The lens lantern at Lime Point was hung on the southeast corner of the fog-signal building’s gallery, where it was nineteen-and-a-half feet above the water. Accordingly, on November 26, 1900, lens lanterns were lighted at the three stations, and California now had three new lighthouses. A light was added at Año Nuevo in 1890, and a decade later, it was decided that the keepers at the remaining three fog signal stations should also exhibit a light. However, fog posed a very serious danger to vessels, especially near San Francisco, and in the late 1800s, fog signal stations were established at Año Nuevo, Point Montara, Lime Point, and Point Knox. Light stations, which may or may not have included a fog signal, were much more common than fog signal stations. The cost of operating the signal for a twenty-four hour period fell from $25.44 to $6.91, and the oil had the added advantage of producing less smoke. The crude oil was fed into a burner at high pressure, mixed with steam, and the resulting minute particles were then set on fire. In an attempt to save money, the boilers were converted in 1902 from coal to oil. The hungry boilers could consume over ninety tons of coal a year, at a rate of 180 pounds per hour when the signal was in operation. Heavy rains during the first winter triggered a landslide that damaged the water tank and led to its being moved to the top of the bluff near the springs, some 1,800 feet from the fog signal. That first autumn, it was found that the spring could not furnish an adequate water supply so a pipe was extended to a second spring. The fog signal was placed in operation on September 10, 1883, with Reinhold Holzhuter serving as the first head keeper and Patrick J. Water for the keepers and the fog signal was tapped at a nearby spring, piped to the station, and stored in a 20,000-gallon tank situated at the inner end of the spur. The fog signal building was positioned closest to the water, so its twin twelve-inch steam whistles, powered by coal-fired boilers, could warn vessels away from the rocky hazard. Progress was at first slow due to the narrow and steep construction site, but over the next few months a one-story fog signal building, a coal shed, and a two-story keeper’s duplex started to rise above the rocky spur. Lime Point Lighthouse with steam whistles in 1893Īfter Congress provided the needed $12,000, work on erecting a fog signal on Lime Point began early in March 1883. “When the sound of a signal on Lime Point is once picked up anywhere outside the harbor or off the city front,” the Board claimed, “it can be steered for directly, and with confidence, until it is so close aboard that it can be made in the thickest weather and then the position can be determined with such accuracy that a straight course can be laid either to the city or to the sea.” The Lighthouse Board entertained the matter and concluded that the proposed steam fog signal should be erected at Lime Point, on the opposite side of the Golden Gate, since there was “an evident obstruction to the transmission of sound” at Fort Point that caused vessels approaching from the south to often lose the ringing of the fog bell when they needed it most. In 1882, the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce petitioned Congress for a “fog-syren” at Fort Point, where a fog bell was then in use. Lime Point is situated on the northern side of the Golden Gate’s narrowest section, and from this point, a rocky spur, just twenty feet wide, extends roughly 100 feet into the bay.
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