UPDATE: SCHS -- Photo of the Week / September 19, 2022: Montauk Lighthouse, c. 1900

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Photo of the Week

FROM THE SCHS LIBRARY ARCHIVES

“How shall we know it is us without our past?”
– John Steinbeck

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Montauk Lighthouse, c. 1900

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Montauk Lighthouse, c. 1900, showing the Marconi Co.’s radio towers to the left and the roof of the Life Saving Station at the far right. Photograph by Hal B. Fullerton. (Image from the Harry T. Tuthill Fullerton Collection of the Suffolk County Historical Society Library Archives. Image Copyright © Suffolk County Historical Society. All rights reserved. — to view the Fullerton photo, please visit the SCHS website).

Montauk Light was the first lighthouse built in New York State and is the fourth-oldest active lighthouse in the United States. Construction of the lighthouse was authorized by the 2nd U.S. Congress, under President George Washington, on April 12, 1792, and was completed on November 5, 1796. Ezra L’Hommedieu of Southold Town, who had been a member of the Continental Congress, consulted with President Washington on the lighthouse construction. Due to prevailing winds in winter, shippers approaching from sea needed a lighthouse at the tip of Long Island to guide them along the south shore into New York Harbor.

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