At Pigeon Point the Keeper Rewound the Light Every Two Hours
An 80-pound weight turned an 8,000-pound lens once every four minutes, and one drop lasted two hours. How a lighthouse clockwork set the keepers' night.
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At Pigeon Point, on the California coast, a keeper on a four-hour watch had to rewind the lens clockwork every two hours, or the light would stop turning.
What turned the lens?
An 80-pound weight hung down the middle of the tower, joined by cable to a drum in the watch room. The keeper fitted a crank to the drum and wound the weight up to the first landing, where it was held. Released, it descended slowly, driving gears that turned an 8,000-pound lens once every four minutes. One descent lasted about two hours. The California State Parks tour transcript compares the arrangement to a grandfather clock, whose weights are wound every day or two.
This is a different kind of waking from the brass-cased alarm that rang once a day, and from the rest of the work in seven jobs where snooze was never an option. The cue came every two hours, from a weight, at the same pace on every watch.
Asked in passing
How did the Gay Head clockwork compare with Pigeon Point’s?
At Gay Head, Massachusetts, a 1922 inspection recorded a 150-pound weight on a 20-foot drop tube, rewound every four hours, according to the U.S. Lighthouse Society’s table of National Archives inspection reports. Pigeon Point used an 80-pound weight and rewound every two.
What did the Pigeon Point light originally burn?
Lard oil, stored in large containers called butts holding 50 to 100 gallons, according to the California State Parks tour transcript.
The sources describe the equipment and the watch length. They do not say how often a winding was late. Pigeon Point figures: California State Parks tour transcript. Gay Head figures: U.S. Lighthouse Society.