Fog Bell

Spring Point Ledge Lighthouse was served by a 1000-pound fog bell cast in Boston the year before the lighthouse was constructed and which was purchased for $180. The bell was suspended outboard of the railing of the upper gallery on the lighthouse's east side. The bell was sounded by a sledge hammer operated by an automated Stevens Fog Bell machine, which was purchased for $300. An additional $100 was appropriated to set the machine up at the Boston Light Station for testing while the Spring Point lighthouse was being built.

The Stevens Fog Bell apparatus was used in many lighthouses to ring a fog bell at a predetermined interval. The interval was determined by a set of cams and ratchets which made up the clockworks. A series of weights was suspended by a wire rope through the center column of the lighthouse. All the keeper had to do was keep the weight wound up. However, that was not as easy as it sounds because the weights could range from 200 to 800 pounds or more. These clockworks were advertised as good for 10,000 blows of the bell at one winding. The weights came in sections of 100 pounds each and the amount of weight applied determined the force with which the bell was struck. The Spring Point Ledge Light probably had a 200-300 pound weight. It is still in the center column in the cellar where it was dropped, along with the cable, when the bell striker was electrified. We hope to extract it one day and display it.

At Spring Point, the bell was struck two times every twelve seconds. Spring Point's fairly rapid interval probably meant that the Stevens apparatus could go almost a full day between windings. The apparatus was set up in the Watch Room with a series of levers and pivots extending through the wall to position the striker (sledgehammer) to hit the bell with enough force to bounce back into the cocked position. There was no spring cocking system. The 1,000-pound bell was strong enough to withstand such strikes.

In Maine, where fog is a very common occurrence during the winter, keeping the bell ringing was just as important as keeping the lamp lit. During periods of heavy fog, the light was often useless and mariners relied on fog signals to navigate and avoid each other.

Prior to the invention of mechanical bell strikers, the keeper was obliged to manually hit the bell with a sledgehammer for as long as the fog persisted. Needless to say, many keepers hated this difficult, monotonous task and often 'forgot' to ring the bell during long periods of fog. Fortunately, Spring Point's keepers were never faced with this arduous task, as the Stevens Fog Bell apparatus was installed during the lighthouse's initial construction.

And then came electricity....

When the lighthouse was electrified, it allowed a more automatic method of bell ringing. The electric solenoid in the base of the bell support was timed to strike the bell on an interval. The only job required by the keeper, by this time a Coast Guardsman, was to turn it on when fog rolled in. It could even be controlled by remote control, so a keeper was no longer needed. This system was used for a number of years until the modern electro-acoustic "hooters" entered service.

Spring Point Ledge Light now has two electronic fog signals controlled by an automatic fog detector which issues a strobe flash every second. A sensor in the unit reads the amount of light reflected back by the atmosphere. When the light reflected back reaches a certain level, the fog signals are activated. This system works in both daylight and darkness and is effective in snow and rain, as well as fog. Because of their cylindrical shape, the electronic fog signals are jokingly called "R2D2."

The original fog bell is now on display on the upper gallery of the lighthouse.