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Private navigational aids were
used for a number of years to aid mariners traveling on the Kennebec
River, heading to and from the shipbuilding center of Bath. The
federal government established several light stations in 1898,
including the Doubling Point Range Lights. The lights were established
on Arrowsic island to mark an extreme double turn in the channel
at Fiddler Reach. Mariners would line up the station's two lights
to know they were on course.
The octagonal, shingled wooden towers are unique in New England.
The front range light tower is 21 feet tall, and the rear tower
is 13 feet tall. The towers, which are 235 yards apart, both
originally held fifth-order Fresnel lenses.
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- U.S. Coast Guard
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- The keeper's house
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A two-story Victorian keeper's dwelling and a shed were also
built in 1898. A boathouse was added in 1901 and an oil house
in 1902. A raised wooden walkway above the marshy ground connects
the keeper's house to the two towers.
The grounding of the steamer Ransom B. Fuller in 1912
at Fiddler's Reach prompted the government to add a fog bell
about 1100 feet upstream from the light station, mounted on a
pyramidal wooden tower that held automatic striking machinery.
The bell remained in use into the 1950s, when it was replaced
by an electric horn.
Capt. Harry L. Nye, a former sea captain, was keeper 1921-37.
Nye had previously been keeper at Seguin Island Light. On one
occasion, herescued four young men who were drifting past Doubling
Point on an ice floe.
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In 1938, Lucy Mae Woodward, the 10 year-old daughter of Keeper
William H. Woodward, drowned in the river within sight of the
keeper's house. Local residents and police tried valiantly but
unsuccessfully to revive the girl. It was reported that she may
have suffered a slight heart attack that caused her to fall.
Beginning in 1935, the keeper of the range lights had the
added duty of tending Doubling Point Light around the bend, as
well as the Fiddler's Reach fog bell. A 1948 article in the Maine
Coast Fisherman reported that Keeper H. L. Kilton didn't
seem "to be worried about slogging over to Fiddler's Reach
fog signal to wind his bell every four hours in fog and snow."
The article continued, "As for the trip to Doubling Point
when things go wrong in the winter - he snowshoes."
In 1979, the Fresnel lenses were removed from the range lights;
they were replaced by 250 mm optics. (One of the original lenses
is now in Maine's newest lighthouse, Rockland Harbor Southwest
Light.) At the same time, the job of monitoring the range lights
went to the keeper at Squirrel Point Light.
In 1982, the responsibility of looking after the lights and
fog signals at Doubling Point, Squirrel Point, and the range
lights was transferred to the Kennebec River Range Lights Station.
For several years, Second Class Petty Officer Karen McLean, one
of the few female lighthouse keepers under the Coast Guard, filled
this position.
In February 1987, McLean's husband, Dan McLean,
took charge of the station.
(Right: Karen and Dan McLean, courtesy of Maine Lighthouse Museum.) |  |
In 1990, the range lights became one of the last light stations
in the United States to be automated and destaffed. The rear
tower was renovated and painted in the summer of 1996.
Under the Maine Lights Program coordinated by the Island Institute
of Rockland, the property was transferred in 1998 to an organization
called the Range Light Keepers. The Range Light Keepers was founded
by Michael Kreindler and his wife, Michele Gaillard, along with
other concerned residents in the area.
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Kreindler, who formerly worked on metal furniture for avant-garde
office designs in New York City, told the Boston Globe,
"My primary goal is to preserve these 100-year-old navigational
devices because they are a major piece of our national maritime
history. I want them to be there for all those lighthouse buffs
with Nebraska license plates who go off the beaten path to find
them."
Range Light Keepers also has the responsibility of looking
after the old fog bell tower at Fiddler's Reach near the light
station, and they have been gradually restoring the structure.
The original 1200-pound bell was put on display at the U.S. Coast
Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut, it 1972.
A similar bell, donated by the U.S. Navy, is on display outside
Arrowsic Town Hall. Range Light Keepers' goal is to restore the
striking apparatus so that there will be a complete demonstration
of a mechanical fog signal.
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- The bell tower
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The range lights continue as active aids to navigation, and
the optics are still serviced by the Coast Guard. The grounds
are open to the public; remember to respect the privacy of the
residents. The station, on a small dirt road off Doubling Point
Road, is a bit difficult to find by car. The lights are most
easily seen from tour boats leaving Bath and Boothbay Harbor.
For more information or to donate to the Range Light Keepers,
contact:
Range Light Keepers
58 Iron Mine Road
Arrowsic, ME 04530
Keepers: (The
following list of keepers is not complete. It is a work in progress,
and any additional information is welcomed and appreciated; you can
email me at nelights@gmail.com. If you copy this list to another site,
you do so at your own risk. I can't guarantee its accuracy.)
Harry L. Nye (1921-1937); William H.
Woodward (c. 1938); H.L. Kilton (1945-?); Joseph Robicheau (November
1981 to February 1982); Karen McLean (Coast Guard, 1982-1987);
Dan McLean (Coast Guard, 1987-1990)
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