I visited the Ponce de León Inlet Lighthouse on a recent cloudless, warm December afternoon. Florida continues unseasonably warm and dry with temperatures forecast to be around 85° (29° C) on Christmas Day.
The Ponce de León Inlet Lighthouse began as the Mosquito Inlet Lighthouse with the purchase of ten acres of land on March 21, 1883. The lighthouse tower design was based on Light-House Board standard plans with modifications made for the specific site. The lantern room was copied from the design used at Cape Florida on Key Biscayne's Fowey Rocks Lighthouse.
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The Ponce de León Inlet Lighthouse began as the Mosquito Inlet Lighthouse with the purchase of ten acres of land on March 21, 1883. The lighthouse tower design was based on Light-House Board standard plans with modifications made for the specific site. The lantern room was copied from the design used at Cape Florida on Key Biscayne's Fowey Rocks Lighthouse.
At 175 feet (53 m) tall, Ponce de León Inlet Light is the tallest lighthouse in Florida and the second tallest in the United States (the Cape Hatteras Light in North Carolina is taller at 207 feet (63 m)).
Lighthouse Chief Engineer Orville E. Babcock and three others drowned in the inlet when construction began in 1884. Despite this setback, the tower was completed three years later in 1887.
The first lighthouse for what is now the Ponce de León Inlet was erected on the south side of then-Mosquito Inlet in 1835 (the current lighthouse is on the north side). Unfortunately, the oil for the lamp was never delivered, and soon after the tower was completed a strong storm washed much of the sand from around the base of the tower, weakening it. The Second Seminole War began soon after, and in December 1835 Seminole Indians attacked the lighthouse, smashing the glass in the lantern room and setting fire to its wooden stairs. The area was abandoned. The war prevented repairs from being made to the tower, and it collapsed the next year.
The entire east coast of central Florida was appropriately known as "Los Musquitos" starting from the 1500s until 1844. See Los Musquitos map HERE.
In 1824, the area to the south of St. Johns County, Florida became Mosquito County, and Enterprise (in present day Deltona) was named the county seat. This massive county (approximately 220 by 90 miles) took up much of central Florida.
In 1842, the Armed Occupation Act, was passed providing a quarter section (160 acres) to any head of family who settled on property south of a line from Ocala to Ormond Beach. The name "Mosquito," being rather uninviting, was discarded in 1844 when the massive county was split in half.
Mosquito County (and Mosquito Inlet) were renamed in 1844 with the southern half becoming St. Lucia County and the northern half become Orange County.
In 1824, the area to the south of St. Johns County, Florida became Mosquito County, and Enterprise (in present day Deltona) was named the county seat. This massive county (approximately 220 by 90 miles) took up much of central Florida.
In 1842, the Armed Occupation Act, was passed providing a quarter section (160 acres) to any head of family who settled on property south of a line from Ocala to Ormond Beach. The name "Mosquito," being rather uninviting, was discarded in 1844 when the massive county was split in half.
Mosquito County (and Mosquito Inlet) were renamed in 1844 with the southern half becoming St. Lucia County and the northern half become Orange County.
Fun Lighthouse Facts
I didn't spend a lot of time in reading all the exhibits in the museums at the base of the Ponce de León Lighthouse, but I did snap a few photos of some interesting facts that jumped out at me from the exhibits.
The kerosene lamp in the current lighthouse, a first order fixed Fresnel lens (made by Barbier et Fenestre in Paris in 1867) was first lit on November 1, 1887, by Keeper William Rowlinski. The new light could be seen 20 miles to sea.
In 1897, author and journalist Stephen Crane was en route to cover a brewing revolt against Spanish rule in Cuba, when the ship he was on, the SS Commodore, sank off the coast of Florida. Crane escaped in a small dinghy with several crewmen, and they eventually sighted and steered for the Mosquito Inlet Light. Crane used this experience in his short story "The Open Boat".
In the early 1950s a lanky lifeguard near Ponce Inlet named Ted Cassidy was just one of the guys, he would go on, however, to Hollywood fame playing "Lurch" on The Addams Family. Click on the image above for a larger view. Ted "Lurch" stands out.
Today, in addition to the museum, a gift shop, park and nature trails surround the lighthouse.
In 1972, the Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse Preservation Association was founded as a non-profit, organization to restore and operate the lighthouse property as a museum. In 1972, the Light Station was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as one of only a handful of 19th Century Light Stations to have all its original buildings still intact.
Through the efforts of the volunteers of the Preservation Association, the damage done by vandals was reversed and full restoration was begun. In 1982, a new tower balcony replaced the crumbling one, and the light in the lantern was restored to active service. The three keepers' dwellings now house exhibits on many aspects of lighthouse history. In 1998 the Light Station was designated a National Historic Landmark.
In 1995, the first order lens from the Cape Canaveral lighthouse was restored and placed on display in the new Ayres Davies Lens Exhibit Building. The original first order lens from the Ponce Inlet Lighthouse was restored and put on display in 2003. In April 2004, restoration work on the third order Fresnel lens was completed and this rotating lens was returned to the lantern room at the top of the tower. The Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse is now listed as an operational private aid to navigation.
In 1982 the light was restored to active service, primarily because highrise buildings blocked the Coast Guard's beacon on the other side of the inlet. The Ponce De León Inlet Light Station was designated a National Historic Landmark on August 5, 1998, one of only eleven lighthouses to earn this designation.
The lighthouse and three keepers' dwellings have been restored, and are open to the public seven days a week. The lighthouse tower is open for climbing.
The spiral staircase inside the lighthouse. There are 203 steps to the top.
Below, the late afternoon, low winter sun catches the glass of the lighthouse and creates its own sort of beacon.
Disastrous Weir-Jetty
at Ponce Inlet
Why does the lighthouse sit so far from the ocean? It didn't always. A weir-jetty system was constructed at Ponce Inlet in 1968 to aid navigation. The weir-jetty was a textbook example of a man-made environmental disaster created by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Today the Corps of Engineers presents this and other cases as evidence of past mistakes.
A weir jetty system is one of several methods for bypassing the natural flow of sediments (sand) at coastal inlets. The weir section, typically less than 1,000 feet long, is a depressed region of the jetty that theoretically permits waves, and the longshore current generated by wind, waves, and tide to transport sediments (sand) moving along the coast to enter a deposition basin located in the lee of the weir, thereby reducing the amount of sediment entering the navigation channel. A weir also acts as a breakwater and provides a semi-protected area for dredging the deposition basin. Another theoretical benefit is to allow flood currents to enter the inlet over the weir and through the channel during flood flow with subsequent channeling of ebb flows out of the navigation channel between the jetties.
Prior to 1968, Ponce de Leon Inlet had functioned as a natural passage through the barrier islands separating the Atlantic Ocean from the Halifax and Indian Rivers. The inlet became recognized as difficult and dangerous to navigate with controlling depths over the ebb shoal of typically 4 to 6 feet. Dating to 1968-1972, two rubble-mound jetties were constructed to provide safe passage via a 15-foot-deep by 200-foot-wide dredged channel. The north and south jetty have overall lengths of 4,050 feet and 4,078 feet respectively.
In the photo below notice that the south jetty is almost completely covered with sand. Massive dunes have built up in the area of the south jetty which interrupted the northward moving longshore current while scour (erosion) of an equal scale has occurred on the north side. Meanwhile the weir, which was constructed on the wrong side of the inlet to function as designed has completely disappeared under mountains of sand.
In the photo below notice that the south jetty is almost completely covered with sand. Massive dunes have built up in the area of the south jetty which interrupted the northward moving longshore current while scour (erosion) of an equal scale has occurred on the north side. Meanwhile the weir, which was constructed on the wrong side of the inlet to function as designed has completely disappeared under mountains of sand.
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| Ponce de Leon Inlet, Florida, December 13, 1995 The mile long south Jetty is completely covered with sand while the north Jetty has caused massive erosion of beaches to the north and completely filled in the Weir with hundreds of millions of tons of sand. |
Additionally, an 1,800-foot-long weir of king piles and adjustable concrete beams was constructed along the north jetty, close to the lighthouse. The weir section consisted of 300-ft length at +4 foot mean low water, and 1,500-foot length at 0.0 mean low water. An impoundment basin to entrap material passing over the weir in the north jetty was dredged between the weir section and the entrance channel. In 1972, a year after the north jetty construction was completed, riprap (loose stone) was placed along the south side of the area adjacent to the weir section to provide scour protection.
In 1984, the entire weir was closed because the impoundment basin was ineffective, and navigation into the inlet was more difficult than pre-construction due to the increased wave energy and cross currents created in the inlet by the jetties and weir. The north jetty continued to experience scour, while the shoreline just south of and adjacent to the north jetty continued to erode westward. The channel, by then restricted by jetties returned to pre-jetty orientation with the confines of the structures that force the channel to the north jetty. The flood-shoal channel has been dynamic, with large changes in flood-channel position and has dominated as the inlet has evolved. The mean tidal range offshore of Ponce de León Inlet is 4.1 feet and 2.3 foot at the U.S. Coast Guard Station inside the inlet. Offshore mean spring tide range is 4.9 foot. Inside the inlet mean spring tide range is 2.7 feet. That said there is a large tidal bore that bears down on the inlet 4 times a day as two high and two low tides per day evolve.
Above: Prior to 1968 this area was part of the Atlantic Ocean. After 1968 it became the failed weir of the weir-jetty system at Ponce Inlet. The large building at left is a lifeguard station. Countless millions of tons of sand have been scoured from the beach north of here by natural process interrupted by the construction of the Ponce Inlet Weir-Jetty.
There is no accurate estimate of how many hundreds of millions of dollars were wasted trying to engineer the Ponce de León Inlet, and today the inlet remains a difficult passage during changing tides and on any but the calmest of days.
There is no accurate estimate of how many hundreds of millions of dollars were wasted trying to engineer the Ponce de León Inlet, and today the inlet remains a difficult passage during changing tides and on any but the calmest of days.
A vast area of scrub (now Lighthouse Point Park) was the former shoreline of the Atlantic, later the weir of the weir-jetty system at Ponce de Leon Inlet.
The lifeguard station sits atop was part of the natural shoreline prior to 1968 and then the Ponce Inlet weir subsequent to 1968. The weir-jetty system completely failed and reformed the Atlantic coastline for miles.
Hotel Inlet Terrace
Bob Pacetti's Dream Resort
As a kid we often played in the ruins of the Hotel Inlet Terrace, but knew nothing of its history. Today due to construction of the weir and jetty little remains of the site as it has been buried by millions of tons of sand resulting from the weir-jetty construction.
This terra cotta wall is all that remains of what was to be a great hotel and resort. Construction began during the great land boom of the 1920's. The developer, Robert (Bob) Pacetti was a native of the area. His ancestors first came to this country with the British Turnbull Colony of New Smyrna in 1768. His grandfather, Bartola Clemente Pacetti, settled on the A. Pons (Ponce) Spanish Land Grant near present day Ponce Inlet in 1850. Portions of the grant were sold in the 1870's, but this area (now Lighthouse Point Park) remained in the Pacetti family.
Bob Pacetti called his subdivision "Inlet Terrace," sold lots, and began construction of a hotel. Then, in the fall of 1926, a disastrous hurricane ripped across South Florida, costing many lives and millions of dollars in property damage. The hurricane precipitated the end of the 1920's Florida Land Boom. Banks closed all over Florida. Work soon stopped on the Hotel Inlet Terrace. Within a few years Bob Pacetti disappeared.
Through the subsequent decades vandals destroyed much of the property and anything of value was carried off. For over 40 years the foundation stood here. Then in 1982 a number of the lots were sold to a Dutch firm called Transol U.S.A. A bold plan to build high-rise condominiums was presented to the town of Ponce Inlet. The tall buildings were prohibited under a town ordinance which restricts building heights. The ordinances were designed to protect views of the lighthouse. A revised plan with a reduced height of 35 feet (12 m) was also turned down by Ponce Inlet. The property was then sold to the State of Florida which entered into an agreement with Volusia County to operate the area as a park, which has been developed and managed with Ponce de León Port Authority funds. During the park's construction, the remaining ruins of the Hotel Inlet Terrace were largely destroyed.
Through the subsequent decades vandals destroyed much of the property and anything of value was carried off. For over 40 years the foundation stood here. Then in 1982 a number of the lots were sold to a Dutch firm called Transol U.S.A. A bold plan to build high-rise condominiums was presented to the town of Ponce Inlet. The tall buildings were prohibited under a town ordinance which restricts building heights. The ordinances were designed to protect views of the lighthouse. A revised plan with a reduced height of 35 feet (12 m) was also turned down by Ponce Inlet. The property was then sold to the State of Florida which entered into an agreement with Volusia County to operate the area as a park, which has been developed and managed with Ponce de León Port Authority funds. During the park's construction, the remaining ruins of the Hotel Inlet Terrace were largely destroyed.
There was an island in the inlet prior to construction of the weir jetty in this area. As teenagers we would walk to the island and picnic at low tide, then get off the island before the tides rushed back in twice a day.
Surfers or Pelicans?
At first glance I couldn't tell if that was a flock of pelicans riding the waves toward the end of the north jetty. The condos and hotels of Daytona Beach are visible in the background. I zoomed in (below) with a 600 mm lens and determined that it was mostly surfers with a few pelicans on a recent very warm December afternoon.
Above, the eastern end of the north jetty at Ponce Inlet
I found this Survey Mark near the seaward end of the north jetty at about 29°4' 44" N, 80° 55' 6" W but could not find any data related to the mark that NOAA shares on "current" survey markers (below). Black dots indicate currently used survey marks. See Survey Marks and Datasheets (National Geodetic Survey) at NOAA.
Below: Looking west toward the lighthouse from the seaward end of the north jetty.
To get to Ponce Inlet by car one has to pass over the Port Orange Bridge (State Road A1A, Dunlawton Avenue). Its worth the time to pull off the bridge causeway and check out bird island underneath the bridge and to the south. Notice the lighthouse in the distance.
Here hundreds of thousands of migratory birds nest on islands in the Halifax River. Especially around dusk there is an amazing amount of activity.
The first bridge built in this area, in 1906, was made of sable palm pilings and pine bridge timbers. It was severely damaged by a hurricane in 1932 and torn down. A second bridge was built in 1951 as a replacement. That drawbridge is what many natives remember in this spot along this quiet palm-lined causeway. We would pay 5 cents for passage over the bridge. Quiet no more, with an estimated 30,000 cars passing daily, a large fast-moving high bridge was built here in 1990. It is underneath the current bridge that one can see these sights.
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| A flock of egrets heads south at sunset near Bird Island |