Manitowoc's harbor has had a lighthouse since 1840. Here's what to know about its legacy.
Since 1839, after the Indigenous Menominee people ceded the land to the federal government, a lighthouse has kept watch over Manitowoc's harbor, guiding vessels and witnessing the town's growth and change.
The city's first lighthouse was lit in 1840. Built at the corner of York and North Fifth streets, it included a brick tower and a home for the lighthouse keeper. By the 1860s, around 680 ships moved approximately 150,000 tons of cargo through the harbor each year — primarily lumber and wheat. As shipping traffic increased, so did the need for stronger navigational and safety aids.
Construction of parallel piers began in 1867, and in December 1873, the North Pierhead Lighthouse was added. For a time, the keeper was responsible for both lights, until the original 1839 lighthouse was decommissioned in 1877.
Further changes came in 1895 with the addition of a 400-foot breakwater and the construction of a fog signal building. Congress allocated $5,500 for the project, which added even more safety for ships navigating the busy mouth of the Manitowoc River.
By 1910, the structures had been moved multiple times because of construction and instability. The Lighthouse Bureau ultimately recommended replacing the now-compromised breakwater light. After several appeals, Congress approved $21,000 for a new lighthouse in 1917.
Construction on this new lighthouse started in May 1918, but was delayed six months as the money from the original appropriation ran out. A temporary oil light was put in until a permanent fourth-order Fresnel lens that was first lit on Dec. 13, 1919. It was also equipped with a powerful diaphone fog signal before construction was completed in June 1920. The Manitowoc Breakwater Lighthouse remains in place today, and the 1873 North Pierhead Light continued serving mariners until it was destroyed in a 1938 storm.
Read more: Manitowoc lighthouse to be open for guided tours by the Wisconsin Maritime Museum
Technology continued to modernize the lighthouse. In 1964, the fog signal was upgraded to an electric horn, and the lighthouse was automated in 1971. Then, in 2009, the Coast Guard declared it surplus property and put it up for public auction. The winning bid came from Philip Carlucci of New York, who later partnered with the Manitowoc Sunrise Rotary Club to restore the lighthouse and make it accessible to visitors.
Read more: 10 things you may not know about Manitowoc's lighthouse
Now, the Wisconsin Maritime Museum is helping preserve and interpret this iconic landmark. This summer, weather permitting, the museum will offer guided tours of the Manitowoc Breakwater Lighthouse. These tours will explore not only the harbor's maritime history, but also the evolution of lighthouse technology and the lives of the keepers who kept the light burning.
For locals and visitors alike, it's a rare opportunity to connect with a living piece of Great Lakes history. For more details, visit our website, https://www.wisconsinmaritime.org/visit/lighthouse-tours/.
Serena Stuettgen is collections manager at Wisconsin Maritime Museum in Manitowoc.
This article originally appeared on Manitowoc Herald Times Reporter: Manitowoc lighthouse will open for tours, legacy dates to 1840
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
USA Today
4 days ago
- USA Today
Education Department delays are putting parenting college students in a bind
Applications for millions of dollars in federal childcare funding are delayed, threatening the education of college students with young kids. There are many differences between Carmina Garcia and Mahogany Ann-Fowler. One attends a community college; the other goes to a regional university. Garcia lives in Arizona; Ann-Fowler is based in Pennsylvania. Garcia studies nursing; Ann-Fowler wants to be an architect. But two key similarities have them in tough situations. Both are moms of young kids. And both are unsure what they'll do in the fall if a federal childcare program they've come to rely on disappears about a month into the semester, as their colleges have warned. On the heels of the U.S. Department of Education cutting its workforce in half in March, grant applications for at least a half-dozen federal programs for colleges have been delayed, according to experts. One of those affected is the Child Care Access Means Parents in School, or CCAMPIS, grant. For decades, the grant has helped parenting students at colleges across the country. Created by Congress in 1998, it awards money to higher education institutions to support or establish campus-based childcare services. In addition to hiring staff to watch infants and toddlers, the grant also helps colleges develop before- and after-school programs for older kids while offering childcare subsidies and advising. In fiscal year 2023, the grant provided more than $83 million to hundreds of colleges, federal data shows. The average award to each school was more than $317,000. The need for such services is evident and ongoing: One in five undergraduate students has a child, according to government data, and research consistently shows that students with children are less likely than their non-parenting peers to complete their degrees on time – or at all. Garcia, a 29-year-old with three kids between the ages of 1 and 4, said the childcare program at Pima Community College allowed her to return to school. "I don't know how I could've done it any other way," she said. "If I wouldn't have found this, I don't think that I would be pursuing the education that I'm pursuing." Come Sept. 30, Pima's program will be gone. Phil Burdick, a spokesperson for the college, said the decision was made due to the Education Department's delays in releasing grant money. The CCAMPIS funding at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, where Ann-Fowler goes to school, is also set to end on that date. IUP spokesperson Michelle Fryling said the university is "unsure of any personnel changes related to the end of this grant." That uncertainty is already causing parenting students to scramble. Unless something changes, Ann-Fowler and Garcia will lose their childcare support just after the fall semester begins at their colleges. Spokespeople for the Education Department did not respond to questions about the delay in the grant applications. Experts puzzled over grant delays Though the grant cycles for colleges' CCAMPIS programs differ, the funding at many schools will dry up in September. In the past, applications for those schools to renew their grants would have opened in late May and closed by July. This year, the Education Department never opened those applications. "We're still very much on the edge of our seats," said James Hermes, the associate vice president of government relations at the American Association of Community Colleges. Exactly what's causing the delay is still puzzling students, colleges and experts. Some suspect the issue is staffing. President Donald Trump laid off hundreds of Education Department personnel in March and pushed hundreds more to retire or take buyouts. Other onlookers, including Eddy Conroy, a senior policy manager on the higher education team at the left-leaning think tank New America, wonder whether the CCAMPIS program might be a casualty of the Trump administration's next effort to claw back funding already budgeted by Congress. The president's budget proposal, released in May, suggested zeroing out funding for CCAMPIS altogether. 'States, localities, and colleges, not the Federal government, are best suited to determine whether to support the activities authorized under this program," said the proposal, which Congress is considering ahead of a government shutdown deadline (which is also Sept. 30, the day the childcare grant money disappears). But the White House has demonstrated an unusual comfort level with flouting the normal budgeting process. In July, the U.S. Senate rubber-stamped $9 billion in reductions to foreign aid and public broadcasting after Congress had already set aside money for those programs. Russell Vought, the head of the White House Office of Management and Budget, has indicated that education funding might be the next area of focus for Trump's cuts. "Is this a capacity issue?" wondered Conroy of New America. "Or is this a backdoor way to illegally impound funds that have been appropriated?" Hannah Fuller, a 22-year-old student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee who's been a CCAMPIS recipient for three years, said her school is still figuring out how it'll handle the situation. She was told to start applying for state childcare support programs instead. If she needs to look elsewhere for childcare in the fall, she may have to find a second job on the weekends. (She's already a full-time paralegal and attends classes on the side.) But in that scenario, she doesn't know when she'd spend quality time with her 4-year-old son. "He would never see me," she said. One college turns to donors While many schools are warning of cuts or sitting in limbo, one college in a small Massachusetts town has found a way to get ahead of the funding volatility. When grant applications didn't open on their typical timeline, Ann Reynolds, the CCAMPIS advisor at Mount Wachusett Community College in Gardner, devised a Plan B. She went to the board members of the school's foundation and urged them to intervene. She asked for $94,000 to cover two years, ensuring all of her currently enrolled CCAMPIS students would have support through graduation. The board said yes. Still, Reynolds is "preparing for the best case scenario" (that the grant applications open soon). "We may not get it," she said. Alyson Koerts Meijer, a student at Mount Wachusett who relies on a daycare program run by Reynolds, said she's seen how CCAMPIS has benefitted her classmates. Though she doesn't participate directly in the program herself, she's been advocating for it because she knows firsthand how hard it is to get a college education while raising a young child. She wishes politicians could see that, too. "They don't see the people," she said. "They just see the dollar signs." Contributing: USA TODAY Graphics Editor Jim Sergent Zachary Schermele is an education reporter for USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at zschermele@ Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele and Bluesky at @
Chicago Tribune
7 days ago
- Chicago Tribune
Today in History: Sue, one of the largest and best preserved Tyrannosaurus Rex skeletons, found
Today is Tuesday, Aug. 12, the 224th day of 2025. There are 141 days left in the year. Today in history: On Aug. 12, 1990, fossil collector Sue Hendrickson found one of the largest and best preserved Tyrannosaurus Rex skeletons ever discovered; nicknamed 'Sue' after Hendrickson, the skeleton is now on display at Chicago's Field Museum. Vintage Chicago Tribune: Sue the T. rex's journey to the Field MuseumAlso on this date: In 1867, President Andrew Johnson sparked a move to impeach him as he defied Congress by suspending Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, with whom he had clashed over Reconstruction policies. (Johnson was acquitted by the Senate.) In 1898, fighting in the Spanish-American War came to an end. In 1909, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, home to the Indianapolis 500, first opened. In 1944, during World War II, Joseph P. Kennedy Jr., eldest son of Joseph and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy, was killed with his co-pilot when their explosives-laden Navy plane blew up over England. In 1953, the Soviet Union conducted a secret test of its first hydrogen bomb. In 1960, the first balloon communications satellite — the Echo 1 — was launched by the United States from Cape Canaveral. In 1981, IBM introduced its first personal computer, the model 5150, at a press conference in New York. In 1985, the world's worst single-aircraft disaster occurred as a crippled Japan Airlines Boeing 747 on a domestic flight crashed into a mountain, killing 520 people. Four passengers survived. In 1994, in baseball's eighth work stoppage since 1972, players went on strike rather than allow team owners to limit their salaries. In 2000, the Russian nuclear submarine Kursk and its 118-man crew were lost during naval exercises in the Barents Sea. In 2013, James 'Whitey' Bulger, the feared Boston mob boss who became one of the nation's most-wanted fugitives, was convicted in a string of 11 killings and dozens of other gangland crimes, many of them committed while he was said to be an FBI informant. (Bulger was sentenced to life; he was fatally beaten at a West Virginia prison in 2018, hours after being transferred from a facility in Florida.) In 2017, a driver sped into a crowd of people peacefully protesting a white nationalist rally in the Virginia college town of Charlottesville, killing 32-year-old Heather Heyer and injuring more than a dozen others. (The attacker, James Alex Fields, was sentenced to life in prison on 29 federal hate crime charges, and life plus 419 years on state charges.) In 2022, Salman Rushdie, the author whose writing led to death threats from Iran in the 1980s, was attacked and stabbed in the neck by a man who rushed the stage as he was about to give a lecture in western New York. Today's Birthdays: Investor and philanthropist George Soros is 95. Actor George Hamilton is 86. Singer-musician Mark Knopfler (Dire Straits) is 76. Singer Kid Creole (Kid Creole and the Coconuts) is 75. Film director Chen Kaige is 73. Jazz guitarist Pat Metheny is 71. Actor Bruce Greenwood is 69. Basketball Hall of Famer Lynette Woodard is 66. Rapper Sir Mix-A-Lot is 62. Actor Peter Krause is 60. Tennis Hall of Famer Pete Sampras is 54. Actor-comedian Michael Ian Black is 54. Actor Yvette Nicole Brown is 54. Actor Casey Affleck is 50. Boxer Tyson Fury is 37. Actor Lakeith Stanfield is 34. NBA All-Star Khris Middleton is 34. Actor Cara Delevingne is 33. Tennis player Stefanos Tsitsipas is 27.
Boston Globe
08-08-2025
- Boston Globe
Today in History: Devastating Maui wildfires
In 1775, 250 years ago, a skirmish between a British warship and Gloucester citizens unfolded after the HMS Falcon chased two rebel schooners toward Cape Ann. After one of the schooners became grounded in the harbor, British sailors attempted to seize it. Armed mostly with only muskets, residents raced to the shore and attacked the British, who eventually surrendered on the grounded schooner. Several British sailors were taken prisoner and other Americans who had been forcibly conscripted were freed. In 1814, during the War of 1812, peace talks between the US and Britain began in Ghent, Belgium. Advertisement In 1815, Napoleon Bonaparte set sail for St. Helena to spend the remainder of his days in exile. In 1876, Thomas Edison received a patent for his electric pen — the forerunner of the mimeograph machine. In 1908, Wilbur Wright made the Wright Brothers' first public flying demonstration at Le Mans racecourse in France. In 1911, President William Howard Taft signed a measure raising the number of US representatives from 391 to 433, effective with the next Congress, with a proviso to add two more when New Mexico and Arizona became states. In 1954, The Boston Globe announced the opening of the first elevated expressway in the United States. Hailed as an engineering marvel and a model of urban planning, the Central Artery incorporated the latest technology, including on and off ramps that could melt snow. Reporters predicted that a 25-minute commute would be reduced to a mere two minutes. It would eventually become one of the most gridlocked expanses of pavement in the United States. In 1963, Britain's 'Great Train Robbery' occurred as thieves made off with £2.6 million in banknotes. In 1969, photographer Iain Macmillan took the iconic photo of The Beatles that would appear on the cover of their album 'Abbey Road.' In 1974, President Richard Nixon, facing damaging new revelations in the Watergate scandal, announced he would resign the following day. In 1988, Chicago's Wrigley Field hosted its first-ever night baseball game; the contest between the Chicago Cubs and Philadelphia Phillies would be rained out in the fourth inning. Advertisement In 1992, the Queen Elizabeth II ran aground off the Elizabeth Islands in Massachusetts, ripping a 74-foot gash in its double hull. Ferry boats the next day evacuated 1,815 passengers and most of 1,000 crew members before the 963-foot boat -- one of the world's last luxury liners -- steamed to Boston for repairs. In 2000, the wreckage of the Confederate submarine, H.L. Hunley, which sank in 1864 after attacking the Union ship Housatonic, was recovered off the South Carolina coast and returned to port. In 2009, Sonia Sotomayor was sworn in as the US Supreme Court's first Hispanic and third female justice. In 2022, FBI agents executed a search warrant at the residence of former president Trump, located at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla.; over 13,000 government documents, including 103 classified documents, were seized. In 2023, a series of wind-driven wildfires broke out on the Hawaiian island of Maui, destroying the town of Lahaina and killing more than 100 people.
