East Chop Lighthouse
by Carla Parris
Title
East Chop Lighthouse
Artist
Carla Parris
Medium
Photograph - Digital Photograph
Description
There are five lighthouses on Martha’s Vineyard, the prestigious New England island located seven miles off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts.
Two of these protect the harbor of Vineyard Haven, a town on the north side of the island. They are West Chop Lighthouse and East Chop Lighthouse, the latter of which is pictured here.
"Chop" means the entryway to a body of water, and hence the name of these two Vineyard Haven lighthouses, which are strategically positioned on opposite sides of the north side of Vineyard Haven Harbor.
East Chop Lighthouse was originally built in 1869. The beacon is also sometimes called Telegraph Lighthouse, because it was built on the site of a former telegraph signal tower which had been established in 1828 to receive signals from Nantucket and send them on to the mainland of Massachusetts.
The original 1869 lighthouse burned down only two years after it was erected, and the current cast iron structure dates to 1878.
East Chop Lighthouse is located in the town of Oak Bluffs on a 79-foot cliff overlooking Nantucket Sound.
East Chop Lighthouse was originally white, as it is today, but for a season it was a red-brown color, which gave rise to it being known as the “Chocolate Lighthouse.” However, since 1988, when it was whitewashed, it has returned to its former color of white.
Uploaded
November 30th, 2022
Embed
Share
Comments
There are no comments for East Chop Lighthouse. Click here to post the first comment.