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Cape Meares, OR
Cape Meares, OR


Lighthouse History

Built: 1890

Type: Octagonal Tower

Height: 38 ft (shortest lighthouse in the state)

Status: Non-Active

Location: Tillamook

Elevation: 217

Deactivated: 1963

Lens: 1st order Fresnel eight sided Lens equipped with 4 Bulls-eye panels and 4 drum panels

Keepers: First Keeper Anthony Miller.  George Hunt and Augusta Hunt - Current US. Coast Guard

Notes: Construction of the lighthouse began in 1888. The first-order Fresnel lens was shipped from France around Cape Horn to Cape Meares. A hand-operated crane made from local spruce trees was used to lift the crates containing the prisms of the one-ton lens up the 200 foot cliff to the tower. The tower is made of sheet iron lined with bricks, the only one of its kind on the Oregon coast. 
This lighthouse doesn't offer many stories of peril like its sister lighthouses on the Oregon coast.
On January 1, 1890 Cape Meares was lit by Anthony Miller (the first principal keeper) and his two assistants.  At this time, the lighthouse consisted of a fire-wick kerosene lamp and an eight-paneled lens that had both red and clear panels to create a red flash every minute.  Cape Meares' light could be seen for 21 miles.
The lightstation consisted of the tower and two oil houses. In 1895 a workroom abutting the tower was added.
Electricity came to the lighthouse in 1934, and the two oil houses were dismantled. The lighthouse was decommissioned in 1963 when an automated beacon was installed on a concrete blockhouse a few feet from the tower. The new flashing light can be seen 25 miles at sea.
Cape Meares Light was eventually turned over to the Oregon State Park system.


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