Point Arena Lighthouse

Point Arena, California - 1908 (1870**)

 
Photo of the Point Arena Lighthouse.
 
 
   

History of the Point Arena Lighthouse

U.S. Coast Guard Archive Photo of the Point Arena Lighthouse 1870 Point Arena Lighthouse (C.G.)

The first lighthouse was built at Point Arena to warn of Point Arena Rocks which sit about 2.5 miles from shore. The first tower stood 100' tall and the had a single 2.5 story residence. The keeper shared this residence with the three assistant keepers and all of the families. This lead to pretty stressful situations at the station. Even though the keepers petitioned the Government to add additional dwellings, the requests fell on deaf ears.

On April 18, 1906, the Great San Francisco earthquake destroyed the entire station. The keepers and their families lived in tents while the station was being rebuilt. However, when the station was rebuilt, it included four structures as residences. The tower gained fifteen feet over the previous one and was built of reinforced concrete to ensure it would stand tall against another quake.

The area of Northern California where Point Arena is located sees its fair share of foggy weather, as noted in this picture. In fact, the old fog signal station was powered by wood-burning boilers that could use up to one hundred tons of wood in a really foggy year.

Directions: From the Town of Point Arena, take Highway 1 north to Lighthouse Road. Follow Lighthouse Road to the end.

View more Point Arena Lighthouse pictures
Tower Information
Tower Height: 115.00'
Focal Plane: 155'
Active Aid to Navigation: Yes
*Latitude: 38.95475 N
*Longitude: -123.74063 W
See this lighthouse on Google Maps.

 


* Please note that all GPS coordinates are approximated and are meant to put you in the vicinity of the lighthouse, not for navigation purposes.

** This year denotes a station date. This is the year that a lighthouse was first reported in the vicinity or at that location.

All photographs and information on this site is copyright © 2016 Bryan Penberthy unless otherwise specified. No content may be used without written permission. Any questions or comments, please email me.