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The Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse
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While visiting Daytona Beach, Florida, tourists and spring breakers should make it a point to save time out of the sun and head to the Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse.
The history of the lighthouse is full of loss, destruction, and a continuing preservation. The lighthouse gets its name from the recorded visit of Ponce de Leon to the area in 1513. A couple hundred years later when the British came to possess Florida from the Spanish in 1763 is about the time that people began to inhabit the area. In 1834, a few years after the United States acquired the inlet, construction of a lighthouse began. One year and $11,000 later, a 45 foot high lighthouse was completed; unfortunately, due to many factors that lighthouse crumbled into the water below.
After many years of ships lost at sea, Congress agreed to funding for yet another lighthouse. Thus, the 175 foot structure that still stands today was built and lit for the first time on November 1, 1887. The Principal Keeper William Rowlinski was in charge of maintaining the then kerosene fueled lamp, viewable from 18 nautical miles away. In 1926 Mosquito Inlet became Ponce de Leon inlet, and with the change in name came a change a few years later from kerosene to an electrical powered lens.
The only stretch of time that the lighthouse was “dark” was from 1970 until 1982. The Coast Guard decided to change to a beacon on the south side of the inlet in 1970, then in 1972 the Department of Interior of the Coast Guard chose to rid themselves of the property, and thus the town of Ponce de Leon Inlet decided to submit proposals for the use of the lighthouse. The Ponce de Leon Preservation Association decided to restore it and open it as a historic site, so it became part of the National Register of Historic Places and was later relit by the Coast Guard in 1982 with a 190 degree rotating lens capable of being seen from 16 nautical miles away; however, the current lens is the original 1933 restored third order Fresnel.
The museum currently contains the original three lighthouse keepers’ houses, where they and their families would live, each with its own woodshed and privy, plus the oil house where the kerosene was housed.
Bob Callister is currently in charge of the education department at the museum and one of his major responsibilities involves organizing the educational workshops. These workshops may include kid’s crafts where they can create yarn dolls and pennants, as well as workshops centered around actual archaeological dig sites on the property with authentic artifacts to be examined. There are also lens demonstrations in the lens museums.
Inside the lighthouse one would have to climb 203 steps before reaching the top; however, 10 of those steps are closed to the public and only accessible to the museum staff whenever they need to enter the lantern room. For those curious enough to visit, the museum hours are from 10am to 6pm with the last guest being admitted at 5pm. During the summer the museum stays open until 9pm, with the last guest entering at 8pm. Admission is $5 for adults 12 and up, and children are $1.50.
