For an update on what a Mise Tale is then please see Mise Tales One.
This is too cute not to show you all. I discovered this page by accident, and could not stop going oooh and ahhh! It is priceless, and I mean that literally, as this item is a one of a kind according to the experts. According to the article:
The object is an early 19th century miniature musical automaton movement that controls a nautical scene. The scene features a gilt lighthouse set on cliffs of green and brown painted wood. A gilded ship sits on a painted sea in front of the cliffs. The ship rocks to and fro as though in a storm while a (then unidentified) tune plays on a plucked comb. more ->
I know many people do not use checks/cheques these days, but if you do, AND you like lighthouses, here is a company that produces Lighthouse Checks!
Check out checkadvantage.com for these checks. They have four different designs which you can see on their website. I will keep them in mind for my next batch of cheques.
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OK, here’s another one. A lighthouse on a USA Waterfowl Hunting Stamp. I know there are lighthouses on Postage Stamps, but never realized they did it for Hunting Stamps. Are there any more out there? This one is for 1994 and shows Oak island lighthouse. The full story is here on the Southport Times website.
For an update on what a Mise Tale is then please see Mise Tales One.
I saw this first item and immediately liked it. It is a screen print from Marcus Walters Shop. The website says:
A two colour water based screen print – featuring Marcus Walters’ distinctive artwork. Each print is a limited edition and is signed and numbered by the artist, and hand printed in our studio on 310gsm Arboreta paper. Size: 297mm x 420mm (A3)
CHINCOTEAGUE — What does one do with piles of broken, historic glass?
Beth Hanback asked herself that question in 2009 after 145-year-old window panes were removed from Assateague Lighthouse’s lantern room.
“I thought, ‘Well, I can melt it down and make something out of it,'” said Hanback, executive director of the Chincoteague Natural History Association, a nonprofit group involved with lighthouse restoration. Continue reading Mise Tales Ten→
Two children’s books by the same author came across my desk today. Both books are available in paperback and in an omnibus e-book collection. The author is Nell Wise Wechter,1 a native of the Carolina Coast. She wrote the young adult novel Taffy of Torpedo Junction and Teach’s Light. Click the links for book reviews from UNC.
The books and the e-books are available from Amazon worldwide. A special offer by the University of North Carolina Press (UNC) makes the e-book a better buy as it includes the two books for a special price.
I just ordered the e-book omnibus collection as a special present for my fiancé on my Kindle. It sure makes ordering books easy.
A quick note on each book:
Taffy of Torpedo Junction by Nell Wise Wechter
A longtime favorite of several generations of Tar Heels, Taffy of Torpedo Junction is the thrilling adventure story of thirteen-year-old Taffy Willis, who, with the help of her pony and dog, exposes a ring of Nazi spies operating from a secluded house on Hatteras Island, North Carolina, during World War II. – UNC
Teach’s Light – Tale of Blackbeard the Pirate by Nell Wise Wechter
The legend of Teach’s Light has been handed down by the people of Stumpy Point village in coastal North Carolina for nearly three centuries. – UNC
What is lighthouse about these books? The North Carolina coast is host to a raft of lighthouses!
Please let the readers know what you think of the books. I will also add a note later when I have finished them.
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FOOTNOTES:
1 About the Author
The late Nell Wise Wechter, an Outer Banks native, was a widely admired author, storyteller, historian, and journalist. As a schoolteacher near Cape Hatteras during World War II, she could look out her classroom window to see ships being sunk by the Germans. Her story of Taffy was inspired by these real events and the courage of the people who lived through them.
After writing the article on Model Lighthouse Working Plans for lawn ornaments or household decorations, I was told of another place in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania called the Lighthouse Man.who offers custom crafted lawn lighthouses – kits and ready-made stucco, stone, wood and plastic lighthouses. Wow, I do not know where to begin! Take a look at some of the beautiful creations in the photo below. Click the photo to take you directly to the page. For others follow the links on the left. Enjoy!
Have you ever wanted to build your own lighthouse for a lawn display, sitting in the house, or maybe on the beach as a decoration, or how about a bird lighthouse? I received a notice about free lighthouse plans. Following the lead I came to a website that asked for US $67 for their free plans. Not really wanting to spend that much money, I started a Google Search. I found this model lighthouse below at U-Bild.com. Not a bad price either.
Lighthouse (Plan #860)
But it does not end there. They have a Lighthouse Value Plans package that gives you three lighthouses to build – Lighthouse Plan #C159. This package includes the plan above Continue reading Model Lighthouse Woodworking Plans→
For an update on what a Mise Tale is then please see Mise Tales One.
LIGHTHOUSE GIN – A BEACON OF HOPE FOR GIN LOVERS EVERYWHERE
I am planning on making a post later on the use of the lighthouse symbol in advertising, but this advertisement for Lighthouse Gin from New Zealand came across my desk and it was too good not to mention.
Nicely designed website, New Zealand product, lots of information, and some delightful recipes for those that like gin.
The source for this link actually came from The Dominion Post website in new Zealand that had a recipe for Gin and Tonic cake. One of the ingredients was this Lighthouse Gin, so I just had to research it.
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This seems to be turning into an advertising Misc Tales post. Today I found this website for Lighthouse FTO Coffee Bright & Light produced by the Chesapeake Bay Roasting Company, USA. At $12.99 US it is not too bad a price.
For the lighthouse collector, there are several more varieties available in different cans, so you will have to drink a lot of coffee to make up the whole collection!
When I was browsing a crafty website called Completely Coastal which I reviewed earlier I came across an advertisement for Etsy. Searching for things lighthouse, I typed that into the Etsy page search box. The page in the picture below came up.
It is page one (1) of two hundred eighteen (218) pages of lighthouse-related items, for a total of 8,696! Enjoy! Tell us what you bought!
Clicking on the photo below takes you to the lighthouse search items on Etsy.
A while ago I wrote a short review on a new book called the Lightkeeper’s Menagerie by Elinor DeWire.
After the publication of the review, Elinor wrote in the Comments section of my website:
This website is absolutely wonderful! I’ve been spending a lot of time on it of late reading all the posts and stories. Kudos to you for preserving this important story! Thank you as well for the nice comments about my book, The Lightkeepers’ Menagerie. I hope you’ve picked up a copy. If not, I’ll send you one if you provide a mailing address. The book has several stories from BC, including Ivory Island and McInnes. If you visit my website you’ll see my other lighthouse books. I’m working on my 18th lighthouse book now. Guardians of the Lights is my favorite and includes some BC stories. Chris Mills read it while serving at Ivory and contacted me; we remain fast friends. He is coming to BC in July and I hope to see him then. He visited me in 2010 and spoke to a nonprofit group I chaired at the time–wonderful man who’s done much to preserve lighthouse history. Currently, I’m writing a book about BC lightkeepers, to be published in 2013 by Paradise Cay Publications, Arcata, CA. I was in BC for two weeks in early June and met Milt Magee at Cape Mudge and the Tiglmanns at Nootka. I’d love to make contact with more of the keepers. Could you help me with that? I am interested in telling their stories and preserving the history. Pictures are really helpful too, as they convey so much of the story and augument the text. I know the keepers (including you??) have scads of pictures. Fisheries is lax to put me in touch with serving keepers, due to the sensitivity about de-staffing. They say they want no more negative press and worry about what I’ll print. I am not planning a tirade in print about de-staffing. I think anyone who reads my books and articles knows how important it is to keep lighthouses staffed–the message is clearly implied in the narrative without hammers and nails and crucifixtion of “The Powers.” People grow to love the stories and then grasp the issues. I know this chapter of history is coming to a close someday–later rather than sooner, I hope–and it needs to be documented and saved. I’m doing my best to make that happen. You’re doing your part. Thanks again for this wonderful website. I look forward to hearing from you.
[private]My email is elinordewire@gmail.com. My address is P.O. Box 1022, Seabeck, WA 98380. Feel free to share my contact info with any keepers, active or retired, and let them know I’d enjoy emailing with them. Best wishes–Elinor DeWire [/private]
So, any lightkeepers or others want to help Elinor, please contact her through her webpage.
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This email was dated June 22, 2012. Boy am I late! Well, finally, today, I got around to answering it. Please drop by her website if you any interest at all in stories about lighthouses. Elinor has lots!
I also see she has a list of Lighthouse Articles, some of which sound very interesting. I will ask her if I can reprint a couple. Maybe I can talk her into writing one especially for this website on BC lighthouse keepers. – retlkpr
The Royal Canadian Mint is paying tribute to the thousands of courageous men and women who have served, and who continue to serve Canada both at sea and on shore, by issuing a 99.99 per cent fine silver coin featuring our flagship icebreaker CCGS Louis S. St-Laurent hard at work in the frozen waters of the Canadian Arctic.Here we see the launch event of the silver coin in Sarnia, Ontario Facebook page.
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The Royal Canadian Mint have launched their newest coin, which pays tribute to the Coast Guard on the 50th anniversary of its formation. The commemorative coin honors all former and current members of the Canadian Coast Guard for their commitment to keeping Canadian waterways safe, often while risking their own lives to do so.
Canada, the world’s second largest country in land mass – has the world’s largest coast line at more than 125,570 miles or 202,080-kilometres. The Canadian Coast Guard was founded on the 26th January 1962 and is a special operating agency within the department of Fisheries and oceans. Today’s Coast Guard employs more than 4,500 personnel with 114 vessels and 22 helicopters under its command. Coin Update Continue reading $20 Fine Silver Coin – 50th Anniversary of the Canadian Coast Guard – Mintage: 7500 (2012)→
What is a Widow’s Walk? It is definitely not a new dance!
I will give you a hint – It is a fixture built onto a house. It was prevalent in the days of sailing ships, both in Italy where it originated as a style of architecture, and also in eastern American houses on the waterfront.
Here’s a legendary quote on the use of the Widow’s Walk:
The widow's walk is the fenced in balcony on the top right
The faithful and dedicated wife, performing her daily circumambulations on the cold and lonely widow’s walk: The next sail to top the horizon may well carry her husband, gone to sea these many years. But not today. The sun sets, bringing to a close her lonely vigil for this day. Perhaps, though, the much-anticipated vision will appear tomorrow and if not tomorrow, the next day. – Fishermen’s Voice
That article gives more credit to the use of the widow’s walk for fire prevention rather than for lonely widows pining for their husbands. Below in the gallery are some photos of what a Widow’s Walk looks like.
It is not necessarily a lighthouse thing, but maybe, just maybe, a lonely lighthouse widow did walk around the lantern searching for the return of her man from town with the mail and groceries in his rowboat, or late from a fishing or hunting trip. On this website there are many stories of death on the water with a lighthouse background.
By the way, The walkway around the outside of a lighthouse lantern room (for cleaning the lantern glass) is called a Gallery, and the walkway around the light inside (for lens cleaning) is called the Lantern Gallery.
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Lighthouse Watch – House Rental, North Carolina, USA. c/w widow’s walk!
Caswell Beach house rental, North Carolina, USA. Interested? Contact
1 Widow’s Walk – A widow’s walk also known as a “widow’s watch” (or roofwalk) is a railed rooftop platform often with a small enclosed cupola frequently found on 19th century North American houses. A popular romantic myth holds that the platform was used to observe vessels at sea. The name is said to come from the wives of mariners, who would watch for their spouses’ return, often in vain as the ocean took the lives of the mariners, leaving the women widows.[1] In other coastal communities, the platforms were called Captain’s Walk, as they topped the homes of the more successful captains and supposedly ship owners and captains would use them to search the horizon for ships due in port.
However, there is little or no evidence that widow’s walks were intended or regularly used to observe shipping. Widow’s walks are in fact a standard decorative feature of Italianate architecture, which was very popular during the height of the Age of Sail in many North American coastal communities. The widow’s walk is a variation of the Italianate cupola.[2] The Italianate cupola, also known as a “belvedere”, was an important ornate finish to this style, although it was often high maintenance and prone to leaks.[3]
Beyond their use as viewing platforms, they are frequently built around the chimney of the residence, thus creating access to the structure. This allows the residents of the home to pour sand down burning chimneys in the event of a chimney fire in the hope of preventing the house from burning down
This is too cute not to show you all. I discovered this page by accident, and could not stop going oooh and ahhh! It is priceless, and I mean that literally, as this item is a one of a kind according to the experts. According to the article:
I know many people do not use checks/cheques these days, but if you do, AND you like lighthouses, here is a company that produces Lighthouse Checks!
OK, here’s another one. A lighthouse on a USA Waterfowl Hunting Stamp. I know there are lighthouses on Postage Stamps, but never realized they did it for Hunting Stamps. Are there any more out there? This one is for 1994 and shows Oak island lighthouse. The full story is here on the Southport Times website.
