Elbow of Cross Ledge Lighthouse

Year Built

1910

Cost

$75,000

Type

Octagonal house with lantern on top

Height

61 feet

Location

Middle Delaware Bay

Automated Year

1951

First Lit

1954

Lens Type

Fourth order Fresnel lens

Fog Signal

None

Year Deactivated

1953

Color

Brown lantern on top of a red, octagonal brick dwelling

Last Keeper - Date

John C. Gray (1947 – 1948)

Description

Destroyed by a ship collision in 1953, and replaced with a skeleton tower.

Brief History

•  Work on the foundation soon began, and the completed metalwork was delivered to the former lighthouse depot on Christiana River near Wilmington, Delaware by January 1907.
•  The three keepers from Cross Ledge Lighthouse, Ethan A. Duffield, Julian Bacon, and Harry W. Sheppard, were transferred to Elbow of Cross Ledge Lighthouse, where the official light was first exhibited by them on February 1, 1910.
•  A 2,000-pound fog bell, cast by the McShane Bell Foundry Co. of Baltimore using 78% copper and 22% tin, was mounted on the deck beneath the veranda, where it was struck every fifteen seconds by a No. 3 fog-bell striker when visibility was limited.
•  The station was electrified in 1932 through the installation of a duplicate set of 800-watt lighting plants.
•  1953, however, the Isthmian Lines' ore freighter Steel Apprentice, navigating in thick fog and without operable radar, struck the light head-on, knocking most of the house into the bay.