Split Rock Lighthouse
The story
Split Rock Lighthouse stands at the edge of a cliff high above Lake Superior. The Mataafa Storm of November 1905 wrecked or damaged 29 ships on the lake. The lighthouse was built after it and first lit in 1910. It was retired in 1969, and the Minnesota Historical Society runs it today.
Split Rock Lighthouse State Park, near Two Harbors, Minnesota
The same moment, today
A driver on an empty back road knows that quiet moment when the pavement curves hard and trees seem to crowd the shoulder. The headlights catch a small yellow reflector on a post, and right away the driver knows where the ditch is. Nobody stops to admire the post. It just tells the driver to turn the wheel before the road runs out.
That's the job a lighthouse did for ore boats. Out on open water in a gale, a captain can't see the shoreline until he's right on top of it. A beam on a high rock wall tells him he's running out of room, and he turns back toward deep water. Split Rock's light hasn't warned off a working ship since 1969, because modern captains don't need a flame to find land. Radar screens do that work now. The tower still sits on that stone point, and the Minnesota Historical Society keeps the lens polished.
The lesson
When you go, walk down the trail to the pebbled beach and look straight up at the cliff. You'll see right away why nobody wanted their boat anywhere near that rock wall in the dark.
Where this comes from
Pete Young, 1910
On July 31, 1910, the first head keeper, Pete Young, climbed the tower stairs and lit the lamp. Getting the station built hadn't been easy. There weren't any roads through the woods, so steam barges brought all the bricks, lumber, and iron to the base of the rock. A steam hoist lifted every piece up the sheer cliff face. Young moved into the brick house with his family, wound the brass clockwork every two hours, and kept that light turning through every gale.
A small reminder, on the cliff or the dash, that a clear light in the dark keeps you from running out of road.
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