The Lighthouse Lens

Somewhere in this blogs chronicles, I thought I’d written on lighthouses, maybe it was only a light inside my head not released yet…

Growing up stories told how the family living in the lighthouse had to go up everyday and wash the lens so it would shine its brightest to alert ships of danger. I envisioned it (actually until just this year) that the lens was like a large 2 or 4 sided smooth convex glass shape, (similar to the smooth side of a telescope) and to clean it you took your big rag and wiped it off. Simple enough, even though it was often over 100 feet high or higher and in the wind and cold…brrr!!!

This summer we toured a maritime museum off the coast of Detroit in the Huron River and saw a number of those lighthouse lenses. I was shocked! Instead of them looking like a RR semaphore light, these were extremely complex rings of crystal glass, (which the wind could blow through) tiered and layered in such a way so when the lamp was lit inside, the light would reflect and refract and so forth to shine out with maximum brightness. It is said some of the lenses shone 20 miles out to sea! (out to see!)

The lenses were 2-3 feet in height or width and it would take some concentrated effort to clean each piece of glass to clarity. (Interesting side note, it was discovered fish glue was heat resistant making it perfect for glass lens repairs.)

While the lenses are called Fresnal lenses, after the Frenchman who contributed so much to its development, there were many others before and after who helped perfect the lighthouse light.

Why? Why are you telling us this story. Anybody could find out about these things and who cares anyway. We have radar now, etc., etc., etc.

The point is it shows care and concern for another human being. We don’t know who might be stuck in the storm at sea, their names, their families, or what they’re doing on a stormy night in the dark. But somebody else thought to shine a light for them so they didn’t crash into a precipitous coastline and be killed.

Yes, we are to watch out and care for one another.

Interesting finale to the story of Fresnal, he died at only 39 after devoting his life to perfecting the illuminating brilliance to save others. He was sick for several years, but kept working on his designs. From the symptoms he had, and I am no doctor, it sounds like he died of TB, a disease which comes upon people who have overworked themselves and neglected proper care 😦 ) He did this while helping others.