Category Archives: History

New HCF Funding Available for Fundy Shore Lighthouses

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From:                         “Heritage Foundation of Canada”  HeritageCanadaFoundation@heritagecanada.org

Subject:                     HCF / FHC Communiqué : 

                                 

                       New HCF Funding Available for Fundy Shore Lighthouses

Date sent:                  Tue, 24 Apr 2012 18:13:05 +0000

HCF Funding Available for Fundy Shore Lighthouses

Ottawa, ON, April 24, 2012 – The Heritage Canada Foundation (HCF) is pleased to announce the availability of heritage grant funding for the repair and conservation of historic lighthouses along Nova Scotia’s Fundy Shore, in the counties of Digby, Annapolis and Kings. Funding will come from HCF’s Runciman Endowment Fund for Heritage Conservation, created with the assistance of a generous bequest.

HCF will consider funding requests from community groups and organizations seeking one-time financial support for repair and heritage conservation work at historic lighthouses in the three named counties.

Among other considerations, priority will be given to: Continue reading New HCF Funding Available for Fundy Shore Lighthouses →

Lighthouse History – 48 (1923-04-11 to 1924-02-03)

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The following extracts taken from early Victoria, British Columbia (BC) newspapers are credited to Leona Taylor for her excellent work in indexing the papers. Full information can be found here: ”Index of Historical Victoria Newspapers“, 2007-09.

 

Pt San Juan likely to get station…; WC will be well guarded… Carmanah, Pachena, Beale to have radio phones… Clayoquot lifesaving station to be linked by cable with Lennard I lighthouse…; 18 – Bamfield life-saving crew’s work appreciated…; Apr 13, 1; proper safeguards on WC…; Apr 17, 5 – confirmation, WC to get wireless station – Pachena Pnt…; Apr 18, 19 – will test Pachena as wireless site… [Colonist, 1923-04-11, p. 17]

Continue reading Lighthouse History – 48 (1923-04-11 to 1924-02-03) →

Book Review – The Light Between Oceans

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A new book has been released about the adventures of a lighthouse family on an Australian lighthouse. The title is The Light Between Oceans. The lighthouse is fictitious as  the story is a fictional and moral adventure, but the reviews show that the author, Ms. M. L. Stedman has a masterpiece here. Read some of the reviews below and see what you think. If anyone has read the book, please comment.

When Tom decides to become a lighthouse keeper, he’s given a placement at Janus Rock. It’s a tough posting on a square mile of green, accessible only by boat, that ”dangled off the edge of the cloth like a loose button that might easily plummet to Antarctica”. The closest community is Point Partageuse, a town long neglected by the outside world until the outside world found use for its young men in 1914. http://www.smh.com.au  Continue reading Book Review – The Light Between Oceans →

Deadline Looms for Canada’s Lighthouses

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Deadline Looms for Canada’s Lighthouses

From:                         “Heritage Foundation of Canada”  HeritageCanadaFoundation@heritagecanada.org

Subject:                     HCF / FHC Communiqué : 

                                 Deadline Looms for Canada’s Historic Lighthouses

Date sent:                  Thu, 22 Mar 2012 21:11:01 +0000

Deadline Looms for Canada’s Historic Lighthouses

Copy of the petition - Do not sign this one! - Go to the link

Ottawa, ON, March 23, 2012 – The Heritage Canada Foundation (HCF) is urging Canadians to sign a petition http://www.savecanadaslighthouses.ca/   to help save Canada’s historic lighthouses.

 The Government of Canada owns hundreds of iconic lighthouses, and has declared almost all of them to be “surplus”. Canadians have until May 29, 2012 to nominate lighthouses that matter to them for designation under the Heritage Lighthouse Protection Act. However, almost all of them will require a proposal from an organization or group willing to acquire and invest in them. Continue reading Deadline Looms for Canada’s Lighthouses →

Lighthouse History – 47 (1920-05-30 – 1922-09-20)

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The following extracts taken from early Victoria, British Columbia (BC) newspapers are credited to Leona Taylor for her excellent work in indexing the papers. Full information can be found here: ”Index of Historical Victoria Newspapers“, 2007-09.

 

photograph: Carmanah Point lighthouse, to be rebuilt this year by Marine Dept. The wooden tower shown is the old original one, which has undergone repairs from time to time, and which was 1st put in place over 40 years ago. [Colonist, 1920-05-30, p. 30]

 

Carmanah lighthouse tower will not be rebuilt this year. Calling for tenders was so delayed that the season has become too far advanced for the work to be one. [Colonist, 1920-10-02, p. 8] Continue reading Lighthouse History – 47 (1920-05-30 – 1922-09-20) →

Books – Chance Brothers – Early Suppliers of Equipment for Canadian Lighthouses

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Chance Brothers – Early Suppliers of Equipment for Canadian Lighthouses 

The graphic to the left appeared on The Lighthouse Society of Great Britain (LSGB) website.

After much Googling for it I finally found “With regret, this website has been closed.” The information below is printed with permission of Dr. Ken Tretheway. 

Dr. Trethewy’s site had all the data from this book on line in PDF files which I am going to host here as they are priceless documents showing the inner workings of older British and Canadian lighthouses. 

The available PDF file, A Few Notes on Modern Lighthouse Practice, can be read, saved, and downloaded from this link (2.45 MB).

The drawings in the gallery below are all referred to in the PDF book but are not reproduced therein.  Continue reading Books – Chance Brothers – Early Suppliers of Equipment for Canadian Lighthouses →

The Lighthouse as a Sovereignty Symbol

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Philippine flag over Pantag Shoal

In the early days of exploration a flag of ownership was placed upon new-found-lands to claim ownership, even though on the other side of the island, or bay there may have been another flag from a different country.

One problem with a flag – it doesn’t last very long.

But build a lighthouse and claim ownership and that light is visible to all peoples for years into the future. Build it high enough and it is visible for 360 degrees. Put some men on it and it becomes your property. Hmmm!

A country's exclusive economic zone - Wiki

Right now in the news there are two island disputes in the South China Sea area that involve China and the Philippines – a stand-off over the Panatag Shoal (Huangyan Island; aka Scarborough Shoal) where China is contesting the Philippines’ internationally recognised exclusive economic zone, and China and Japan – an age-old dispute  surrounding the group of islands called Senkaku by the Japanese and Diaoyu by the Chinese.

Continue reading The Lighthouse as a Sovereignty Symbol →

The Diaphone Fog Signal

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The Diaphone Fog Signal by Jeff Laser

reprinted with permission from Terry Pepper and his website

Diaphones were a once familiar sound heard throughout the Great Lakes from the early 1920s until the late 1960s / early 1970s when most lighthouses were automated. 120 such installations existed on both U.S. and Canadian waterways in the 1950s. The two most commonly heard Diaphones were the “Standard” Diaphone, which gave a full steady upper tone that terminated in a heavy “grunt” tone, and the classic two-tone Diaphone that produced an upper tone followed by a full steady low tone of equal or greater duration than the upper tone.

 

Robert Hope-Jones

In 1895, Robert Hope-Jones, an English pipe organ designer and builder, developed a special tone generator for his famous WURLITZER organ; the WURLITZER was a popular musical instrument in the days of silent movies and live stage performances. The new tone generator consisted of a casing that contained a slotted cylinder with a similarly slotted piston. Air was channeled through the casing in such a way that it caused the piston to reciprocate within the cylinder. The major portion of the air was discharged through the slots in both the piston and cylinder as the piston stroked back and forth in the cylinder. As the air passed through slots in the piston, it was “chopped” which caused a vibration that was amplified though a long cone shaped trumpet. Hope-Jones labeled this new tone “diaphonic” (meaning two or more tones”). The new tone had a full, powerful harmonic structure that could be heard over some of the other tones on the pipe organ. He called his new tone generator a Diaphone. Continue reading The Diaphone Fog Signal →

‘F’ Type Diaphone Foghorn c. 1969

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– John Coldwell (assistant Keeper to Walt Tansky on Pulteney Point 1969 – 1972)

Lennard Island diaphone - photo Chris Mills

The diaphone is a unique organ pipe. The theory was based on a design for the Wurlitzer pipe organ invented by Robert Hope-Jones dating from 1895.

A special tone generator in the organ involved a piston vibrating inside a cylinder, which had slots through which air was discharged. The air passing through the slots caused a vibration which when amplified through a long cone (like a megaphone) created a powerful harmonic sound.

Robert Hope-Jones also applied this principle successfully to foghorns, and this then became the most common type of navigational aid in the world. Continue reading ‘F’ Type Diaphone Foghorn c. 1969 →

Lighthouse History – 46 (1919-01-05 to 1920-03-18)

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The following extracts taken from early Victoria, British Columbia (BC) newspapers are credited to Leona Taylor for her excellent work in indexing the papers. Full information can be found here: ”Index of Historical Victoria Newspapers“, 2007-09.

 

Locked from World on North Island (Kains Island)… Thomas Sadler, lighthousekeeper describes horrors of isolation that left him a broken man – wife is driven to insanity by worry over plight of children…; Jan 7, 7 – Superintendent of Lights states report incorrect… [Colonist, 1919-01-05, p. 2]

 

To Cape Beale lighthouse there was taken a new lightkeeper, and with him went a cow. It so happened that a short distance from the light there was a whistling buoy floating on the water. This aid to navigation is such that air is compressed by the action of the waves and a whistle is thus actuated. The noise of the ingoing air and then the whistle is like a huge and gruesome groan, the note of whistle being like that of a foghorn.  Continue reading Lighthouse History – 46 (1919-01-05 to 1920-03-18) →