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A schematic icon of the Sandy Hook Lighthouse — a tall pale tower with a red lantern room at the top, drawn in the site's brand palette

Sandy Hook Lighthouse

1764

Sandy Hook Lighthouse, Fort Hancock, Gateway NRA

The oldest continuously operating lighthouse in the United States, first lit on the eleventh of June, 1764. Commissioned by New York merchants to guide vessels around the north tip of Sandy Hook into New York Harbor. When lit, it stood roughly five hundred feet from the tip; the tip has since walked well over a mile past it. The tower has not moved. Now the fixed reference point for every measurement of Sandy Hook spit growth in the historical record.

Item record

Title
Sandy Hook Lighthouse
Date
1764
Source
Schematic by Above the Hook · underlying subject is a federal historic landmark (public domain)
Contributor
Above the Hook editorial schematic
Rights
Above the Hook original schematic, public domain
Slug
lighthouse-sandy-hook-1764

Verification: unverified.

Cite this item

Sandy Hook Lighthouse (1764). Schematic by Above the Hook · underlying subject is a federal historic landmark (public domain) The Highlands History Project, https://history.abovethehook.com/archive/lighthouse-sandy-hook-1764/.