The Burnt Coat Harbor Light, known more commonly on Swan’s Island as “the lighthouse,” is one of our key landmarks. When you’ve got a first-time visitor on your hands and you wonder what you ought to do with them, the lighthouse practically gives off a gravitational pull. Conveniently, it’s also the place you end up if you just follow the main road and stop before your car reaches ocean.
I won’t go into an extensive history of the lighthouse here, but those who want to learn more should visit the shiny new website: www.burntcoatharborlight.com
Before the days of flipping switches, it took effort to keep the light and buildings in order. A series of families rotated through the community as lighthouse keepers after the station’s construction in 1872.
My friendly neighbor Fran Chetwynd recently traveled to the National Archives to study the keepers’ logs. She sorted through lots of dull stuff about bulbs and wind to bring back the highlights that I borrow from below.
The majority of the entries dealt with the day’s weather and routine maintenance on the buildings and light. A lot of sweeping and whitewashing went on over the decades. Concise and routine-oriented as the entries are, they offer a peek into an older way of island life.
Before the switch was made to kerosene in 1878, keepers burned lard to fuel the light:
Feb 9, 1875- NW Gale very cold weather at 2 AM so cold could not keep the lights burning had to take them down and heat them on the stove and set them agoing again with hot oil.
Feb 10, 1875- Still cold had to keep a regular watch to keep the light burning the Harbor all closed up with Ice.
The logbooks mark many significant, and sometimes tragic, events:
July 26, 1876-Friday afternoon about four o’clock Mr. Cutler and wife of Boston was here on a visit Mr. Cutler and wife and my daughter in the lighthouse boat and the boat was capsized and Mrs. Cutler was drowned.
Keepers had a difficult life, taking on sole responsibility for their lifesaving light. There were no vacations:
Oct 24, 1878. Wind SE fresh breeze rainstorm. I have been on the station 3 years and 3 months have not been absent one night from the station in the whole time.
The Lighthouse Service made regular visits to Burnt Coat Harbor to deliver supplies and inspect the premises.
April 20, 1880 – Arrived US Steamer Iris Capt. Fisher (?) Johnson with supplies for Mount Desert Rock and landed on this Station 10 barrels of cement.
The keeper’s vigilance couldn’t prevent all shipwrecks:
July 5, 1880 – A vessel wrecked on Johns Island. Put at one o’clock AM it was foggy. The name was Malanta of Canning bound for Boston loaded with railroad sleepers one hundred and six tons Register. There was a crew of five men none was lost the wreck was sold at auction as it lay on the rocks the proceeds was about four hundred dollars. Saved a large part of the cargo and the sails and anchors. The vessel was said to be seaworthy at the time of the disaster.
March 7, 1882 – A vessel wrecked on Black Ledge at 1 o’clock PM in a thick snowstorm Name J W Sawyer of Portland, ME, bound for Portland from fishing banks loaded with fresh fish. One hundred and 15 tons register. Was a crew of fifteen men. Three was lost – the remaining twelve was brought to Swan’s Island. The vessel was a total loss.
Wrecks were probably inevitable in an era that was busy with shipping traffic.
July 29, 1880 – there was 29 schooners passed the light today.
A few islanders still remember the active lighthouse days, mainly children invited over to play with the keepers’ family. Like the rest of the island, the buildings have changed with the decades.
The commendable efforts of folks around here have led to a restoration project which has firmly secured the Burnt Coat Harbor Light as a destination for years to come. And though I’m glad I don’t call it home, it’s certainly worth a visit.
Kaitlin Webber is an Island Fellow on Swan’s Island through AmeriCorps and the Island Institute working with the Swan’s Island Historical Society.