08/02/2021
WAY BACK MACHINE: A Fenwick Island Birthday!
This light went on for the first time 162 years ago today--on Aug. 1, 1859. The government had purchased land for the lighthouse the year before. As there was nothing else out there, the land's owner--a woman named Mary Hall--agreed to sell it for just $50.
This photo is from 1891. Still nothing around out there! Development wouldn't come to Fenwick in any serious way until well into the 20th century.
At the time this lighthouse was built, the nearest beacon to the south was 60 miles away, on Assateague Island. Plus, the shoals off Fenwick could cause trouble in bad weather. Here is a description of the thinking involved from the 1855 "Annual Report of the Lighthouse Board:"
"A light-house in the vicinity of Fenwick’s island will serve to guide vessels from the southern ports, bound into the Delaware, and also the great coasting trade with the same or a more northern destination. Fenwick’s Island shoal is a very dangerous one for those, and also in some degree for the European trade of Philadelphia. It is very common for ships coming from the eastward to fall in with the coast considerably to the southward of Cape Henlopen, and in thick weather a light on Fenwick’s island would serve to ascertain their position when the Henlopen light was invisible."
I came across this photo and the quote on the Fenwick beacon page of the website Lighthouse Friends:
https://www.lighthousefriends.com/light.asp?ID=452