Captain Joshua Card here, at Fort Point on the New Hampshire Seacoast. The days are getting longer and the weather’s been mostly clear. I haven’t had to wind the fog bell mechanism in more than a month. That will change come summer. Thought I’d tell you about Benjamin Ellsworth today, another contemporary of mine who… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #12
Ahoy, Captain Joshua Card here, down at Portsmouth Harbor Light in my home town of New Castle, New Hampshire. Winter’s been hanging on tight but spring is just around the corner, so they tell me. Today I’d like to tell you about an interesting fellow who kept the old Egg Rock Lighthouse down the coast… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #11
Captain Joshua Card here, down at Portsmouth Harbor Light Station in New Castle, New Hampshire. We’re looking forward to a new paint job for the tower this spring. Thought I’d take this opportunity to tell you about a colorful character who was a contemporary of mine down in Rhode Island, John Mullen—better known as Captain… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #10
Joshua Card here. I hope you’ve been enjoying this happy season. I’ve had a very merry Christmas eve and day with my daughter and some friends, but I promise you it wasn’t so merry that it interfered in any way with my light keeping duties. There was a little light snow to heighten the holiday… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #9
Joshua Card here. I hope you’ve been enjoying this happy season. I’ve had a very merry Christmas eve and day with my daughter and some friends, but I promise you it wasn’t so merry that it interfered in any way with my light keeping duties. There was a little light snow to heighten the holiday… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #9
Ahoy mateys, Captain Joshua Card here. Been getting the Portsmouth Harbor station ready for winter, and we have plenty of coal to heat the house and kerosene on hand for the light. I’d like to take this opportunity to tell you about a lighthouse keeper from down Rhode Island way, Horace Weeden Arnold. Horace was… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #8
Captain Joshua Card here. Been busy lately, scraping and painting the tower and showing the summer people around my station. Been meaning to check in with you folks for a while. I thought I’d tell you about a colorful old acquaintance, a contemporary of mine from down Connecticut way. Stratford native Theodore Judson became keeper… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #7
Captain Joshua K. Card here. Like many of my contemporary lighthouse keepers in the late 1800s and early 1900s, I was sometimes accused of being a pirate. I can assure you I was nothing of the sort, in spite of my salty appearance. But there was a keeper before me down in Massachusetts who couldn’t… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #6
Captain Joshua K. Card here. I told you a while back about my early days as a keeper in 1860s and ’70s at Boon Island, one of the most isolated and desolate light stations imaginable. But I learned many years ago about a light keeper who had a much more miserable life on a little… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #5
When last we met I was telling you about Keeper William C. Williams, the longtime keeper of bleak and isolated Boon Island Lighthouse off the southern Maine coast. Getting on and off the island was hard enough in calm conditions, but frequently a risky proposition when the seas grew heavy. On one occasion in April… Continue reading The Kaptain’s Kolumn #4
