, and the sea-side of the bank has been faced with stone.
1878	The earth embankment surrounding the building, which was damaged by the storms and high tides, has been repaired, and the outer slope protected with stone, to prevent the wash of the sea.
1883	To protect the bank from abrasion from the sea, a line of sheet piling 203 feet long was placed on the bank of the creek.
1885	Some 60 tons of riprap were placed around the banks of the station to protect them from scour and ice.
1888	A brush and stone protection was placed in front of the banks, and the lightning conductor was supplied with new ground connection.
1891	Damages to the bulkhead and banks, by the storm of October, 1890, were repaired, the height of the bank was increased and the banks were protected with stone riprap and facing.
1895	A portion of the banks surrounding the station was rebuilt, and small repairs were made.
1897	The high dike around the site, the stone riprap on its bay front, and the new water tank were completed.

Mispillion Light in 2006

The 1873 Mispillion River Lighthouse only had three keepers during its years of service. James H. Bell, a Civil War veteran, served from June 9, 1873 until April 4, 1881. Henry B. Spencer took over next and remained at the station until his death on February 21, 1896. The final keeper was Walter P. Graham, who served until an automated acetylene light was installed in the tower in July of 1911. All these keepers were paid an annual salary of $500, and Graham would remain at the station as a caretaker for some time after automation, receiving a token salary of $1 per year.

On December 29, 1929 the Mispillion River Lighthouse was deactivated, having been replaced by a 60-foot steel skeleton tower that was relocated from Cape Henlopen, where it had been in service since 1924. Alexander Still served as caretaker for the Mispillion Lighthouse until 1932, when the lighthouse and all but 0.1866 acres around the steel tower were sold to private parties.

After passing through several hands and receiving little attention, the lighthouse, along with a restaurant and marina, was sold to Galen & Eileen Stauffer on January 28, 1991. During the first week of the following January, a severe storm inundated the area with eight feet of water and swept the restaurant and tackle shop a mile inland. Amazingly, the older lighthouse didn't budge an inch. Undaunted, the Stauffers repaired the marina and constructed a 60-seat restaurant atop elevated pilings. Turning a profit proved difficult, and the weary couple placed the site up for sale in 1998 for $549,000. By then, the lighthouse had been reduced to just a wooden shell.

In early 2001, it appeared there was hope for the dilapidated lighthouse, when a local lawyer, Merritt “Sam” Burke, III, announced he was planning to purchase the property and was willing to work with a non-profit organization to restore the historic structure. An enthusiastic group of supporters soon formed the Keepers of Mispillion Lighthouse, and in September of 2001, Burke announced he had purchased the lighthouse from the Stauffers.

Mispillion Lighthouse Photograph courtesy David Kenton

On April 18, Burke broke the news that he would no longer be working with the non-profit following an acrimonious dispute with locals over the zoning for a nearby historic fort that he owned. Less than a month later, storm clouds for the lighthouse literally appeared on the horizon, and on the morning of May 2, 2002, a lightning bolt struck the top of the tower. The upper portion of the tower and much of the lighthouse’s interior were charred in the resulting fire.

But something positive for the lighthouse’s future occurred that same day, when John and Sally Freeman purchased a building lot in Lewes’ Shipcarpenter Square, a neighborhood reserved for residences consisting of relocated historic structures. A few days after the purchase, Sally saw a picture of the damaged lighthouse in a local newspaper, and the couple had soon contacted the Burke family and started negotiating a deal. Later in 2002, the remains of the lighthouse were removed to an undisclosed location. Lighthouse enthusiasts believed the beacon was lost forever, but in July of 2005 a modern lantern, costing over $53,000, was placed atop a reconstructed and expanded Mispillion River Lighthouse in Shipcarpenter Square.

Although the salvation of the Mispillion Lighthouse didn’t turn out quite as the Keepers of Mispillion Lighthouse would have foreseen in 2002, at least a portion of the historic lighthouse was incorporated in the modern replica, and the memory of Delaware’s last standing wooden-framed lighthouse will not be limited to old photographs.

References

1. Historic American Engineering Record for Mispillion Lighthouse.
2. Guiding Lights of the Delaware River & Bay, Jim Gowdy and Kim Ruth, 1999.
3. “Mispillion Lighthouse headed for a very bright future,” Dennis Forney, Cape Gazette, May 10, 2004.
4. “Mispillion Lighthouse Virtually Destroyed by Lightning,” Bob Trapani, Jr., Lighthouse Digest, June, 2002.
5. “Cedar Neck, Slaughter Beach & the Mispillion Lighthouse - 1609 - 2006,” Dave Kenton.