Sand Point Light

The Sand Point Lighthouse is located in Escanaba, Michigan, United States, on Lake Michigan's northern shore. Since 1989, it has been an unofficial aid to navigation. Though it is an operational aid to navigation, the restored lighthouse is now open to the public during the summer months. It is also known as the Escanaba/Sand Point (Little Bay de Noc) Light or the Escanaba Light.

This Sand Point Light is one of two bearing that name in Michigan. The other is in Baraga.

Soon after it became a town in 1863, Escanaba was quickly growing as an important shipping port. The Peninsula Railroad was completed in 1864, which linked Escanaba to the iron mines of the Upper Peninsula to the north. Iron ore docks were built in the Escanaba harbor and the shipping of iron ore to steel mills along the Great Lakes became Escanaba's leading industry.

As shipping traffic increased dramatically, so did the need for some sort of light structure to guide the ships in and out of the harbor and to warn them of the treacherous sand shoals that reached out into Little Bay de Noc from Sand Point, a sandspit located just south of and adjacent to the harbor area. The United States Lighthouse Service approved construction of the Sand Point Lighthouse at a cost of $11,000. Construction began in the fall of 1867 and was completed in early spring 1868. The light first shone on the night of May 13, 1868.

The Sand Point Lighthouse is a story-and-a-half rectangular building with an attached brick tower. The tower is topped with a cast iron lantern room which houses a fourth order Fresnel lens, emitting a fixed red light with a radiating power of 11.5 miles (18.5 km). A unique distinction concerning the Sand Point Lighthouse is that it was constructed with its tower facing the land instead of facing the water. Whether this orientation was intentional or an engineering blunder is unknown.

John Terry was appointed the first lighthouse keeper of the new lighthouse in December 1867, but he became very ill and died in April 1868 a month before the lighthouse was ready to be staffed and operated. With the lighthouse nearly completed but with no lightkeeper ready to report to duty, John Terry's wife, Mary, was appointed lightkeeper and subsequently became one of the first female lightkeepers on the Great Lakes. Mary Terry was a well-respected citizen in the community and fulfilled her duties as lightkeeper with efficiency and dedication. She was lightkeeper from 1868 to 1886, when a mysterious fire severely damaged the lighthouse and took her life. To date, no one knows exactly what happened or why it happened. Some speculate that it was an attempted burglary and that the suspect set the lighthouse afire to cover any evidence of wrongdoing. The south entrance door showed signs of forced entry, yet none of Mary Terry's valuables were taken. With the lighthouse badly damaged, restoration took nearly two full months and a new lightkeeper, Lewis Rose, was appointed to take over.

Over the years a number of changes took place at the Sand Point Lighthouse. Perhaps the most significant was when the lighthouse was hooked up to the city's electric supply in 1913. This meant that the kerosene lamp was removed from within the lens and replaced with an incandescent light bulb.

A total of nine lightkeepers and their families lived in the Sand Point Lighthouse from its inception in 1868 to its deactivation in 1939. It was in this year that the United States Coast Guard took over all navigational lights in the country from the National Lighthouse Service. The Coast Guard constructed an automated crib light several hundred feet offshore, which replaced the function and duties of the Sand Point Lighthouse and its lightkeeper. The automated crib light is still in use today and can be seen from the tower of the Sand Point Lighthouse.