THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 14, 1994 TAG: 9408120220
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 07 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY PAUL SOUTH, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 199 lines
IT'S SHORTLY AFTER 11 o'clock on a Sunday morning, and the sun is slowly but surely winning a duel with the clouds for the sky's affection. Underneath the brightening blue, the Corolla Lighthouse towers 158 feet in copper-colored majesty.
In the beacon's shadow, children laugh and play near willow trees, or hold their parents' hands, and wait to ascend the 214 steps to the beacon's highest point. As the line slowly forges ahead, some folks crane their necks upward like diminuitive admirers trying to get a look at the face of basketball star Shaquille O'Neal.
``It's so big,'' one boy says in a voice full of awe. Nearby, a couple embraces and kisses warmly. Others gather around a plaque honoring Star, the Black Stallion of Corolla, one of the patron saints of Currituck's wild horse population.
Without even a wink from its light, the lighthouse inspires romance and wonder, and quenches the thirst for legends.
And so it is for the other lighthouses of the Outer Banks, at Bodie Island, Hatteras, Ocracoke and Diamond Shoals. They are the symbols of the Carolina coast, as much a part of the identity of this region as the Washington Monument is to the nation's capital.
But long before they became objects of awe, they were guides for sailing ships. They have aided thousands of vessels to sail safely through the treacherous coastal waters, and stood in silent grief as schooners, sloops, trawlers and tankers, some with their gallant crews aboard, went to watery deaths.
Highway N.C. 12 is the Lighthouse Route for the Outer Banks, carrying the curious from Corolla to Bodie Island, over the Oregon Inlet Bridge to Hatteras, and then by ferry to Ocracoke, home of the state's oldest active lighthouse. The four accessible sites (Diamond Shoals is not accessible to tourists) sandwich the seemingly unending string of motels, restaurants and souvenir shops.
But even in these places where the quiet of the lighthouses seems an eternity away, they are an inescapable presence, providing names for motels, gas stations and even churches, decor for countless other businesses, and symbols for local governments.
Lighthouses first appeared on the North Carolina coast in the early 19th century, but their origin predates the birth of Christ. The first recorded lighthouse was constructed in Alexandria, Egypt. Historian David Stick, in his book ``North Carolina Lighthouses,'' writes that the Pharos of Alexandria, a 450-foot structure, was built in 300 B.C., and survived for nearly 15 centuries until being brought down by an earthquake in A.D. 1200. The Romans built an estimated 30 lighthouses during the reign of their empire.
And at least one lighthouse built 2,000 years ago is still in use. The Phoenicians constructed the Tower of Hercules on the northern coast of Spain, a 130-foot structure that was topped by an open flame that burned continuously, providing aid to ancient mariners.
The Italians built towers at Meloria and Genoa in the 12th century. One of the keepers of the Genoa light was Antonio Colombo, whose nephew Christopher Columbus would sail to the New World.
In America, the first light was constructed at Boston in 1716. But lighthouse construction in the New World was slow to devlop. Only 11 lighthouses were built in the American colonies, with but two (Charleston and Savannah) built on the South Atlantic coast.
The 65-foot white lighthouse at Ocracoke was built in 1823, in the heart of the romantic village on Ocracoke Island. Its predecessor in the area, the Shell Castle Lighthouse, was built in 1800 by ``Governor'' John Wallace and John Gray Blount, owners of a tiny island between Ocracoke Inlet and Pamlico Sound. The Shell Castle light was first illuminated, historians say, between 1798 and 1803. Construction was fully funded by the federal government. The Ocracoke light was not the only North Carolina structure funded with federal dollars. Construction was begun on the original Hatteras light in 1800.
Alexander Hamilton, George Washington's secretary of the Treasury, was instrumental in the construction of lighthouses in North Carolina. In 1794, America's first Congress passed the Lighthouse Bill, which provided funding for the first Hatteras Island light and the Shell Island Light.
The Civil War literally turned off the lights in North Carolina, and by 1862, virtually all of the lights on the coast fell into Union hands. Gen. Benjamin Butler led Union forces that captured the Hatteras light, a key strategic victory for federal forces.
North Carolinians destroyed many of the original lighthouses, which led to the construction in the 1870s of new lights at Hatteras, Bodie Island and Currituck Beach. Those beacons, as well as the Ocracoke light, were rebuilt.
Because the lighthouses at Hatteras, Bodie and Cape Lookout were almost all identical, the North Carolina Lighthouse Board decreed in 1873 that Cape Hatteras should be painted in spiral bands, alternately black and white. Bodie Island is painted in black and white horizontal bands, and Cape Lookout in black and white checkers. At the time of the decree, the board ordered that the Currituck light be left in a natural red brick color.
Both world wars affected the history of the North Carolina lights. In World War I, German U-boats were virtually unhindered off the Outer Banks, and were able to disrupt American shipping.
In the early years of World War II, German U-Boats turned the waters off the Outer Banks into Torpedo Junction, another alias to go with the tragic name ``The Graveyard of the Atlantic.'' During the war years, all the lighthouses were darkened, caretakers for that graveyard.
``I think the thing that's most fascinating to me about the lighthouses is the history, particularly in the era of the war,'' said Chris Eckerd, a historian for the National Park Service. ``Ninety percent of the people who come here don't realize that the Germans were so active off this coast. They came very close to knocking us out of the war.''
The history of the lighthouses also draws Janet Chenoweth to the lights. She and a companion, Stu Frakes of Richmond, recently visited the Bodie Island Lighthouse.
``To me the appeal is that there is so much history here,'' she said. ``When you think of the men who went down in all of the shipwrecks, it's very powerful.''
Chenoweth's trip to Bodie Island was her second visit to a North Carolina lighthouse. In few words, she captured the majestic simplicity of the Beacons of the Banks.
``When I was a little girl, we went to the Hatteras Lighthouse,'' she said. ``All I can remember is thinking about how big it is, and that I counted the steps.''
Changes in technology and the environment have led to changes for the lighthouses. Erosion may lead to the relocation of Hatteras Lighthouse.
And while the five lighthouses still serve as active aids to navigation, even the smallest vessels are now equipped with modern navigational aids.
Public entities, like the National Parks Service, as well as private groups such as Outer Banks Conservationists and the Save the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse Committee, are working to find solutions to many of the problems facing the symbolic structures.
But on a recent day, as the sun fades, the still vigilant lights at Hatteras and Ocracoke are a memory in the rear view mirror.
On the side of the road, a man in his pickup truck is selling replicas, large and small, of the Hatteras Light. Motorists slow down to look at the roadside merchant's wares.
Even the replicas possess a certain magic, generated by images as gallant as sailors going down to the sea in ships, and as simple as little girls counting steps on the way to the pinnacle.
``These things are strong and powerful, yet subtle and controlled,'' said Stu Frakes. ``It's an attraction that doesn't reach out and grab you. It's a subtle allure. That's what makes me come to these places.'' ILLUSTRATION: Cover and inside photos by DREW C. WILSON
Color on the cover
Jon Taylor, 39, of Spruce Pines, points his camera toward the top of
the Currituck Beach Lighthouse.
A sportfishing boat leaves Silver Lake in front of the Ocracoke
Lighthouse in the island village of Ocracoke.
Two visitors to the Currituck Beach Lighthouse at Corolla look out
from the top of the light.
A worker paints the Bodie Island Lighthouse at Oregon Inlet in this
view from the top.
Staff map
Lighthouses
For copy of map, see microfilm
THE LIGHTHOUSES
CURRITUCK BEACH LIGHTHOUSE
Built: 1875
Height: 150 fee
Pattern: red brick
Seeing it: Call for hours.
Admission: $3 per person
Location: Corolla
For information: 453-4939
BODIE ISLAND LIGHTHOUSE
Pattern: horizontal black-and-white bands
Location: north of Oregon Inlet
Built: 1872
Height: 150 feet
Seeing it: Lighthouse closed to public; Visitor center open 9
a.m. to 4 p.m. through May 26; until 5 p.m. May 27 through Oct. 10
Admission: free
CAPE HATTERAS LIGHTHOUSE
Pattern: black-and-white spiral pattern
Height: 208 feet, tallest brick lighthouse in the U.S.
Location: Cape Point, Buxton
Seeing it: Open on a limited schedule. Visitor Center hours: 9
a.m. to 5 p.m. daily.
Admission: Free
For information: 473-2111
OCRACOKE LIGHTHOUSE
Built: 1823, second oldest in the U.S.
Height: 70 feet
Pattern: black on top, solid white tower
Location: Ocracoke village by Silver Lake
Seeing it: Lighthouse closed; Visito Center next to Swan Quarter
Ferry terminal, open Memorial Day through Labor Day, 9 a.m. to 5
p.m.
For information: 928-4531
KEYWORDS: OUTER BANKS LIGHTHOUSES
by CNB