Asticou Azalea Garden - June 2, 2013 - #2

This is the second of three posts on the Asticou Azalea Garden in Northeast Harbor on Mt. Desert Island in Maine.  Please enjoy!

Panoramic View

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Asticou Azalea Garden - June 2, 2013 - #1

My wife and I usually make one trip a year to Northeast Harbor, Me. on Mt. Desert Island to visit the Asticou Azalea Garden.  This year we timed our visit at almost the optimum time for the flowers to be in bloom.  This will be the first of three posts I will make sharing my photos with you.  I sincerely hope you will enjoy viewing them as much as I enjoyed taking them.

Paroramic View

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Early Spring Wild Flowers From Eastern Oregon

     During an early April trip to visit our daughter's family we spent one entire day exploring wildflowers and waterfalls.  Below is a selection of the flowers we found.  I hope they bring a little warmth into your chilly spring.  Enjoy!

My Favorite Wildflower

 

The Lightship Portsmouth in Portsmouth, Virginia

     In early November of the fall of 2012, my wife and I traveled to Virginia Beach.  While there we seized the opportunity to visit the Lightship Portsmouth located in Portsmouth, Virginia, just outside Norfolk.  Please enjoy the following photos and history of this somewhat unique guide to ships in the nearby waters.

      The lightship currently docked in Portsmouth, Virginia has a long and eventful history, dating back to its construction in 1915. The vessel was originally given the simple alpha-numeric designation of LV 101 - such numbers were assigned to all lightships after 1867. This augmented the tradition of renaming the ships every time they moved to a new station, which made it nearly impossible to track an individual ship and its maintenance history.

      Lightships still had their geographical names painted in very large white letters on red hulls, so that captains could recognize them from a great distance. LV 101, for example, was christened Charles shortly after its January 12, 1916 launch date, as it was then assigned to Cape Charles in Virginia. Other names for LV 101 include Overfalls, for her 1926 duty at Cape Henlopen, Delaware, and Stonehorse, for her last assignment to Stonehorse Shoal in Massachusetts in 1951.

       LV-101 was built by Pusey and Jones out of Wilmington, Delaware for $108,507. The vessel is 102 feet in length and displaces 360 tons of water. Its hull is of a steel whaleback design, which helps to keep it on an even keel in stormy seas. It was one of only two such rounded-hull lightships ever constructed. LV 101 was originally powered by a 200 HP Meitz and Weiss four-cylinder, two-cycle, direct reversing kerosene engine. Her top speed was eight knots, which she achieved with her four-bladed propeller.

      The ship’s illuminating apparatus first consisted of a 500 mm lens with six flash panels set in a rotating motion by weight-driven clockwork. The light itself was derived from a kerosene lamp of 24,000 candlepower set inside a cylindrical lantern. LV 101 was equipped with a number of fog signals as well: a 6 inch air siren was on deck, complimented by a submarine bell and a thousand pound bell which was operated by hand. The lightship had a sister ship, known simply as LV 102, and together they sported the novel feature of a hollow mast. This allowed the sailors protection from the elements as they ascended to service the lantern. Both ships also possessed a steel pilot house on the bridge, at the foot of the mast.

     The Portsmouth Lightship has undergone a number of technological improvements over the course of its service. In 1917 the lamp illuminant was changed from kerosene to acetylene, and two years later the ship was equipped with a radio. In 1931, she was given a radio beacon and a new ten inch air whistle to serve as fog signal, and in that same year the lamp was converted to electricity. Gone was the cylindrical lantern housing, replaced with two 375 mm electric lamps at 13,000 candlepower each. In 1944 it was the engine’s turn for refurbishment, and LV 101 was upgraded to a 315 HP Cooper-Bessemer diesel engine with a maximum speed of 8.2 knots.

     LV 101 was decommissioned in 1964, after serving at three posts during her 48-year life span. At this time Large Navigational Buoys, complete with lights and radio transmitters, were taking the place of the venerable lightships. Other competition for the lightship’s niche came from sturdy permanent structures like Texas Towers, which were used at hazardous coastal spots. The purpose of lightships was to mark very dangerous areas which were too turbulent to sustain a vulnerable lighthouse. They were, however, very expensive to crew and maintain, and were usually replaced with more sturdy buoys as these became available.

      It was not long after her decommissioning that LV 101 was assigned to a new station. In 1964 the Portsmouth Chamber of Commerce sought ways to reawaken interest in their declining waterfront areas. LV 101 had been docked in Portland, Maine after her last stint in Nantucket, and this came to the attention of Portsmouth. The city sought the aid of Anthony Penello, a native of Portsmouth working as a fisherman in New England. He agreed to tow the lightship south to Virginia using his fishing vessel. Two days into the voyage Mr. Penello encountered stormy seas resulting from Hurricane Dora, which necessitated a hasty jaunt into the dangerous Nantucket Shoals. This shortcut saved the two ships ten hours and allowed them to beat the hurricane. They pulled into Portsmouth on September 7, 1964.

      The lightship had not deteriorated much, having been on active duty as late as 1962. Nevertheless, it took volunteers nearly three years to repair and repaint the lightship and otherwise transform it into a museum piece. It was opened to the public as a museum in 1967, and was dry berthed close to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard Museum. The volunteer staff is extremely dedicated to the museum’s exhibition and upkeep, and they regularly collect information from the numerous visitors who seek out LV 101. These visitors include engineers, sailors and sometimes former lightship personnel, who are able to provide true to life accounts of life aboard such a vessel. Recently the staff has been working with the Tidewater Maritime Heritage Living Association to stage re-enactments of daily life on a lightship. The routine could get somewhat monotonous, as it was broken only by the ‘tender,’ the weekly supply and mail ship. Still, ship’s watches were only four hours long, and allowed for leisure activities like reading, fishing, swimming and climbing the mast to build muscles. Another break from the monotony was storms, which could be quite dangerous for lightships. Vessels like LV 101 were moored only at the bow, and not at both the bow and the stern, so that they would be able to rotate during a storm. Sometimes the single anchor chain would break in really rough seas, and the ship’s engines were often not strong enough to keep it under control. One such ship, the LV 73, was lost with all its crew during a 1944 hurricane off the coast of Massachusetts.

      A visitor to the lightship museum today would first be struck by several lighthouse lenses on display on the main deck, such as the original 3 ½ order Fresnel lens from Smith Point Lighthouse. The main deck also contains the crew and officer’s quarters, the ship’s galley and the mess hall. The captain’s cabin contains a bed, porcelain sink, closet and a desk with a nautical map spread upon it. Above the main deck there is the Pilot house, radio room and the storm helm, which is a traditional brass ship’s wheel. The ship was primarily piloted from the Flying Bridge on the very top deck, which contains yet another brass wheel from which to survey the seas. The top deck also has two lifeboats, a fog horn and two air scoops to provide the crew with fresh air. On the starboard side of the bow there hangs the ship’s 5,000 pound mushroom anchor. The mast sports a brass bell inscribed with USLHS 1915, standing for the United States Lighthouse Service and the 1915 casting of the bell.

      In 1989, lightship Portsmouth was granted the status of National Historic Landmark. Indeed, the city of Portsmouth is uniquely suited for the honor, as it is often cited as the birthplace of American lightships. In 1820 James Poole built the first U.S. lightship in nearby Hampton, Virginia. His vessel was assigned to service Wiloughby Spit, but was soon moved to Portsmouth’s Elizabeth River due to perilous conditions at the Spit. These first wooden lightships were a far cry from LV 101 and similar ships of its class. Simple boats with large lights on their masts, they were plagued by poorly trained and undisciplined crews, and were completely unassisted by any relief ships. This meant that if an early lightship was damaged, then its post went unmanned, regardless of navigational importance.
 
     In 1852 the Lightship Service itself was refurbished and placed under the command of maritime professionals, and the situation began to improve. As previously mentioned, the numbering system was developed in 1867 which allowed individual ships to be tracked across their various assignments. Crew conditions and training were upgraded as well, and the ships themselves were constructed of metal instead of wood. By the nature of their duty lightships were subject to numerous collisions with wayward vessels, so they needed to be as sturdy as possible. In 1934, for instance, the ill-fated Titanic’s sister ship Olympia collided with a lightship and sheared the vessel in two. LV 101 herself was rammed twenty-four times, with eight of those hits coming during her tenure at Cape Charles. Most of these accidents were glancing, minor blows, although an examination of the hull will still reveal their effects.

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The Old Point Comfort Lighthouse, Norfolk, Virginia

     On a recent trip to Virginia Beach my wife and I seized the opportunity to visit a few of the most assessable lighthouses.  One of those was the Old Point Comfort Lighthouse on Fort Monroe neear Norfolk, Virginia.

     The Old Point Comfort Lighthouse marks the entrance to historic Hampton Roads, an important harbor situated at the mouths of the James, Nansemond and Elizabeth Rivers, and stands on ground which has seen many a fort constructed nearby to defend this import waterway. The tower’s present neighbor, the Civil-War era Fort Monroe, was preceded by colonial Fort George, which in turn was probably preceded by an even earlier fortification. A navigational beacon on Old Point Comfort was active as early as 1775 when John Dams, caretaker of the ruins at Fort George, was paid an annual supplement of 20 pounds to tend a light there. Some historians believe that Native Americans kept wood fires burning at the Point before that for the benefit of Spanish ships during the 16th century.

    With the establishment of the United States government and its ensuing lighthouse projects at places like Cape Henry, pressure mounted to build a permanent aid to navigation at Old Point Comfort. An early edition of the American Coast Pilot noted the 1798 law passed by the U.S. Congress that called for a light at Old Point Comfort, and proclaimed: “We wish, for the security of navigation, that the important work may soon be undertaken, for the safety of our mariners.” Between 1800 and 1801 Congress appropriated $5,000 for construction costs, and contracted the services of Elzy Burroughs to complete the octagonal stone structure.

     Burroughs completed most of the work on the lighthouse, which stands 54 feet high, during 1803. The tower possesses a spiral staircase composed of hand-cut stone, stacked strategically on top of each other. The stairs lead to a ladder that ascends to a trap door, beyond which is the lantern room. Eleven oil lanterns, which consumed 486 gallons of oil each year, were set in fourteen-inch reflectors to produce a light that could be seen from fourteen miles at sea.

    During the War of 1812, the lighthouse temporarily fell into British hands, when the Jack Tars and Royal Marines sailed into the Chesapeake. Frustrated in their efforts to seize the town of Norfolk, the invaders landed at Old Point Comfort and used the tower as an observation post. From there they went on to take and burn Hampton on June 25th, 1813, and then torch Washington D.C. a weeks later on August 14th.

     After the war, Old Point Comfort was vastly transformed by both the federal government and private investors. The government erected Forts Monroe and Calhoun, the former on shore and the latter on a man-made island called ‘Rip Raps’ situated in the middle of Hampton Roads. The clever Robert E. Lee, Lieutenant of Engineers, was transferred to Fort Monroe in 1831 and was instrumental during the next three years in helping complete construction on Fort Monroe, which is the largest stone fort ever built in the United States . Entrepreneurs built several resort hotels and otherwise made the area into a vacationer’s paradise for the leading lights of a young American society.

    In 1855, the lighthouse received a companion structure; Congress had appropriated $6,000 to build a fog bell tower for navigation in inclement weather. The bronze bell was forty inches around and three feet high, and its ringing could be heard up to three miles away. Soon thereafter a beacon light was added to the station to guide ships docking at Fort Monroe.

     While most east coast lighthouses were damaged, destroyed or at least put out of commission during the Civil War, the tower at Old Point Comfort remained undisturbed during the conflict as Fort Monroe remained under Union control throughout the war. An observer perched on the deck of the lighthouse would have seen an impressive procession of historic events during the conflict. President Lincoln once landed at the wharf to Fort Monroe; he had come to witness the Union troops take Norfolk. The legendary battle of the first ironclads, the USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia, occurred just offshore in Hampton Roads. Finally at the end of the war Confederate President Jefferson Davis was imprisoned in an artillery room behind the light station.

     After the War Between the States, the lighthouse was in danger of being closed; an 1869 report contended that it no longer played a vital role for navigation. Evidently a number of festive establishments were putting out candlepower that dwarfed the little light. Among these were the Hygeia Hotel, the Sherwood Inn, the Chamberlain Hotel and the Adams Express Company. Given the increasing sophistication of the area, it is likely that the historic and aesthetic value of the light helped save it. Instead of being decommissioned, the lighthouse grounds were vastly improved upon. In 1891, a new keeper’s house, built just south of the tower, replaced the original 1823 dwelling, and various buildings such as a stable, new oil house and iron railings were added as well. The station was hooked up to a modern sewer line in 1901, and the resulting dug-up grounds were substantially re-landscaped. Fifty cart loads of topsoil were spread on the premises and sixty-three varieties of plants and grasses were planted.

    Improvements to the station continued to be made in the new century. The oil fuel lanterns were replaced by electric power, and the beam increased in intensity to 3,300 candlepower. With advances in aeronautics the station was designated as an aerial landmark. One of the buildings’ roofs was painted in a distinctive pattern, part of a chain enabling pilots to find their way from Washington D.C. to Norfolk. In 1936, an experimental apparatus was added to control the fog signal. A beam of light was shot every two minutes from nearby Fort Wool, onto a photoelectric cell at Old Point Comfort. If the beam failed to arrive, that meant it had been impeded by rain, fog or snow, and the fog signal was activated.

     The problem of competing coastal lights from hotels and attractions was tackled in an innovative manner in 1954. A Coast Guard officer in charge of the lighthouse attached five 250 watt bulbs on poles extending from the guardrails, so that they resembled spokes on a wheel. While this may have made it more noticeable, one writer in The Keeper’s Log lamented that “it made the light look like an amusement park ride...rather than a noble lighthouse.”

     Over the years the characteristic of the Old Point Comfort Lighthouse was altered several times. In 1905, the Lighthouse Board reported that “the light was again changed to a fixed red through the entire arc of visibility.” In the 1950s, the ruby-red glass was still in place in the lantern room, but the automated signal showed a mixture of red and white light. The white beam covered 132 degrees of the circle, while red occupied the rest. The pattern was arranged in such a way that if a ship saw red, the crew knew it was on a “danger course.”
 
     Today the lighthouse tower is a freshly painted white, topped by a dull red, domed copper roof and a lightning rod. The structure has four large double-paned windows, with bright green doors, sashes and frames. The ‘eye-catching’ green was rumored to be a contractual error that would soon be corrected, but it has remained for years. A solid steel door guards the base of the lighthouse, alongside a plaque denoting it as a Virginia National Landmark.

    The keeper’s dwelling housed the families of two Coast Guardsmen until automation in 1973; presently it is the house of an Army Major. The house was described in an inventory of the station produced by the Army as stylistically eclectic, exhibiting “influences from the Shingle Style of the 1870's, the Stick Style of the 1870's, a touch of Queen Anne, and a soupçon of Eastlake.”
 
     The Old Point Comfort Lighthouse has been privy to events of great military importance, since those it overlooked during the Civil War. Teddy Roosevelt’s ‘Great White Fleet’ set sail from Hampton Roads in 1907 for its cruise around the world. On November 14, 1910, the first launching of a plane from a warship took place on the deck of the USS Birmingham in Hampton Roads. Today, the historic lighthouse still watches over the busy waterway frequented by sailboats and aircraft carriers.

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