June 9, 2004
Lighthouse groups save structures
Secretary of the Interior signs over five lighthouses at Traverse City conference
By Carol South
Herald contributing writer
It's a groaner, but true nevertheless: lighthouse people are lit up.
Exuding passion for both a specific structure and the historic beacons in general, lighthouse enthusiasts from around the state gathered in Traverse City for a three-day conference entitled "Keep the Lights Burning." Three organizations, the Michigan Lighthouse Project, the Michigan Lighthouse Fund and the Michigan Lighthouse Alliance, sponsored the conference, which drew 150 attendees from around the state and nation.
The conference featured a special highlight: the turning over of five lighthouses from federal government roster to private, county or state hands.
At a reception Friday evening held at the Great Lakes Culinary Institute, Gale Norton, Secretary of the Interior, signed over the three Michigan lighthouses and one in the state of Washington to new owners. These organizations or state or local government entities will cherish and maintain this slice of maritime heritage for future generations.
"I'm always amazed at the special energy in any room full of lighthouse people," Norton said. "They are one of the most enthusiastic groups of people I've ever encountered."
After her remarks, Norton put pen to paper and signed the transferred of the Sturgeon Point Light, the Manitou Island Light (on the Keweenaw Peninsula in the Upper Peninsula), the Cheboygan River Front Range Light and the Grays Harbor Light in Washington state.
The next day, Norton presided over a special ceremony in Benzie County that transferred ownership of the Point Betsie lighthouse from the Bureau of Land Management to the county.
"There's a mystique to lighthouses, a resonance for the lifesaving function of lighthouses," Norton said Friday evening. "Lighthouse are truly a national phenomenon and everybody can help in some way to protect them."
Michigan's 3,200 miles of Great Lakes shoreline sports more than 120 lighthouses, the most of any state in the nation. Norton said this profusion of lighthouses requires special effort by the state's citizens to preserve these structures - and the history they represent.
"Michigan has the responsibility and the challenge to find caretakers for these lights," she told the conference attendees. "Volunteers like you are the lifeblood of this preservation."
"We're here to keep the lights on and the Michigan Lighthouse Project is a model for other states," Norton added.
The move to privatize lighthouses gained momentum when the United States Coast Guard decided they were not in the historical lighthouse preservation business. In 1997, they decided to remove 300 lighthouses from their responsibility.
"State historical societies and a lot of groups got involved and in 1998 the Michigan Lighthouse Project was formed," recalled Dr. Steve Belko, administrator of the organization, which is based in Clarkston.
Belko, a Missouri native who has summered in Northport since childhood, said the project's goal is to help organizations form and find funding to take over these lighthouses.
Michigan Lighthouse Project members include a range of state and local governmental officials, historical organizations as well as private individuals. They all work together to help preserve the 50 or so lighthouses still in federal hands, teaching the basics of becoming a non-profit organization, raising money, operating and restoring a facility and so on. Conferences such as this one help train others as well as get the word out about the quest to preserve the lighthouses.
"A lot of the lighthouses have deteriorated but none are lost," Belko noted. "We will do everything we can to find homes for these lighthouses, about half are already in state hands and others are privately owned."
"We will hold [historical groups'] hands as much as possible, if we don't know how to do something they need, we'll find someone who does," he added.
This knowledge base is crucial as the cost of preserving a lighthouse runs at around $250,000-300,000 each, noted Kirk Lindquist, president of the Michigan Lighthouse Fund.
"We're working with non-profits, community foundations and communities to find funds," he noted.