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Cape St. George Light to Shine Again
10/22/09 - 10:56 AM

St. George Lighthouse Association

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The Cape St. George Light on St. George Island will be lighted at midnight on October 31, 2009, for the first time since the lighthouse was decommissioned in 1994.  The public is invited to participate in the historic lighting at St. George Lighthouse Park.

The United States Coast Guard has designated the lighthouse a Private Aid to Navigation in its new location at the center of St. George Island.  The St. George Lighthouse Association has purchased a VLB-44 LED beacon from Vega Industries Limited in New Zealand, a frequent supplier of optics for the USCG.

The 5-tier white VLB-44 has a 13 nautical mile range and 2.5 degree vertical divergence, and will flash for a fraction of a second every six seconds.  The light will be shielded on the north side to accommodate the concern of the USCG that the beacon could interfere with traffic crossing the bridge to St. George Island.  It is estimated that the focal plane of the light at 76 feet is approximately the same height as the “big hump” of the bridge.

The modern optic replaces the third order Fresnel lens which was removed from the lighthouse when it was automated in 1949.  While it is thought that the lens was taken to a Coast Guard facility in New Orleans, the current disposition of the Cape St. George lens has yet to be proven.  “We hope that one day we will find the magnificent Fresnel lens that once illuminated our lighthouse,” said Dennis Barnell, president of the St. George Lighthouse Association.  “However, it is unlikely that we would ever install it in the lantern room because of its size and value.  But it would be a wonderful addition to our Keeper’s House Museum,” Barnell said.
The small size of the new optic will not interfere with visitors who climb the lighthouse to enjoy the view from the lantern room.  Over 17,000 people have climbed the lighthouse since it was reconstructed by the St. George Lighthouse Association and opened to the public on   December 1, 2008.

The Cape St. George Light was originally built on what is now Little St. George Island in 1833.  At that time it was outfitted with a Lewis Lamp comprised of 13 lamps in 13-inch reflectors.  When the lighthouse was rebuilt in 1848, the lamp was increased to 15 lamps in 16-inch reflectors.  The lighthouse was rebuilt for the third time in 1852, and in 1857 it was outfitted with the third order fixed white Fresnel lens.  The Fresnel lens, developed by French physicist Augustin-Jean Fresnel, was the most advanced technology for the transmission of light over long distances at the time.  The lens utilized multiple glass prisms set in a metal framework, and transmitted the light from Cape St. George 14 nautical miles out to sea.

The original lens, manufactured by L. Sautter and Co. of Paris, was removed during the Civil War and re-installed in 1866.  Having apparently suffered some damage during the war years, it was replaced with another third order lens in 1889.  The manufacturer of the second lens has not been verified.  When the Fresnel lens was removed, the nightmark of the lighthouse was changed from fixed to flashing, and the new optic will also preserve the most recent flash characteristic.

While the location of the Fresnel lens itself remains unresolved, the lens pedestal and the metal label identifying the manufacturer as “L.Sautter et Cie., Constructeurs, a Paris” were recovered after the collapse of the lighthouse in October of 2005.  The metal label is currently on display at the St. George Island Visitor Center & Lighthouse Museum.  The pedestal components have been preserved via a desalinization process at the State Preservation Laboratory in Tallahassee, and will be displayed in the new Keeper’s House Museum when it is completed.

For more information contact Terry Kemp with the St. George Lighthouse Association at 850-927-2000.