Episode 85 - Point Bonita Lighthouse

0:00 Hi everyone, I'm Vince and I'm Emily and you're listening to the lighthouse lowdown You're gonna push it again, yeah, I was gonna turn it off like enough of that you can't cut that now You can't let it roll. I'm not used to being the button presser. Here's what's fun First off. Hi everyone. Welcome to 85 episode 85 You got a five number. That's always satisfying. I know. I don't think I've had one in a while. Anyways, here's what's fun. When we record, we're a little bit like radio jockeys or whatever, disc jockeys, radio people, because we listen to the sound playing. Almost everyone who does video and sound editing, they insert like now. I'm going to insert my 10 second. Welcome to. That's what I did in the past. Ours is actually live. Yeah, so we're like. Every time. We're extra cool. Yeah, we're actually listening with you. Just in our headphones.

1:00 Right. Sometimes there's dancing. We actually have a live band off to the side that plays it every time. Okay, so welcome to 85. Thank you. Thank you for being here. You're welcome. I'm going to give a shout out. I found out. So we have pretty low listens right now on YouTube. Oh, YouTube. I was like, you're lying. Our podcast is doing exceptional. Oh, well, thanks, everybody. I didn't know that. It's great. It's fun. We're bad at this as far as like knowing. Talk us up. Talk us up. I'm not operating this as if it's a business. I'm operating this as if it's something I do for fun. Which it is. We make no money.

1:40 So anyways, thanks. Thanks, everybody, for coming. But I want to give a shout out to one of the people who is keeping our YouTube alive. Alex at work. Oh, thank you, Alex. That's nice. He told me he prefers to watch on YouTube. He doesn't always watch. He says he listens. But YouTube, he has like a premium account, I guess. So, OK, no ads. And I was like, well, we also don't do ads. So I can understand the appeal of. sometimes watching like people do the podcast, but I, I don't know. I feel more calm listening and my eyes don't also have to be activated, you know? Yeah. That's yeah. I like podcasts for that reason where it's like you're listening and that's the best part is like, I don't have to also be staring at a screen to enjoy it. Right. Like a movie.

2:31 I'm almost always driving. I watched zero TV. Movies are great. So I've got to let everyone down. There's no history buoy today. That's okay. I had one started. I know what it is still, but I couldn't find the source material, and so I don't want to just like half do it. I appreciate that. No buoy. I used to have a lot more buoys to skip to catch up to me. Well, we're doing good. So let's just get started. Okay. I had this lighthouse on my list for a long time. My list is much shorter than Emily's list. It's huge. But I'm supposed to check her list, and I didn't until I was already like halfway through the research. That's okay. And so I poached one.

3:16 Great minds think alike. Welcome. What is it? To Point Bonita. Bonita. Yes. Okay, I don't know anything about it. Cool. That's perfect. That's what we do here. Was it a listener lighthouse or no? No, it didn't have any credits. I wonder how I put that on my list. So Point Bonita Lighthouse, the reason it was on my list, it was the second batch of eight lighthouses added to the state of California. Oh, yes. And you've covered one of them at least. Another one that was on our list and you had already covered was Hereford. No, you covered. Oh, it was on your list also.

3:58 Oh, was it? Yeah. Oh. Because it's the same. I forget. I wish I'd, this is the time when I should say, because I know, but I don't know. Oh. That architecture. Yeah, yeah. They applied it to all those lighthouses. The first four were carried over. East to west coast. Yeah, stick. That sounds right. Stick something. Stick style. Stick. Stick. And then, you know, Victorian, Gothic. Yeah. Anyway, so there's some architecture that's shared between those. But there's a couple. And Alcatraz Island is really close to this. It's in the San Francisco Bay. So we're going to talk about that first. Okay, great. So here's a little look at the cover. I just made it. And we're going to use the link for Vader Abode Lite because that's the last one I looked at on Google Maps. So we're going to go from Sweden. We're going to just show you Sweden to San Francisco.

4:45 It's just like that. Boom, just pop on over. At least you know where it is. I would be like, where is it? San Francisco. And then it's over here. I would have to type it in. No chance. I actually did test this out like a minute ago to see if I could find it. And then I just left the Vaderobold. Yeah, it just happened that way. There was a lot going on. Anyways, that's a Sweden lighthouse that I covered last. If you're interested in checking that out. Yeah, Vaderobold. Starts with a V. Here's San Francisco. And here we have the Golden Gate Bridge. Oh, look at that. That's cool. Google does this like 360 thing I've never seen before. Brand new. Alcatraz and East Brother Island is a little bit north. Yes, of course.

5:27 Where's brother? Excuse me. Keep going. It's past the little nub. Or no. Yeah. Zoom in. There it is. Is that right? Yeah. Okay. You can't see pink on blue. I'm too far from the screen. My glasses are not made for this. Okay, so anyways, here we're in San Francisco, and I'll read from my notes, but a couple things, just kind of fun facts that don't really fit in anywhere else. Yeah, got to start with them. Obviously, it's near the Golden Gate Bridge, which has a long history in San Francisco. It's worth looking up on its own. It's known as the hidden gem of San Francisco because it's literally hidden behind a rock. Point Bonita? Point Bonita. That's not very good for a lighthouse. It's really pretty.

6:12 It's good. Okay. There's a purpose. But not for like seeing it from the city of San Francisco. Oh, I see what you're saying. You got to go out there. And then I have a gap on here. Open Sunday and Monday. I'm actually not sure. There's been a lot of changes. Yeah. But keep in mind as we listen, you can visit. Right now, currently, there's a bridge that typically you would cross that's closed for repairs. So we'll come back to that. It's hard to get to. Yeah. So really at this moment, I can't recommend going there. But it's been great to visit. It looks great to visit again. So, of course, it's busy because it's in California. But, hey, to visit it, there's a walk down a trail. It's about a mile. You have to get to the island. There's a door that is often closed. The door is closed because they're not open. If it's open, the door goes through a tunnel. And then maybe at the end we can watch a little YouTube video. Cool. Just you and I.

7:07 I like it when they make getting there an adventure too. There's a tunnel. There's a cliff side walking path with railing and such. And then there's a bridge that was built in the 50s, I think, the last bridge, the latest of the bridges, 1950s, that resembles the Golden Gate Bridge in style. Cute. So if I'm going to flash back to our slides, you're going to see that kind of that cable support style. Yeah. So that's the bridge. That's cute. What else do I want to say about that? Do you have to do all that just to get there? Like cliffside walkway? Yeah, it's one mile total in walking.

7:47 Climbing is not open to the public. I don't think it ever actually has been. Is it because the lens is still in there? The lens is still there. Second order. Pretty cool. Jealous. Also, last little fun fact that doesn't really fit in the history here. Someone referred to it as pobo. P -O -B -O. Point Bonita. Oh my gosh. So I'm going to call it Pobo sometimes because I like that. You know the people who actually live there are like, no. No, it's not Pobo. Pobo. You have to say the whole thing. Point Bonita Lighthouse. Or maybe that's like a fond term for it. Could be an endearment. Like by the locals. Yeah. You know. Surf's up or whatever. I don't even know. I have no idea if like you can surf in the San Francisco area. No idea. Probably. There's an ocean. There is water. So I'm going to bring up, here's an image, the original Point Bonita Lighthouse. That reminds me of Split Rock, just how it's placed. That's pretty neat. Very sheer cliff going on. Humongous. How high up is that?

8:50 Sorry, you can just continue on your notes. That's okay. It was a 60 -foot conical brick tower situated 260 feet above the sea. Whoa. Yeah. 260 feet. Pretty high. Well, because like looking at this photo that you have pulled up, it looks very short. 60 feet. That's six stories tall. Yeah. It's a tall second order Fresnel lens. I heard one of the guys who has made a video that I watched and they said a Fresnel lens or Fresnel. I think he said Fresnel. And I was like, no. Like, what an American. Am I right? Now that we know one thing, I'm an expert, of course. Hey, we can be annoyed. It took a long time for us to get that correct. Yeah, we asked that question. We asked that question. How is it pronounced? So Fresnel. So the original tower, we're going to talk about, it actually wasn't a good idea of where it was put. And you can probably deduce why. Well, you know. Too high? Funny enough, too high. Oh. So yeah, I'm just going to, well, I might have to skip this later, but the original lighthouse, the first one which we're viewing, 60 foot conical brick tower, 260 feet over the sea. It's a one and a half story brick and stone cottage that went with it. Yeah. That was built near the tower. It's not shown in this image though. Is it like tucked behind there or something?

10:10 Don't know. It's not there anymore. Oh, that's a shame. Yeah, and the first head keeper lit the lamp so that the lighting was May 2nd of 1855. All right. And his name was Edward Colston. So kind of cool. First keeper. Okay. So in the 1850s, there was the gold rush, the 49ers, right? Yeah. She's smiling so big. The gold rush. The gold rush. You know the gold rush when we all went up to California. I don't know what accent that is. All right, 1849 was, right, the big pop. So in the 1850s, California exploded. There was a growth in San Francisco from 20 ,000 was the ending population. I think it was like 5 ,000 people. We don't talk about the gold rush very often. It's come up a couple times in this California. Yeah. Because trade made the area boom. And there was a couple lighthouses already.

11:09 Lighthouses, so 1850s. So there was already lighthouses in the area. Notably, Alcatraz Island and Fort Point were in those first batch of eight lighthouses that were contracted to be built on the West Coast, the wet coast. It is wet. Are they saying white coast? Also, if you feel something on you, it's because there's a fly just absolutely pestering you. I thought that was just schizophrenia coming in slowly. It's all over you. I can feel it. Must be stinky. Anyways. So the second batch of eight lighthouses was this contract that included Point Bonita or Pobo. Pobo. So it's because when we looked at the map, you know, the bay is obviously it's a, you know, C shape with an opening. Yeah.

11:58 Golden Gate Bridge. Bridge is the opening. Very interesting how that happened too. What? Like just a skinny little channel and then this big. Yeah. Bay. And the, I actually don't know that that's entirely, I'm sounding dumb, I'm sure, if there was any man control to how that worked. Probably not. Anyways, California. And so Pobo was put out on kind of the tip of the land on the north side. So the north side comes down, south side comes up. The north side has this tip out here. So it was like on the outside? On the outside, on the southern face, southern and western face towards the water. So there was another place discussed. Originally it was called Point Lobos, which is another area. It's on the south side of the entrance of the Golden Gate. But the locals said that actually approaching Pobo Bonita would be better because the water was deeper there. You could come like... 150 feet and in, you could hug this thing and then come into the bay. Yeah, safe to get close. Right, right. So you could go further out to sea, you could see the other lights and come in, or it would be nice to have another navigation point.

13:12 Yeah. So that's where Pobo came from, the need for it. So it was $25 ,000 from Congress, which... Oh, that's a lot, $1850. I was going to say, it's almost never enough money, but this time I guess California was golden. Well, we covered. That was March 3rd of 1853. Congress allocated those funds. And this is the time of the Lighthouse Board in the United States. Fresh or? I don't know. Okay, I can't remember the dates. Yeah, I can't recall. This is early on, I think, when westward expansion became part of the Lighthouse Board's concerns, I think was these years. I mean, it was really when they started building that program out there. But it was kind of an expensive mistake to choose the point that they chose, which is what we talked about. It was too high. They planned actually for the lighthouse to sit on the highest hill on Punta Bonita. That's not always better. It's not. There is a time when, which what most people probably think, oh yeah, put the light as high as you can. It'll go the furthest. You can reference it. That's what we've discovered not true. So the fog in this area in particular, even to today, is notorious for being high setting fog. So that didn't really work with the lighthouse. Yeah. Quite often, the lighthouse was shrouded in fog, rendering it nearly useless to the men at sea. Yeah, I can imagine. So because it couldn't be seen and they had just built it, they needed some type

14:45 of signal for non -visible time. So an eight foot long cannon was purchased. Oh no. Cannon time. A cannon. A dude named Edward Maloney was hired to fire this cannon. So he was a retired army sergeant at the time. And his job was to be on staff to fire it every half hour in times of fog. Which is like all the time. Almost all the time. So where is this? Big seasonal. Right. But continually firing a cannon. Did they actually shoot something out of the cannon? Is that what makes the sound? Okay, I don't know what makes. Basically like a big fiery trumpet. Boom. Yeah, just a boom. Boom, am I right? I mean, even Fort Hayes State, if you're familiar, that's where I'm from, but they had a cannon at the football games, and they would fill a balloon with, I think it was acetylene, I'm actually not sure.

15:37 Oh, my. Some flammable gas, and they would put it down into the cannon, and the cannon faced the crowd at a range of 100 yards. You know, it was off. off the face of the crowd and anytime there was a touchdown a guy with an acetylene torch you know a welder's torch would hold it to the hole which would ignite it and it was it was loud i don't know if it's as loud as an actual cannon firing like if there's a cannonball if it's louder the charge is more or whatever but it was loud and they do it again if they made a field goal which is oh you know what is it pat the field goal right after the uh you know Sports. Yeah. Anyways, so. You're talking to the wrong person about that. You're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, sports ball. Yeah, that's tough.

16:20 Yeah, the point extra, yeah. Yeah, point after touchdown. Anyways. Six to seven. So they'd fire this cannon in times of fog. That started August 8th, 1855. So it was just months later. Yeah, they were like, wait a minute. He sent a complaint via a letter to the secretary of the lighthouse board. Quote. Whoa. Oh, my gosh. End quote. The guy firing the cannon. Because it's so often.

17:15 Because it's every 30 minutes. You can't sleep. That doesn't make any sense. Yeah, it's like, are you wanting me to work 24 -7? That doesn't make any sense. Do you lay next to the cannon? At least he cares so much that he's like, I have to fire this 24 -7. So somebody needs to come help me. I'm surprised he doesn't walk off the job. Well, yeah, but people die. So he's firing this cannon. Soon after this letter, an assistant was hired to provide some relief for Sergeant Maloney. Okay. Sergeant Maloney also sounds like a character from a show. Like because it's so close to Maloney. Or a cat's name. Sergeant Maloney. That's what we should name our next cat. Sergeant. Maloney. Alas, all the effort that went into firing the cannon was in vain. As mariners reported, it was inaudible from the water. A cannon. An eight -foot cannon. So, and, you know. I don't know if that means all the time or when it was stormy. But I remember us doing a history boo one time that talked about how high -pitched notes traveled better in air. Is that true? I thought it was low. Because we had the bi -tone.

18:23 No, piano. They said there was someone playing piano. Oh, and they could hear it. No, I can't. Anyways, so he was fed up. Mr. Maloney. Yeah. Sergeant, excuse me. Okay, my job's actually useless and I'm tired. He resigned one year from when he started. Oh, that's crazy. That's a long time. I would not have lasted a year. And I don't know if the fog is all year round. No. Okay. No. I'm not used to being the support. So he retired. So that cannon was replaced with the West Coast. Oh, excuse me. It was the West Coast first fog signal. Oh. That cannon. Really? Yes.

19:13 And it was replaced by a mechanically struck bell, which was installed near the lighthouse. You know how pissed he had to have been? Maloney had to have been like, you wait until I resign? It's like I've reached my absolute limit, and then you... His job was not to be there to tend to Bell. His job was to fire a cannon because he was an army sergeant. Like, this guy won't kill himself. But it wasn't even useful. That's the problem. If it were doing a damn good job, then it would be worth it. But it wasn't even worth it. Yep. Yep. So mechanically struck Bell. Kind of cool. So time goes by, 20 years, 1870s. It was clear that the fog signal in the lighthouse should be relocated to the southwestern tip of Point Bonita. where they would be at a lower elevation to better serve the mariners. The whole lighthouse or the fog signal? The fog signal and lighthouse should both be moved. Whoa. Because they were picked on this highest point, and I think this was the north side, so ships were coming from the north, but they were trying to get to the south to get into the cove. You want to know when to stop from, stop, yeah. And it was lower over there. So remember, though, this is a rock, so there's a couple interesting things.

20:24 They noted that these were Chinese workers that did a lot of this work. I don't know how that's relevant, but they noted it. Against their will? I don't know. Railroad workers. Probably not. But there was a narrow path that was carved into the rocky point. What? Oh, sorry. The rocky point. Yeah, I know. Just crazy. And they made a landing platform for supplies. A railway. With a 45 degree incline, which is really steep. For anyone who wants to know, that's one for one slope. They made a railroad for this? To load supplies, to get them up. Do you think that that's normal? Well, we've seen it a couple times now. Oh, really?

21:05 Yeah. I only remember when they would make kilns to bake bricks on site to use in Lighthouse, which I guess alone, if they're willing to go that crazy, it's not that crazy that they would build a railway for supplies. I mean, we even do that today. We don't make bricks on site, but we make concrete. If the project is big enough, they actually build a concrete plant on site to make concrete. Okay, I didn't know that. Pretty cool. Crazy. Anyways, so there's a 45 -degree angle on this railroad. That's wild. And a platform to a path. Can you imagine how hard it had to...

21:51 I wish we had video. Emily's pumping her arms in a circular motion as if she is a locomotive. Bigger and bigger, because somehow... I was feeling, I was like, channel the locomotive. Channel it. These people are going to be like, how many drinks in are they? Zero. One coffee. Okay, so a steam -powered winch. pulled the cart that contained the supplies up this 45 -degree thing to the landing. What is it? A winch? Steam -powered winch. So a winch is a mechanically driven pulley. It rotates and it collects cable. I wouldn't say chain, but I'll say cable around a spool.

22:36 So there can even be winches on trucks, like on pickup trucks. You can put a winch on the front. So if you get stuck, you can hook it to a tree. So it would let out? It would just pretty much go from point A to point B back and forth? Yeah. It would let out to let the cart down to the water and then pull it back up. And the pulling is where a lot of the work is because gravity helps with the other way around. But it would pull small cars filled with supplies and construction materials up the track. Cute. Very dangerous. And then, you know, during this construction, one section of the rocky face was impenetrable. It was just super hard. They just couldn't carve the path they wanted to pass. So they actually made a wooden walkway that skirted that portion as a cliff edge. Oh. Now, today, that's not there anymore because they tunneled through the rock.

23:31 They got through the hard part. Which is where those Chinese gentlemen, I assume gentlemen, came in to. literally tunnel and it's still stable you can still walk through it so on your little your little hike down uh it's the doorway i talked about yeah opens to this tunnel i want to go so we'll look at it we got to look at a video but we'll do it at the end so there was a in 1872 there was a steam fog siren that commenced operation which is pretty cool spooky um but two years later it was undermined by a landslide Oh, no. Landslide. This is so interesting. I feel like there's a lot of little lighthouse things that we haven't talked about, like landslides. I don't think we've encountered a landslide.

24:13 No, I don't think so. So the point was cut down 25 feet to provide a more secure site for the new signal. So they're going through this whole deal. Wow. It was deactivated two years later in 1874, resumed its operation in its new home. So they demoed and moved it because it wasn't that it collapsed, but being undercut meant the land below it fell away, and so it was going to probably collapse. So I just can't believe it. But because of the extra work and this little more distance that they had to go, they brought on a second and third assistant keepers in the 1870s. So a full house, four people. Do they have families? Oh, cool. They do have families.

24:54 There were several families out there. Look at that bridge. I didn't realize the bridge was so close to the lighthouse. It's so cute. It's close to the lighthouse, and we're going to see some really high -resolution new photos at the end from various travelers and bloggers. It's quite a precarious place to be. We'll see up close. I wouldn't have imagined landslides being a problem when everything's rocky, you know? Whatever they built on. So the new lighthouse. The second location, when in operation 1877, everything from the lower balcony up is the original 1855 tower. Lower balcony, like up towards the top of the lighthouse? Okay. Yeah, so not the base, but everything else, which included the Fresnel lens, so it's the same, the original still, and eagle -shaped rain spouts, which I could not find a picture of. No! But I bet they're still there. That's so cool. Yeah. I love it when they have beautiful architectural touches.

25:56 Like, which lighthouse was it? So many. Maybe Nubble. But one of the lighthouses had miniature versions of it. Oh, yeah. On the rail. Little brass versions of the lighthouse. So good. Pretty cool. Thank you. Whoever was like, let's just spend the extra money to make it cool. Thank you for that. Just whatever. Just do it. No big deal. For real. Really cool. Eagles, that's awesome. Yeah, so the new lighthouse in this placement that you see, it's 124 feet above sea, so it's 180 feet lower than the predecessor. That's crazy. So very different location, yeah. And even, that's still really high. So how tall is the new tower?

26:50 Like, did they chop it? I think it was the same height. I think they just rebuilt. Because they don't mention that it's different. Okay. It seems low, though. Yeah, it looks more squat than 60. It might be lower than 60, but I actually don't have that figure right now. Yeah, but like... Let's see. Also, compared to the bridge and everything, maybe it is. You know, we've talked many times about the tower height. Yeah. Like how do you discern? Yeah. So, so it's a 33 foot tall tower, the focal plane. Oh. But the focal plane is 124 feet above sea level. Okay. So it's smaller and it's, that makes sense. Cause as you're going to see it in these photos, it doesn't look very much taller than the structure next to it. Cute.

27:41 Fun fact. John Briarcliff Brown was one of the keepers there. He went through several positions, so he was promoted multiple times. He was serving as the head keeper when the new lighthouse was built. So over his career there, which was about 30 years, Brown and his assistants were credited with saving over 40 lives. Oh, my. So several shipwrecks that I have some notes here. It looks very treacherous. There's one story. I won't go into detail, but two boats were being pulled by a tugboat into the bay. One of them had chlorine gas. Oh, my gosh. Which they said if that ship had wrecked, so they became disconnected from the tugboat somehow. Oh, can you imagine the fear? They said like 40 -foot swells were going on. I'd be like, I'm out of here. If that ship had wrecked. This is in 79? 19 or 18? Ignore that. I don't know when this was. But if that ship had wrecked, that gas would have been released, and they would have had to evacuate the entire city of San Francisco. I think it was like 700 ,000 people. I think this is 79. Anyways, and then the other boat had beer and lumber, which it did hit the rocks, and the lumber and beer could not be saved. If we had to pick one, I suppose it's the beer that could go. But it is a shame. Anyways, so shout out to Brown and his assistants. 40 Lives. Briarcliff. And there was a bunch of ship owners and merchants that got

29:14 together, I think at his retirement. It's hard to say. But they got together at the Office of the Collectors of Customs. So like shipping folks. In 1896 and presented him with a gold -headed cane. Pretty sick. Awesome. Yeah. Gold -headed cane. The same year. What? Just like a knob. That's all I have. Okay. Gold -headed cane. Probably the grip is gold. Yeah. That's what my grandpa had. We have it here. It's pretty cool. That's cool. Wow. I was just thinking, I was hoping you were going to say gold eagle -headed cane.

29:55 Yeah. You know, to match. California bear or eagles from the spouts or a lighthouse. Ow, that would be kind of painful. Assuming you had to use it. Yeah. If you're actually using it for assistance. Yeah. Which I bet he was. Probably. That's a pretty unique thing. That was the time in which everybody had canes. It was fashionable. Yeah. You're just like. Can you imagine getting a cane now? Like for our wedding present or something? I'd be like, why? We got you a cane. It's a fine mahogany. Fine mahogany. It's like, can I sell it? Here's another. Okay, sorry. What? I was just going to go in deeper. Go for it. No. It was more for the moment thing. What were you saying? There's another story of rescue I'd like to share. The day after Christmas, 1896. That was a bad time for a rescue. Why? Because you're all like. Tis the season. Because it's reality check. She gave me a very stern look. Okay. Keeper George D. Cobb with two Bs. Cobb Salad. Yep.

31:09 That was his name after him. He was on duty amid rain squalls and gale wind when he saw a sailboat capsize off of the point, sending its three occupants into turbulent water. Oh, no. No doubt they were celebrating Christmas. I'm sure. Cobb reacted immediately. and soon he had successfully launched the station's rowboat, life -saving station here, by the way. I forgot to say that. Upon reaching the sailboat, because of all this, life -saving station, he found two unconscious men in the water. Oh my gosh. Which is impressive that he pulled them aboard, because they're blacked. Yeah. Wait, they were... Unconscious. Unconscious, but not blacked, like drunken? Blacked out. Okay.

31:51 Unconscious. Anyways. That is crazy. The third victim, cut and bleeding profusely, was soon found among some nearby rocks. Cobb succeeded in pulling him aboard as well. Among the rocks? This is crazy. Who are these men? Is this average or is this exceptional? I can't even stand up on a paddleboard. I've never even tried. This guy's pulling men onto a boat during a storm. Rocks! So all three of them survived. That's crazy. It's crazy. And he was awarded, Cobb was awarded the Life Saving Services Silver Medal for his heroic rescue. Love that. This accident further punctuated the need for a life -saving station. I mistimed this, sorry. On the northern side of the Golden Gate. And such a station was established at Point Bonita, 1899. Cool. So this was kind of a... So Cobb was in charge of the life -saving station. At the time, he was a keeper.

32:52 Oh. It sounds like. And then they drove the need for a licensing station. You may remember 1899, shortly after that was 1906. Only seven years. In history, it was pretty short. Do you remember what happened that year? No. In San Francisco. Earthquake. Massive earthquake. Big fires. Big boy. Yeah. Right? Huge. Okay. Which we've talked about, and you should go back and listen to East Brother Light and also Alcatraz Island Light. Any other San Francisco I'm forgetting? No, that was it. So far. There's more to cover. There's lots written here, but because we talked about it, I just wanted to read the logbook entry. Oh, I love the logbook entries. Quote, terrible earthquake occurred at 5 .13 a .m., doing considerable damage to the assistant's quarters. Oh, no. Shaking the gable ends out, which I don't know what that means, but something not good, and cracking it so badly. that it was difficulty that the families were taken out without injury to their person.

33:52 I'm shocked by that. The chimneys were shaken to pieces. The keeper's quarters were given a terrible shaking. The doors were all jammed, so the keeper had to take his family out through the window. I didn't even think about that. The frame of the building was... Shifted so much, they can't even get out. Yep. Whoa. Crazy. That is crazy. Can you imagine the earth? bucking. I can't imagine the chimney collapsing. I think of that as the strongest part of a house. Yeah. Wow. She gone. She gone. So, because it's California, two years later, a double dwelling was finished to replace that one. Two years? Where were they staying? I actually don't know where they stayed in that meantime. I bet they squished all together.

34:33 I think it said they were all like, yeah, squished together in one of the structures. That stinks. For two years? And it's the whole family too. It's not just the guys. It's not just the bros hanging. Yep. Point Menina Lighthouse 1955 on the screen now, if you'd like to see that. So what is this little bridge for? It's just that the ground went down a little. So that's the formation of the island and you need to be able to walk across it. And if you absolutely die left or right, it's super steep. Oh. And that's actually going to come up right now. I guess I would have thought that they would just like install. This is probably. This is probably a lot bigger than I'm thinking it is. I'm like, why don't you just put stairs up and down? It probably doesn't make sense. Definitely over 100 feet. You don't want to walk. No, no, no.

35:23 You might die. Right, I just thought. And they're like, look at the bridge in the background. Well, because. Golden Gate Bridge. Yeah, in my head, that's what I'm thinking of is like there's water underneath. You have no choice but to build a bridge. I'm like, what? They have land right there. But now I see. It's to scale. It's not to scale in my eyes. So, I don't know. A new keeper's residence was built, of course, on the eastern end of the suspension bridge, which... Like, is it on the lighthouse side or is it on the non -lighthouse side? I'm just going to keep reading. This fly is fucking... I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. He's going back around. So the new residence was where the former fog signal had stood. Oh. And that new residence was for the assistant keepers. Okay. Although the keeper assigned to the dwelling no longer had to make a lengthy journey to reach the lighthouse, he was faced with other challenges. Okay. Keeper Alexander Martin, what another good name. Very good. Who lived in the dwelling with his wife and young children, built harnesses to tether his children so that when they played outside, for when they played outside. The foresight was prudent as a daughter named Dorothy was once found dangling over a cliff in her harness. Oh my gosh. Unfortunately, no such restraint was provided for the family cat who fell to the water below. No. Why would they put that in there?

36:51 Facts. Facts. Very sad history. Rest in peace. They didn't even name the cat. I'm sure they did, but they just don't mention it in here. History did not name the cat. Facts. Facts my ass. So just want to put that out there. Can't put a cat on a leash. If any of you didn't know that, you can't do it. And I learned that. Snap their necks. I thought, well, there you go crazy. Snap their necks. That's why you can't. Because a dog has all this neck muscle. So when it pulls, like the worst that happens is he's like, cats will snap their necks. That's why. their collars have safety releases. It's because if they get their collar caught on like a bush or something, they will kill themselves trying to get out.

37:38 They have weak necks. So they're meant to be in the barn. Yeah, no collars, no leashes. No houses. No, but they're in here, no leashes. Yeah, you have to keep them inside. Anyways, December 11th of 1931, we're taking a jump just to another notable time. The fog signal. which, along with the light, had been electrified five years prior, was placed in operation for two and a half hours. This would not have been noteworthy if it had been on the account of fog, but it was due to heavy fall of snow. Cute. Yeah, huge for California. Yeah. The Lighthouse Service Bulletin noted that this was believed to be the first time that snowfall in the bay had required the sounding of a fog signal. Amazing. I love that. Can you imagine how whimsical it would be? This fly. You got it, though. There hasn't been a fly all summer long. We've never had a fly bugging us down here. There was a radio beacon added. Bugging us? Hit the button. Hit it. Hit it. Yeah. What were you thinking? I would have gone with the, no. Oh. Third try's a charm. Anyways, Radio Beacon was added in 1938, which jibes with a lot of other history lighthouses. So the lighthouse, as we see it, could be accessed until 1940 by

39:09 foot. Oh. So you could go see it. Erosion cut a gap in the trail near the lighthouse. Oh, shoot. And for a period of time, a breeches buoy was actually set up to permit access. What? Yeah. Which is insane. Can you imagine? You'd have to have balls of steel to be like, well, let's go see the lighthouse. And then it's like, climb in, and I'm going to... I have a feeling regular civilians didn't use it. I think it was for maintenance and stuff. But even so, they're like, go out to the radio beacon. It's not working. You've got to put on these breeches that are built into a buoy in case you fall to the ocean 100 feet below. Anyways, if you don't know what we're talking about, look up. my last episode where we talked about the Lyle gun, which was a cannon that shoots this weighted line. Anyways, and then you put on these pants and they, yeah, look it up. Breaches buoy. Look at it. Excellent story.

40:04 Yep. Do you know what episode that would have been? Four, 81. 81. 81. Yeah. So. Vader abode. In 1954, a suspension bridge, which appropriately mirrored the style of the Golden Gate Bridge. was built over this chasm. Oh, I see. There you go. So this was all before this little bridge happened. Yes. And you see the erosion and whatnot. It was probably all relatively level. Yeah. And they might have even carved it to be a path. But then, you know, they're like, let's throw a bridge on it. So this bridge, I'm just going to say an aside. 1954 it was built. I forgot the contractor. I deleted their name, I think.

40:47 It lasted until 2014. I don't know. 2024. Wait, what? It's gone? Well, it's still there, but it's in a point where it needs repair, where they're not letting people cross it anymore. Okay. Wow, that's a long time. That's almost like 75 years. It's over 75 years. But I'll say... Math is so hard. 70 years. I'll say some of these pictures I've seen... visiting pobo is kind of a thing to do like walking trails visiting california taking photos and so i hate to say that i'm from kansas it's a lot of people and i wonder if the bridge has been overly used and weighed from people they didn't expect so much foot traffic i mean it wasn't yeah it wasn't a tourist attraction yeah it became one so It's so cute. Like this tiny bridge with the Golden Gate Bridge in the background. It's like, aww. So cute. I forgot about this detail. So after the Federal Highway Administration report concluded that the rusting bridge posed a danger to visiting public, it was closed in 2010. Work on a new bridge of a similar design began in 2011. The new bridge allowed public access to the lighthouse to resume in 2012. The price tag for this work, which was...

42:06 Built by Flatiron West of Benica. Okay. Benicia. B -E -N -I -C -I -A was around a million dollars. For a little bridge? Yes. Construction's insane. That's crazy. And that was back in the good old days when coffee still cost $5. Now it's $10. Anyways. $5 already. $4. You know what I'm saying. $3. All right, hear me out. That was 2012, and it's 2024 when it's no longer walkable? It needs repair? Could have been something. Weather happened. But the last bridge lasted 60 years, we'll say. Yeah, a million -dollar bridge, and it only lasts a little over a decade. Yeah, let's do better. That doesn't make any sense. Flatiron West. I'd be upset with that. I'd be like, where'd my money go? Yeah. Out the window. That's where. Out the window. He didn't even know. So here we are in 1979. The two barges I told you about, the Golden Gate. The one that was carrying the beer was called the Kona, K -O -N -A. Anyways, so Point Bonita is interesting. It was the last manned lighthouse on the California coast. Wow. Mark Van Buskirk, the last head keeper, who at the time was living on the Coast Guard housing. So the Coast Guard took over. Yeah. Of course, always same history. Constructed, it was at the former life -saving station. He left in 1981. Whoa.

43:32 Yeah, that is really late. And he left a quote. I think he was interviewed. He said, people see the lighthouse and the waves breaking around the rocks and the sunset, and they think, I wish I was stationed out there. Then they get stationed out here, and it's a different story. There's not a whole lot to do. Yeah. Coast Guardsmen. They said, we maintain the grounds, make sure the grass is mowed, and watch the fog. Grass? What grass? There's grass somewhere. Oh, I want to see a modern picture of this place. Also, the life -saving station is not pictured. I think that's where they were living. Oh, I see. So not quite at this location. They had to make their way up here for stuff. And they said this is a station where you have to find work to do.

44:12 Keep yourself busy. Surf. It's now been adopted, and it's one of my big sources today, for both images and content by the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. So it's within the National Park Service domain. And the Coast Guard continues to maintain the light and fog signal, which is why I believe that you can't climb it because it's military. You can go there. You can actually go inside that dwelling that's there. You just can't climb the tower itself, which with this many people around, it's probably for the best. But yeah, August of 2024, so a year ago, the Park Service closed the suspension bridge for repairs. I hope it opens again. Over the life of Point Bonita or Pabot, it's had four light signatures. I couldn't find all four. But the first was constant, just steady. Yeah. Second order. And then the last, which is still current, is three seconds on, one second off. Okay. So pretty active. You know, some lighthousees you have to kind of wait for a while to see the pattern.

45:19 So it's kind of fun. But it still has its lens up there? It does. That's pretty nice. And I'll show you some images now. So also I just found this in the National Park Service image. I wanted to show this. How beautiful is this home? Look at that. This was built for the steam siren fog signal. What? 1874 this house was built. Structure was converted to a residence for the lighthouse keeper in 1906. Look at all the fun windows. It's beautiful. I don't even know how to describe it. If you're watching YouTube. Take a look. There's a picture of the signal today. Pretty. The shot of the bridge, the suspension bridge. That's crazy. Here's some visitor photos. I have all these credited in our sources if you're interested in seeing more from these folks. That's a really nice picture. Yeah. This is two different photos clearly, but you can see there's lots of green still growing. Yeah. That is a really sketchy piece of rock. That used to be the walking platform.

46:13 Yeah, I wouldn't go on that. The bridge, much better. Looks very sturdy. It's a gal. I forget her name, but she visited. Took lots of pictures. Some of these pictures are hers. Does she have a blog? I couldn't really tell. I couldn't get a consistent knowledge out of it. But this is the pathway that leads to the bridge. And then back behind us in view is the tunnel that leads to this pathway. Pretty cool. Honestly, lots of good things to see. Oh, and those sources I'll leave off screen because they're from Vader Abode. Sorry. Forgot to update that. And we're not going to show it. I don't think. The tunnel? Yeah, I think we're going to look at the tunnel on our computer. Yeah, you should just go. That's how you get people going. Don't make them feel like they've already seen it all before they go. You've got to be looking forward to something specific. Something Pacific? Something Pacific.

47:06 I would definitely go. See that? Vince, if we're talking about hikes, that's something I would do. Yeah, look at this. So now we're off screen, folks. Sorry. But we're looking at. It's creepy. What the tunnel looks like. No. I don't want it. It's so cool. I would run through. There's a bunch of people, so it's not going to be. Well, like that's going to stop it from caving in? Well, it's going to be less scary. Ghosts? Look at that. As Emily would say, creepy, deepy. Creepy, deepy. So, well -traveled trail. I feel that it's unfortunate the bridge is closed. I do hope that they reopen it. Yes. But I didn't hear anything about that. Has the lighthouse always been white?

47:47 Was black everything? White was black. You know, I didn't see day marks discussed in this. There was one article that talked about what a day mark was. Okay. I think it's always been the same. I'll be honest with you. It looked like it in the photos. Yeah. So I put this one together pretty quick. I had another grand idea that I didn't have time to do justice to. Sorry for everyone. It happens. But it will come. I enjoyed that. When you said Point Bonita, I wouldn't have thought San Francisco. Point Bonita. What comes to mind? What do you think? Like Spain? I was kind of thinking like Owl's Head was kind of what popped up in my brain. But anyway. I'd love to go. All right. Anything else to add before we sign off for the day? Nope. Thanks, everybody.

48:36 Oh, we got a nice message from... I didn't write down her name. But she was just saying that she really loved our podcast. And she and her husband, I think, really enjoy listening to us. And they're excited for us to get married. Really nice. So am I doing the outro? Go for it. Okay. Well, just thank you for being here. And we'll catch you next time on The Lighthouse.