NORTH EAST -- For 167 years -- first by whale oil, later by electricity, then by solar panel -- the Turkey Point Lighthouse burned high above the bluff at the end of Elk Neck State Park, a constant beacon to guide boats big and small around the peninsula jutting into the head of the Chesapeake Bay.
Then, on April 1, 2000, the light went out.
The Coast Guard, which owns hundreds of lighthouses along the nation's coastline, determined that the remote Cecil County signal was no longer needed -- and that it was no longer worth the cost to maintain the historic brick structure.
Local lighthouse lovers, who have been raising money since 1995 to rebuild the house that keepers had lived in for generations, were distraught. One woman across the bay called to say she had looked out her window before bedtime every night since she was 12 to see the light -- and couldn't sleep now that the plug had been pulled.
But through the hard work of a group of neighbors and consultation with the Coast Guard, on Saturday night the light will shine again.
"We'll obviously feel a sense of accomplishment because it was no small task to get this light turned back on," said Michael W. Duvall, vice president of the nonprofit Turkey Point Light Station Inc. The group has a $1 lease on the lighthouse for 10 years in exchange for taking care of the structure -- and permission from the Coast Guard to restore its glow. "There were a lot of negotiations and conversations. If it had been up to us, it never would have been extinguished," he said.
The first goal accomplished, members of the lighthouse group hope to soon take the next step: Assume ownership of one of the oldest lighthouses in Maryland, one with a fascinating history as a "ladies' light" for its succession of female light keepers.
It's not a far-fetched goal. The Coast Guard, with help from the U.S. Department of the Interior, is beginning to liquidate its inventory of lighthouses. In some places, the lights have been rendered obsolete, thanks to advances in navigation equipment such as radar and global positioning systems. More often, though, it's not the lights that are no longer necessary -- even the biggest ships lose power and need guidance -- but the old conical buildings, many of which have fallen into disrepair.
"The Coast Guard now has these beautiful, elaborate, well-loved historical structures that they no longer need," said Kevin J. Foster, chief of the Maritime Heritage Program run by the National Park Service. "A simple pole or steel tower would be enough to serve the same purpose."
"Maintaining these old buildings takes time, and it takes cash," said Russell Rowlett, a professor at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and a lighthouse aficionado. "The Coast Guard is out looking for smugglers and terrorists. They have a lot of important jobs, and historic preservation is not one of them."
Giving them away
To that end, the federal government has in the past year started to give the lighthouses away, at no cost, to local governments or nonprofit groups willing to assume responsibility for their care. There are about 600 lighthouses standing in the United States, and about half of them are in the hands of the Coast Guard. The plan is to transfer nearly all of these from federal control in the next 10 years, Foster said.
"This makes it available to people who really do want these historic structures to survive," he said. "People are jumping at the chance."
Two Maryland lighthouses -- the Craighill Channel Lower Range Light off Baltimore and the Thomas Point Shoal Light off Annapolis -- are available to the right organization, he said. Both are in the water and difficult to reach for restoration.
At Turkey Point Lighthouse on a recent morning, state park crews were mowing the grass and trimming the hedges in anticipation of the lighting ceremony. (It will be at 5:30 p.m. and involves a 1-mile hike on a wooded path, so bring a flashlight). The lighthouse is 35 feet tall, but the lighted lantern can be seen for miles around because it is atop a majestic bluff.
For now, the inside is off-limits to the public. The only way to get to the top is to climb a steep ladder. Originally, there was a staircase that wound around inside the lighthouse, but it is gone. Joan Russell, a member of the preservation group who has lived down the road from the lighthouse since 1965, hopes a new staircase can be built so she can go to the top. "I don't like ladders," she said.
The lighthouse organization was formed to rebuild the keeper's house, which was torn down in 1971 after vandals left it in horrible shape. So far, the group has raised $60,000 toward the $350,000 they estimate it will cost to build a new house. They need large donations to help them reach their goal, concedes Dean Rice, president and founder of the group and a retired schoolteacher.
"As my wife said, you can't do that selling Christmas tree ornaments or selling $25 memberships," he said.
Fannie May Salter
The last light keeper was Fannie May Salter, who served from 1925, when her husband, Clarence, died, until 1947 when she retired and the beacon became automated.
She almost didn't get the job. Though many women had done the work before her, new civil service regulations had been written and by the mid-1920s, women were no longer allowed to be keepers. It was decided the work had become "too technical," said Tad Barteau, her great-grandson.
"The only thing my great-grandma knew how to do was keep a light," he said.
It was a lonely place back then. Keepers grew fruit and vegetables and farmed small livestock. There were few neighbors.
By the time Melba Barteau, Tad Barteu's mother, was born 73 years ago, the garden was still there, but the family would make a monthly trip to Aberdeen for supplies. Young Melba Barteau had to walk nearly 2 miles to a stop where she was picked up by a station wagon, which took her to a one-room schoolhouse 7 miles away.
Her grandmother's bed was by the window so she could keep an eye on the light and make sure it stayed on.
"If the light would go out, she was out of that bed and down the steps [of the house] and up into that tower in a matter of seconds," Melba Barteau recalled.
Discouraging news
When Rice first had the idea of rebuilding the house, he was discouraged at every turn. He spoke with one historic preservationist who practically pushed him to tears.
"He told me, 'You don't even know what the house looked like,'" Rice recalled. And it was true. He called the Coast Guard, which told him of an archive in Philadelphia where he could find the blueprints.
Melba Barteau's remembrances of her time at Turkey Point have provided details of what the house looked like on the inside, from the curtains to the furniture. So now Rice knows what it looked like, inside and out.
When the lighthouse was decommissioned, the Coast Guard removed the optical equipment. The Coast Guard gave the group permission to restore the light as a private aid to navigation, said Chief Warrant Officer Walt Schroter.
But where the light that has been installed atop the lighthouse came from remains a mystery. Duvall said it came "from a friend," and Rice said he thanked God for its appearance.
People have really missed the light flashing off in the distance, a welcome sign that they were approaching Turkey Point and the end of a trip down to Baltimore or Annapolis, perhaps.
"They see the Turkey Point Lighthouse and they know they're almost home," Duvall said.
To the descendants of Fannie May Salter, it means even more.
"Sometimes I'm out at night in my boat, and it was great to look up and see that light burning and see part of my family," said Tad Barteau, who lives just a few miles from it. "It looks awful lonely sitting up there in the dark."
"It was never turned off before," said his mother, who hasn't returned to Maryland from her Texas home since the lighthouse was extinguished. "I couldn't even picture it. I've never seen it turned off."