Sea Hill Light, Historical lighthouse on Curtis Island, Australia.
Sea Hill Light was a lighthouse on the northwest point of Curtis Island, Queensland. The first lighthouse, also called Little Sea Hill Light, was a 20-foot (6.1 m) square tower with a hardwood frame clad in corrugated iron, painted white with a red dome. A second, 43-foot (13 m) corrugated iron tower with lantern and gallery was built in the 1920s and demolished in early 2009.
The first Sea Hill Light was built in 1873 or 1876, the first Queensland lighthouse of a hardwood-frame, corrugated-iron design later used at Grassy Hill, Goods Island, Bay Rock, Old Caloundra, North Point Hummock, Gatcombe Head and Bulwer Island. In the 1920s it was moved about 6 km northeast to Station Point, deactivated in the 1960s and sold; it is now at the Gladstone Maritime Museum. A second lighthouse, 13 m high, was built in the 1920s, deactivated in 2006 and demolished in early 2009.
The lighthouse represents how Queensland built its maritime infrastructure during the colonial era to serve growing shipping traffic. Today it stands as a reminder of the region's dependence on coastal trade and navigation.
The first lighthouse now stands at the Gladstone Maritime Museum, where it can be viewed on land; the Curtis Island site itself holds only a small 7-foot beacon listed in 2010. Reaching that northwest point of the island takes a boat, and no public ferry or formed walking track is documented.
The first Sea Hill Light was the first Queensland lighthouse built with a hardwood frame clad in corrugated iron, a design later copied at seven more lights, from Grassy Hill to Bulwer Island. It is also the only square one of the eight; the others are round.
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