As was the case with several 19th century lighthouses, local citizens and mariners had to loudly demand a lighthouse for the dangerous site for decades before one was actually built. In the case of Halfway Rock, the delay was 36 years. The petition began in 1835 in the usual manner: a series of spectacular shipwrecks and lost lives triggered the pleas for an adequate warning beacon. On June 19 of that year, a severe southeasterly gale battered the Maine coast. The brig Samuel was heading home to Bath, and Captain George W. Small was well aware of how dangerous a lee shore could be in that area during a storm. The captain ordered his crew to reef the mainsail so the ship could ride out the storm a safe distance offshore.

Despite this precaution, the ship hit ground hard on Halfway Rock at 10 p.m. that evening. Captain Small and another crewman were washed overboard by a rogue wave and lost. The surviving crewmembers managed to climb onto the rock and take cover behind protective ledges until morning, when they were rescued. Shortly after this incident, Captain Joseph Smith of the U.S. Treasury Department, which administered lighthouses at the time, wrote to his superiors in Washington: “I respectfully request the erection of a stone monument on this rock and the cost of it I estimate at $3,000.”

Halfway Rock Lighthouse with bell tower Photograph courtesy U.S. Coast Guard

Smith’s request was ignored and no action was taken for the next 26 years. On February 12, 1861 the British bark Boadicea, headed for Glasgow, Scotland, crashed into Halfway Rock so unexpectedly and hard that all aboard drowned. This incident caused a slight stirring in Washington, but an additional eight years passed before Congress finally authorized $50,000 to build a lighthouse at Halfway Rock.

Huge granite blocks were brought from other Maine islands by boat and unloaded on Halfway Rock, where the surface of the rock had been cut to the proper level. On June 30, 1870, the balance of funds for completing the lighthouse reverted to the Treasury, and construction at the site had to be suspended. Congress approved an allocation of $10,000 on March 3, 1871 for the completion of the lighthouse, and work on the rock soon resumed. On August 15, 1871, the light at Halfway Rock was lit for the first time, 36 years after the wreck of the Samuel. The tower was originally outfitted with a revolving third-order Fresnel lens, showing a white light punctuated by a red flash.

The new 76-foot tower was cone-shaped and built with white granite blocks, with a black cast iron lantern. A pyramidal, skeleton bell tower, standing forty-eight feet high and constructed of 10-inch square yellow pine timbers, was bolted to the ledge eighty feet from the lighthouse in 1887. A striking mechanism delivered regular blows to a 1,000-pound bell suspended in the tower. During the bell tower’s first winter, a sea with a depth of eight feet swept over the ledge beneath the tower. The fog bell was replaced in 1905 by a diesel-powered Daboll fog trumpet

The granite tower originally double as a dwelling for the keepers. A kitchen was located on the first floor, the principal keeper lived on the second floor, the two assistants on a third level, and a watchroom, outfitted with a small stove and a desk, was located directly beneath the lantern room. In 1884, an 18 by 24-foot wooden boathouse, with two bedrooms in its loft, was constructed in the lee of the lighthouse in 1884. The boathouse was securely bolted to both the ledge and the tower, and a sloping wooden ramp connected to structure to the water.

There were three keepers employed at Halfway Rock, with two always on duty and the third on shore leave. Due to the tight living conditions, no families or spouses were allowed at the station. Sometimes, the isolation and lonely nature of the work exacerbated personality conflicts between keepers. An inspector from the Lighthouse Board investigated a problem between two keepers at Halfway Rock and explained the matter in a report to his bosses: “Some 18 months ago Mr. Holbrook, then 1st Asst. Keeper…came to my office and reported to me that when he and Mr. Toothaker were alone on the Rock (the 3rd Keeper being absent), Mr. Toothaker would often refuse to speak to him for a week or 10 days at a time without any apparent reason whatsoever. The place was lonely enough of itself, and to be deprived of the company of the only other person there seemed, unless good reasons existed, and improper state of affairs…

“…last spring Mr. Holbrook reported to me that Mr. Toothaker, he believed, was at times out of his mind, or on the verge of so being…Finally, Mr. Holbrook informed me that he was afraid to remain longer at the station with Mr. Toothaker, as he believed Mr. Toothaker, while in an excited state, might attack him, and that he ought to resign…I at once visited the station…Mr. Toothaker admitted that he did get into a queer state of mind at times…I then informed him that he had without a doubt a natural tendency to insanity, which his lonely life on the Rock had aggravated…I then informed him that I could not take the responsibility of him remaining there longer – that if he did, there might be a tragedy, and that if he did not resign, I would be obliged to ask the Board to remove him. Thereupon Mr. Toothaker resigned.”

Toothaker later wrote to the Board and made counter-accusations against Holbrook, claiming that he had been absent without leave and had abused the President of the United States. A lot of a lighthouse inspector’s time must have been taken up dealing with these personality quirks and conflicts among keepers, which were not uncommon. All correspondence and reports had to be laboriously hand-written by a clerk, with a second copy made for the files.

Halfway Rock Light was automated in 1975, and modern, solar-powered optic replaced the Fresnel lens, which was subsequently placed on display at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut. In 2000, the station was leased to the American Lighthouse Foundation, which faces a daunting task in restoring a lighthouse with such limited access. Maine Preservation declared the Halfway Rock Lighthouse one of the state’s “Ten Most Endangered Historic Properties” in 2004. The lighthouse foundation has done an excellent job with other lighthouses, and will hopefully be able to save this maritime landmark.

References

1. Lighthouses of Maine, Bill Caldwell, 1986.
2. Annual Report of the Light House Board.
3. Maine Lighthouses: Documentation of Their Past, J. Candace Clifford and Mary Louise Clifford, 2005.