Alternate Name(s):
Galveston Harbor
Type:
Year Established:
1882
Existing:
No
Source:
LL-1908
Download:
468b_Fort_Point_TX_CG1.jpg (2.2 MB)
File Type:
jpg (image/jpeg)
Photo Credit:
USCG Historian's Office
Photo Courtesy of:
US Lighthouse Society Archives
Collection / Donor:
LOCATION
Location:
NE End of Galveston Island
Latitude:
29° 20.2'
Longitude:
94° 46'
City / Town:
Galveston
U.S. State:
Texas
Country:
United States
OWNER & ACCESS
Open to Public:
No
STRUCTURE
Year Discontinued:
1909
Disposition:
Downgraded to Fog Signal Station 1909, Demolished 1954
Year Tower Established:
1882
Tower Construction Material:
Wood
Tower Foundation:
Screwpile with Platform
Height of light above mean high water, in feet:
47.5
Tower Shape:
Hexagonal
Tower Daymark:
White
Fog Signal Building?:
No
Keeper's Quarters?:
No
Year Keeper's Quarters:
1881
Keeper's Quarters Construction:
Wood
OPTICS
Original Optic Type:
Fourth Order
Year Original Lens Installed:
1881
Private Aid:
No
USCG Access to Optics:
No
Entered by:
Entered Date:
Jan 15, 2018
Erected and lit in 1882, the Fort Point Lighthouse was a long-awaited addition to the northeastern end of the Galveston Island coast. Since the 1850s, private interests had been establishing beacons of varying sorts on Galveston pierheads. In 1880, the Light-House Board was able to acquire for $1 a 10-acre plot two miles to the south of the Bolivar Point Lighthouse. The lighthouse raised at this site in 1882 held a fourth order lens with three red sectors to show the location of the jetty, wharves, and turning buoy. The light was lit continually until 1898, when it was extinguished in accordance with a prohibition on nighttime navigation of the Spanish-American War. The light was permanently discontinued in 1909, though the station remained in use as a fog signal until 1950. The station was demolished in 1954.