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The Roaring Twenties was a time of economic prosperity with a distinctive cultural change in the United States. Jazz music blossomed, clothing styles changed dramatically, and women finally won the right to vote. It was also a time that saw the rapid and large scale growth in the use of automobiles, telephones, and motion pictures.
This rapid growth and new technology also found its way into the United States Lighthouse Service, which, by 1923, declared that it had more employees decentralized outside of Washington, D.C. than any other branch of the government. When plans were announced for a World’s Fair, to be held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to honor the 150th Anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Lighthouse Service wanted to be a big part of the celebration, which had been officially named the National Sesquicentennial Exposition.
The U.S. Department of Commerce, under which the U.S. Lighthouse Service operated, planned a major display of important lighthouse apparatus and equipment. The July, 1926 Lighthouse Service Bulletin stated, “This exhibit will emphasize the old historic features of lighthouse work as far as practical in contrast with new and improved apparatus.” The Bulletin went on to give a detailed list of items that would go on display, including the first fog cannon to have been used in America, a 12-ton gas and bell buoy, a 1,000 pound fog bell, and many other types of lighthouse equipment. It would also include models of lighthouses and lightships, and 80 dramatic photos of lighthouses in two-foot square frames.
But the biggest and most prized part of the exhibit was the massive 1st order Fresnel lens that once saw duty in the north tower of the Twin Lights of Navesink in Highlands, New Jersey. In 1841, it was also the very first 1st order Fresnel lens to be installed in a lighthouse in the United States. The Bulletin went on to say, “Many types of modern lenses, giving much higher candlepower at greatly reduced expense will be exhibited near it.”
The U.S. Lighthouse Service sent a number of lighthouse keepers to the Sesquicentennial to help set up the lighthouse exhibits and that stated lighthouse keepers “will be present, in uniform, to care for the apparatus and explain the operation of various devices to visitors.” One of those men was veteran lighthouse keeper Harry E. Spencer, who was the keeper at the Liston Rear Range Lighthouse in Delaware. He was assigned to serve at the lighthouse exhibit from June 28, 1926 to August 20, 1926, and, as shown here, was photographed next to the 1st order Fresnel lens from Navesink Lighthouse, which was his duty station for the exhibit.
Billed as a World’s Fair, the Sesquicentennial Exposition also marked the 50th Anniversary of the 1876 Centennial Exposition, which was the first official World’s Fair held in the United States and also held in Philadelphia.
However, internal bickering by the exposition’s founders, planners, and financial backers caused cutbacks to the initial grand plans for the Sesquicentennial Exposition. The cutbacks were so dramatic that David C. Collier, the Director of the Exposition, resigned over the budget cuts. Amazingly, the fair opened on schedule on May 31, 1926.
One of the buildings planned for the Sesquicentennial was a 175-foot-tall structure that was named “The Tower of Light.” Reportedly, it was designed to cast a beam of light for 70 miles from its top. It is unclear if the U.S. Lighthouse Service was to supply the light for the tower. Running behind schedule, construction of the tower did not start until June 6, 1926, a week after the Exposition opened. Although the tower reached great height, organizers ran out of money and the tower, which looked more like a mini skyscraper, was never completed.
Probably because of the bad press, the Sesquicentennial Exposition drew smaller crowds than expected. By August of that year, it was $20 million in the red, an equivalent to nearly $285 million today. Somehow or another, the Exposition managed to keep its doors open until its scheduled closing in November of 1926. Variety dubbed it as “America’s Greatest Flop.”
The Exposition was unable to cover its debts, and in early 1927 was placed into receivership, at which time all of its assets were put up for auction and sold.
The January 1927 Lighthouse Service Bulletin stated that the work of dismantling the exhibit started on December 1, 1926 and proceeded rapidly. It went on to say, “Under the department’s instructions, the various bureaus pooled their forces and cooperated with each other, as well as with riggers and truckmen from the Philadelphia Navy Yard, Within two weeks all the exhibit material was removed and shipped to its storage destinations and the space allotted to the department cleared off and turned over in good condition to the exposition authorities.”
The next mention of the Navesink 1st order Fresnel lens was in a story about lighthouses that appeared in the Miami News on July 7, 1928 where a short sentence in referring to the lens stated, “The Bureau still preserves this lens as a relic.” But that statement does not say where the lens was reportedly being preserved.
In 1933 the 1st order Fresnel lens from the Navesink Light Station shows up at the Century of Progress International Exposition in Chicago, which became known as the Chicago World’s Fair, and as the Chicago Century of Progress Exposition. It opened on May 17, 1933 and was scheduled to run until November of that year. But unlike the 1926 Sesquicentennial in Philadelphia, the Chicago World’s Fair was so successful that it was decided to reopen the fair after the winter months and it ran again until November of 1934. Because of space limitations, the U.S. Lighthouse Service exhibit in Chicago was dramatically scaled down from the dramatic size of the 1926 exhibit in Philadelphia and contained many smaller items. The exception was 1st order Fresnel lens from Navesink Lighthouse, which was displayed in a corner of the exhibit.
But what happened to the 1st order Fresnel lens from the Navesink Light Station, America’s first Fresnel lens, after the Chicago World’s Fair closed? Did the U.S. Lighthouse Service disassemble the lens, crate it up, and ship it off to some undisclosed location? Was it shipped somewhere to be installed in another lighthouse or perhaps another upcoming exposition or exhibit? Did they loan it to some other organization? Did they place it in storage locally until they could figure out what they were going to do with it, and then forget about it? Did they order it destroyed when the World’s Fair was over? Considering that the lens from Navesink Lighthouse was the first Fresnel lens in use in America, it would seem that it would have been saved, if nothing else, but for its extreme historical significance.
In 1939 the Coast Guard took over the Lighthouse Service and in 1941 the United States was thrust into a World War. Did either of those events cause the lens to be forgotten about or discarded? And why after all these years, has none of the lighthouse experts or historians solved the mystery of what happened to the lens or where it is today?
To this day, the final outcome as to what happened to the 1st order Fresnel lens, America’s first Fresnel lens, from the Twin Lights of Navesink remains a mystery waiting to be solved. Perhaps it is stored in a government warehouse at some secret or mysterious location, all crated up in wooden boxes, sitting next to stacks of hundreds of other wooden crates such as in the ending of the Indiana Jones movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark, where the government brought and stored the Ark of the Covenant. The mystery may never be solved. Only time will tell. Maybe we’ll have the answer in the next edition of Lighthouse Digest.
This story appeared in the
Jan/Feb 2019 edition of Lighthouse Digest Magazine. The print edition contains more stories than our internet edition, and each story generally contains more photographs - often many more - in the print edition. For subscription information about the print edition, click here.
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