Lights of Michigan's Shipwreck Coast: Beacons on the Lonely Shore

This story is part of our series on Lake Superior lighthouses.

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When you stand on a sandy eastern Michigan beach and look out into Lake Superior, you see the graveyard of many a ship and sailor beneath those anxious waters extending from shore to horizon. So tremendous is the number of ships lost from Whitefish Bay to Grand Marais, Michigan, that it is still called the “Shipwreck Coast.”

The remains of a hundred vessels and crews lie in the unforgiving depths – about one-quarter of all ships lost on the lake – victims of roaring north gales and overwhelming waves or driven to wreck amid the deadly breakers on the beach. Blinded by thick fog or the acrid smoke of forest fires, hapless vessels smashed into reefs or shoals or each other. The most remembered modern wreck on the Great Lakes – the loss of Edmund Fitzgerald and its full 29-member crew in a 1975 November storm – occurred near Whitefish Point along this shore.

Here mariners need as much help as they can get to navigate the dangerous waters. Nine special lighthouses are congregated from St. Marys River, the only natural outflow of Lake Superior, to Munising on the western edge of Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.

Beginning in 1849 with Whitefish Point Light Station, lighthouses here have served essentially two purposes: warn mariners clear of the dangerous reefs and shoals and act as a set of highway markers pointing ships from light to light toward their destinations.

Modern technological systems may have made lighthouses obsolete for determining vessel position, but the solid bulk of a known beacon tower can’t be completely replaced by an invisible electronic navigation signal. When a forgotten piece of space debris smashes a satellite or when batteries fail in the boat’s positioning system, the bright beam of the lighthouse will still bring sailors home safe.

Beyond nautical safety, the beauty of form and the heroism of function continue to attract admirers to the historic buildings and towers of this region’s light stations.

These days, the once-critical lighthouses are themselves imperiled as the buildings fall into disrepair from neglect and into danger from the erosive lake waters. As you will see, some brave souls still occupy themselves at the lighthouses and their rescue efforts today focus on saving these lake sentinels.

The history of lighthouses here and perhaps on all of Lake Superior started with establishment of the station at Whitefish Point.

There is a dispute, of sorts, as to whether Whitefish Point or Copper Harbor is home to the oldest lighthouse on the lake. Records show that both were first illuminated in 1849, but shed no light (pun intended) on the exact date, making it an honor that must be shared.

Whether it gets credit as the oldest lighthouse on Lake Superior, Whitefish Point indisputably was one of the most critical lighthouses on the Great Lakes. It marks the literal turning point for both upbound and downbound vessels. Especially during fog and other conditions of reduced visibility, the lighthouse offered a “lightline” to ships blindly groping their way around the point before the days of the new technological aids.

Impetus to build the Whitefish Point Lighthouse actually arose from activity far west of its beam: exploitation and transportation of the tremendous reserves of Marquette Range iron and of Keweenaw Peninsula copper in the mid-1840s. In 1855, the completed Soo Canal opened the trickle of lake shipping into a torrent. Every vessel going up and back turned at Whitefish Point.

According to specifications, the original light was to be “constructed of split stone or hard bricks and laid in good lime mortar,” and “on top of the tower is to be an iron lantern of octagon form … to be fitted up with 13 patent lamps with 14-inch reflectors.”

Finished in 1848, both the crew quarters and beacon tower were poorly constructed, and soon both were falling apart. The tower declined seriously enough that in 1861, the Lighthouse Board erected a 76-foot iron-pile tower. Identical towers were erected at DeTour Passage on the lower St. Marys River and on the Keweenaw’s Manitou Island that year.

Also that year, the board installed a revolutionary lens designed by French physicist Augustin Fresnel. Whitefish Point’s new powerful beam cut 20 miles out over the dark lake. Keeper Joseph Kenny certainly liked the more efficient tower and apparatus, but just as certainly was greatly put out by a clockwork mechanism installed in 1863 to rotate the lens. That device, working like a grandfather’s clock, needed to be wound every hour and doubtless gave Kenny, who had no assistant keeper, some long and tiring nights.

The new Fresnel lens, though, was welcomed and the most vital improvement in the history of light keeping. Developed in 1822, Fresnel’s design placed a number of glass optical prisms around a light source, producing a lens resembling a magnificent glass beehive. The central prism magnifies the light while upper and lower prisms bend it into a single powerful beam.

Previous lighting apparatuses – usually a complicated combination of lamps, smoky glass lenses and reflectors easily bumped out of alignment – showed a weak beam for four to five miles. The Fresnel projected a beam a hundred times brighter for 20 miles or more. Eventually seven different “orders,” or sizes, of Fresnel were developed, from the massive 12-foot-tall 1st Order to the diminutive 6th Order at 18 inches tall. Whitefish Point had a 3rd Order lens.

In 1970, Whitefish Point Lighthouse was automated. Eight years later, the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society, a non-profit group dedicated to preserving Great Lakes maritime history, took over at the station. The society itself evolved into a world-class institution with created exhibits focusing on the area’s rich nautical heritage. At the station-museum, one finds a special shipwreck exhibit that includes the bell removed from the Edmund Fitzgerald. The grounds feature access to many buildings, including the restored 1927 keeper’s quarters.

While lighthouses were appreciated by sailors in peril, operation of the lights might conflict with local land and water use. Isolation provided no exemption from conflict at Whitefish Point when the usual practice of Enders Fishing Company clashed with light service policy. In pursuit of fish, Enders’ fishermen drove pilings and set pound nets off shore at the lighthouse reservation, all contrary to Lighthouse Board policy. Asked to desist and to leave, Enders not only refused to vacate, but employees prevented lightkeepers from fishing – a crucial food source.

The situation was resolved in 1888 when a district inspector arrived on the tender Warrington, removed the offending stakes and nets by force and drove the company off the lighthouse reservation.

Animosity over fishing never prevented keepers and local fishermen from cooperating when danger arose. In 1914, Keeper Robert Carlson and two fishermen used the keeper’s boat to rescue 11 men from a capsized launch. There does remain some question of whether the fishermen actually volunteered to help. One old-timer claims Carlson obtained their services only when he threatened them with his trusty revolver.

Whitefish Point is the oldest lighthouse on the Shipwreck Coast, but the first U.S. lighthouse encountered these days out of St. Marys River is Point Iroquois Lighthouse. Before its function was replaced by the automated Canadian Gros Cap Light near the mouth of the St. Marys, Point Iroquois guided vessels between the open waters of Lake Superior and the river.

High on a bluff above the lake, the 65-foot conical brick tower and the keepers’ quarters that survive today were built at Point Iroquois in 1871. They replaced an earlier wooden house and tower constructed in 1855.

The newest quarters, a two-story Cape Cod-style brick structure, was built in 1905. By then, the station housed the keeper and two assistants, as well as their families. On the lighthouse reservation were the keeper’s and assistant keepers’ quarters, a fog signal building, three barns, a chicken house, a boathouse, a wellhouse and an oilhouse.

Point Iroquois light was decommissioned in 1962 and its 4th Order Fresnel lens sent to the Smithsonian Institution the next year. Today the lighthouse serves as a museum operated by the Bay Mills/Brimley Historical Research Society with the Hiawatha National Forest. Volunteers live in a restored apartment at the station. The site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975.

The point’s name comes from a bloody battle here in 1662, when Ojibway warriors ambushed Iroquois fighters. “Point Iroquois” stems from the Algonquin name for the place, Nadouenigoning, from the words Nadone (Iroquois) and akron (bone).

Like Point Iroquois Lighthouse, where volunteers have contributed greatly to preservation and restoration, there are extensive lighthouse rescue efforts under way elsewhere along the Shipwreck Coast.

Two lighthouses especially have needed not just restoration of old buildings, but emergency protection against the lake itself. Crisp Point and Grand Island East Channel lighthouses have benefited from strong volunteer support and both governmental and private funding. The two lighthouses were once on Lighthouse Digest’s “endangered” list, but local action has staved off destruction and allowed their removal from the list.

Thirteen miles west of Whitefish Point, the point identified on maps today as Crisp Point should more properly be, as it once was, “Crisp’s” Point. It was named for Captain Christopher Crisp, an early keeper at the lifesaving station. (Sometime around 1900 government map makers apparently ran out of apostrophes and changed the name.)

A lighthouse at the point was first proposed by the Lighthouse Service in 1896. Congress failed to see the need until 1902, when it authorized money. The lighthouse (picture, page 22) was finished two years later.

The station was so isolated and storm-tossed that virtually all supplies arrived by boat despite its mainland base. It is not uncommon to run across keeper’s log entries indicating that an assistant, gone Monday to pick up supplies, had not returned by week’s end.

Compared to other coastal lights on Lake Superior, the Crisp Point station was relatively minor, its conical brick tower a bare 58 feet and topped with a small 4th Order Fresnel lens. Prior to establishment of the lighthouse, the point was known for its U.S. Life-Saving Service station. Operational in 1876, it was one of four original stations on the Shipwreck Coast. The others were at Vermilion, Deer Park and Two-Hearted River. The lighthouse and lifesaving stations created a small community of as many as 35 people. All were keepers, lifesavers or their families. Still, isolation made it one of the least favored stations.

In 1947, Crisp Point Lighthouse was decommissioned. In 1963, a storm destroyed the fog signal building and in 1965, most of the remaining structures, including keeper’s quarters, boathouse and lifesaving buildings were demolished by the Coast Guard.

Over time erosion ate the beach on which the lighthouse stands; soon waters lapped at its base. Intrigued by the old light tower when they first saw it in 1988, Nellie, who died in February, and Don Ross made it their mission to save the tower. Crisp Point Light Historical Society has raised thousands of dollars in a valiant effort to keep the old tower safe. In the winter of 1997-98, some 1,000 cubic yards of stone were placed on site as a breakwater.

The battle is uphill. During the light’s operational years, the federal government spent huge sums erecting breakwaters and devices to halt the constant erosion. All eventually failed. Only time will tell if the volunteers’ hard work will succeed.

Another active community group making tremendous progress to save a lighthouse formed in 1999 within the Alger Historical Society. The project is on Grand Island, which is owned by the U.S. Forest Service.

Like the Crisp Point group, East Channel Lighthouse Rescue first had to save the charming wooden lighthouse from impending shoreline erosion. The next step was to save it from collapse due to neglect and deterioration.

“The group felt the lighthouse was such an important part of local history and feature of Grand Island and Munising Bay, that unless something was done soon, it would be lost,” says society and rescue member Chris Case.

Although the function of the lighthouse ended not long after its establishment, the Grand Island East Channel Light is one of the most picturesque on Lake Superior. Located on the south shore of Grand Island, it is a longtime favorite of locals and the thousands who visit Pictured Rocks annually.

This wood-frame lighthouse was built in 1869-70 as a front range light to guide vessels past several sand bars into Munising harbor. By 1913 the Lighthouse Service determined the East Channel Light was redundant since new range lights were in use. The lighthouse was abandoned and two years later the land was privately purchased and divided into 13 lots. The lighthouse itself became community property among the 13.

East Channel Lighthouse Rescue has made heroic strides, stabilizing the building by jacking it up off of its foundations and placing new 10-by-10-inch timber sills. This structure will not be restored in the traditional sense, rather it will be maintained with its rustic appearance as part of its romance.

To stave off erosion, more than 120 volunteers reconstructed a 320-foot shoreline protection wall, placing 120 tons of rock by hand. The lens room was removed and rebuilt by students at Northern Michigan University to be replaced this year. This is certainly a wonderful example of a community rallying to save a much-loved local lighthouse.

As a range light, East Channel Lighthouse served a function little understood among those who do not sail. Range lights not only identify danger areas, but serve as alignment guides to steer vessels within narrow channels.

The range light concept is simple. A front light is set relatively low to the water while a rear light is set higher, on a hill or tower, about a quarter mile behind the front light. When a ship enters the “range,” it steers to view the rear light above the front light. Thus aligned, the ship proceeds down the channel. If the rear and front lights are not aligned, the ship is outside the safe channel.

In a complicated waterway like the St. Marys River, a ship will shift from range to range as it follows the winding channel. In the eastern part of Lake Superior, there are many such range lights.

The Munising range lights were built in 1908 to replace the antiquated wooden East Channel Lighthouse. The newer 58-foot-tall front tower is built of riveted steel plates and sits beside Highway M-28. The 33-foot rear range tower, set into the hillside a couple of blocks landward, is also riveted steel. In April 2003, the lights’ ownership transferred to the Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.

Another set of range lights – the Grand Island Harbor lights – mark the west channel. Established in 1868, they guided vessels among numerous sand bars. The original rear light, since removed, was a 32-foot tower identical to the Grand Island East Channel Lighthouse. The old front range was a simple 19-foot-tall wooden tower. In 1914, the rear light was replaced with a 62-foot-tall riveted steel tower. Part of the original rear light structure was moved for a private house. The front light was replaced with a directional light in 1969.

A pair of range lights also was established in the town of Grand Marais, the only harbor of refuge along the desolate 80-mile Shipwreck Coast from Whitefish Point to Munising. As such, Grand Marais (population today of 450) – and its range lights – achieved an importance beyond their size.

When the town was a booming lumber center in the late 1890s, it was a frequent stop for vessels and adequate navigation aides were needed. At times, the harbor sheltered as many as 40 ships. As a result, the steel skeletal light on the end of the breakwater was established in 1895 and inner light in 1898. The lifesaving station building at the site is now a museum.

The Grand Marais lights are the smallest on eastern Lake Superior. The largest lighthouse along the Shipwreck Coast is at Au Sable Point, long identified as a perilous place for shipping. Flying over the area in good weather, one can clearly see the offshore reef as a shallow sandstone shoal running about a mile into the lake. At places a bare six feet of water covers its deadly teeth.

For a captain “coasting,” following the shore between Whitefish Point and Munising or Marquette, shading too close to this point because of the common thick fogs could spell disaster. At least a dozen ships left their bones scattered on the unforgiving reef.

As early as 1622 French explorer Pierre Esprit Radisson termed this shore, “most dangerous when there is any storms.”

In 1871, Marquette Mining Journal noted that “in all navigation of Lake Superior, there is none more dreaded by the mariner than that from Whitefish Point to Grand Island.”

That same year the Lighthouse Service stated in its annual report that it was the most dangerous unlit site on the Great Lakes. Congress responded to the prodding by appropriating $40,000 for construction of what was called, until 1910, the Big Sable Light. On August 19, 1872, the lighthouse’s fixed white light shone for the first time.

The 87-foot tall conical brick tower was topped with a 3rd Order Fresnel lens. The walls at the base of the tower are 4 feet thick tapering to 3 feet at the lantern room level. To hold the tower steady, its foundation goes 23 feet deep. Foghorns, oilhouses, boathouse and assistant keepers’ quarters were part of the extensive compound.

Like many Lake Superior lights, Au Sable Point was a lonely place. The nearest town was Grand Marais, a dozen miles to the east by a winding footpath through the sand dunes or eight miles by boat. One Lighthouse Service inspector wrote that the station was “just as isolated as if it were 30 miles from land.”

Lighthouse equipment and supplies were landed at a pier below the light but only during calm weather.

Au Sable storms could be terrific. On December 8, 1876, Keeper Napoleon Beedon noted, “a frightful storm blew down 50 trees or more close to the lighthouse.” He feared “the lighthouse and tower would blow down as they shook like a leafe (sic). The wind was N. N. West snowing and feesint (sic) it was the worst storm I ever saw on Lake Superior.”

Living at the light wasn’t all bad. Keepers enjoyed hunting and fishing. In 1901 the lighthouse journal noted the assistant shot a bear so large that it took two men to drag it to the station. Another entry notes that a keeper caught 144 brook trout.

The station, automated in 1958, was transferred to the National Park Service and included 10 years later in Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. The lighthouse remains an active aid to navigation; the beam radiates from a 300mm solar-powered optic. Now a maritime museum, the light has been extensively restored to reflect the 1910 era.

One of the most spectacular, yet little known, of Lake Superior lights is Grand Island North. Perched on a 175-foot sandstone cliff, it is reputed to be the highest lighthouse above sea level (about 777 feet) on the Great Lakes.

The original light, a wooden structure with a 30-foot tower, was established in 1856. As with other lighthouses then, the materials and construction were abysmal. In 1865 an inspector reported its “wretched condition.” The current lighthouse was built adjacent to the old one in 1867. The design, a standard for harbor lights, is identical to ones at Huron Island, Marquette, Granite Island, Ontonagon and Gull Rock. The 40-foot tower got a 4th Order Fresnel lens, adequate for directing coastal traffic from Au Sable to Marquette.

Life at the light was generally a quiet affair, although in October 1856 the surprised keeper sheltered nine survivors from the side-wheeler Superior, wrecked at Spray Falls along the Pictured Rocks coast. Thirty-six passengers and crew were lost in the disaster, one of the worst on Lake Superior.

The light was automated in 1941 when fuel changed from oil to acetylene, allowing use of a sun valve, an on-off switch controlled by the sun’s heat. Twenty years later the light was moved from the old brick tower and installed on a nearby steel structure.

In the 1960s, Dr. Loren Graham, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor with Grand Island roots, bought the light and converted it into a cottage. Loren and his wife, Patricia, are developing a museum there – at no local, state or federal cost. It will be open to the public with sustaining funds.

Grand Island North Light was once the scene of a real life murder mystery. On June 12, 1908, a small sailboat from the North Light washed ashore at Au Sable Point and was found by the lightkeeper. Sprawled across the bottom was the lifeless body of Assistant Keeper Edward Morrison, his head “battered beyond recognition.” Morrison had arrived at North Light only six weeks earlier.

Local residents were confused by the discovery and more ominously by the fact that North Light had been dark for nearly a week.     

What was going on at the light?

A group of Munising residents went to investigate … and found the light deserted! Keeper George Genery, a 15-year veteran at lighthouses, was missing. Evidence suggested a hasty departure. Supplies remained piled on the dock; his coat still dangled from a hook in the boathouse. The second station sailboat was gone. Perhaps he took it when he fled.

Despite a search, Genery never turned up. Rumors placed him at some Munising saloons, then leaving town without explanation. Another sighting put him in the Ontario Sault. Investigators developed two theories. The first: Genery murdered Morrison for unknown reasons, placed the body in the boat and pushed it into the lake, expecting it to be lost “at sea.” Then he fled in the remaining boat. The second: Both men, recently paid, were robbed and murdered by unknown assailants. The mystery goes unsolved to this day.

Mysterious, romantic, heroic, lonely … every lighthouse along the Shipwreck Coast has its story. Heard together, they speak eloquently of loneliness faced by keepers and their families, of heroism in danger, of storms and tribulations. The common thread is faithfulness. Always the beacons burned to show the way to safety. Today, Lake Superior residents are faithfully banding together to save those beacons so that their stories will survive for years to come.

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Light Station Facts

Au Sable

• Established: 1874.
• Original Tower: 87-foot, brick conical.
• Automated: 1958.
• Lens: 3rd Order Fresnel.
• Other: Owned by Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. Grounds open days, guided tours available in summer. There is a 1/2-mile hike from the parking lot.

Crisp Point

• Established: 1904.
• Original Tower: 58-foot, brick conical.
• Deactivated: 1947.
• Lens: 4th Order Fresnel.
• Other: Owned by Luce County, managed by Crisp Point Light Historical Society. Grounds open daily, tower open most Saturday afternoons in summer.

Grand Island East Channel Light

• Established: 1870.
• Original Tower: wood, square.
• Deactivated: 1913.
• Lens: 5th Order Fresnel.
• Other: Private owners, water view from tour boats.

Grand Island Harbor Range Lights

• Established: 1868.
• Existing Historic Tower: 62-foot, steel pole, finished in 1914 to replace 1868 wood-framed tower.
• Deactivated: 1969.
• Lens: Plastic optic.
• Other: Owned by U.S. Forest Service. Grounds open.

Grand Island North Light

• Established: 1854.
• Existing Historic Tower: 40-foot, brick square, finished in 1867 to replace 1855 wood tower.
• Automated: 1961.
• Deactivated: 1969.
• Lens: 4th Order Fresnel.
• Other: Private owner.

Grand Marais Range Lights

• Established: 1908.
• Existing Historic Towers: front light is a 34-foot, steel skeletal structure while rear light is a 55-foot, cast-iron skeletal structure.
• Automated: 1908.
• Lens: 5th Order Fresnel.
• Other: National Park Service owns the keepers quarters and leases it to the Grand Marais Historical Society, which uses the 1908 quarters as a museum. Grounds open.

Munising Range Lights

• Established: 1908.
• Existing Historic Towers: front light is a 58-foot, steel-plate conical structure while rear light is a 33-foot, steel conical structure.
• Automated: 1908.
• Lens: Locomotive-style headlamps.
• Other: Owned by Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore.

Point Iroquois

• Established: 1855.
• Existing Historic Tower: 65-foot, brick conical constructed 1871, replaced original wooden tower built in 1855.
• Automated: 1962.
• Deactivated: 1971.
• Lens: 4th Order Fresnel.
• Other: Owned by U.S. Forest Service, the lighthouse is a museum in Hiawatha National Forest open mid-May through mid-October.

Whitefish Point

• Established: 1848.
• Existing Historic Tower: 76-foot, cast iron skeletal structure first lit in 1861.
• Automated: 1970.
• Lens: 3rd Order Fresnel.
• Other: Owned by U.S. Coast Guard, leased to Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society as a museum complex.

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Frederick Stonehouse of Marquette, Michigan, is the author of more than 30 maritime books for adults and youths. His latest, The Last Laker, will be published by Lake Superior Port Cities Inc. in 2015.