East Brother Island Light, Victorian lighthouse on East Brother Island, San Rafael Bay, California
East Brother Island Light is a wooden lighthouse tower on a small island in San Rafael Bay, California. It connects to a two-story Victorian keeper's house painted in ochre with white trim, with a red lantern room at the top.
Congress allocated $20,000 in March 1871 for a lighthouse and fog signal, but mainland landowners refused to sell. After captains petitioned in January 1873, a further $30,000 was approved and construction began on East Brother Island in July 1873. The lamp was first lit on March 1, 1874.
The keeper's house has operated as a bed and breakfast since 1980, after volunteers restored the station. Guests stay in the 1874 Victorian building on the blasted one-acre rock, where the lamp was first lit on March 1, 1874.
The island lies a quarter mile offshore and is reached by boat; the restored keeper's house and fog signal building now serve as a bed and breakfast, so overnight stays must be booked in advance. Fog is frequent along this stretch of the Pacific coast, and the crossing should be planned with that in mind.
The island was levelled by large-scale blasting, and the resulting sandstone blocks were used to build a wall around its edge. The cistern was blasted 30 feet deep and holds 50,000 US gallons of rainwater, since the island had no fresh water for the keepers or the steam fog signal.
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