Janes Island Light

Janes Island Light

Location	Tangier Sound southwest of Janes Island (near Crisfield, Maryland)
Coordinates	37.9633°N 75.9185°W / 37.9633; -75.9185
Tower
Foundation	screw-pile
Construction	cast-iron/wood
Height	38 ft
Shape	hexagonal house
Light
First lit	1867 (second light in 1879)
Deactivated	1935
Lens	fourth-order Fresnel lens

The Janes Island Light was a screw-pile lighthouse located near Crisfield in the U.S. state of Maryland. Twice destroyed by ice, it was replaced in 1935 with an automated beacon.

History

Janes Island (also sometimes called James Island) has a shoal jutting out into Tangier Sound from its southwest point. The shoal was marked with lightships beginning in 1853, and in 1866 a screw-pile light was erected on the spot. It was destroyed by ice in 1879, and a new light was constructed to replace it, identical to the second Hooper Strait Light. The new light was damaged by ice in 1893, and in 1935 the house was torn from the foundation and floated in the sound for three days before sinking. A new beacon was constructed, a short tower on a caisson foundation, and it has remained in service since.

References

• "Historic Light Station Information and Photography: Maryland" (PDF). United States Coast Guard Historian's Office.
• Janes Island Light, from the Chesapeake Chapter of the United States Lighthouse Society
• de Gast, Robert (1973). The Lighthouses of the Chesapeake. Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 167. ISBN 9780801815485.

External links

• Rowlett, Russ. "Lighthouses of the United States: Maryland". The Lighthouse Directory. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.