After sitting darkish for a decade, Alligator Reef Gentle within the Florida Keys is shining once more. An Islamorada neighborhood group is spending $6 million to revive and protect the 150-year-old lighthouse. The group turned on its new solar-powered lights final Saturday.
In 1822, the U.S. Navy schooner Alligator, a part of the U. S. Navy Anti-Piracy Squadron that had been established in Key West, went aground on a reef southeast of Higher Matecumbe Key within the Florida Keys. In 1873, a lighthouse was constructed simply north of Alligator Reef, named after the ill-fated schooner. It was automated in 1963 and was final operational in July 2014, when it was changed by a 16′ metal construction with a much less highly effective mild situated adjoining to it.
On February 1, 2019, it was introduced that the lighthouse can be given away freely to any authorities companies, instructional companies, non-profit companies, or any neighborhood growth organizations who needed to make use of it for “instructional, park, leisure, cultural or historic preservation functions.”
“Alligator Lighthouse was lit in 1873 and it stayed lit till about 2013, after which it went darkish for 10 years,” stated Rob Dixon, the manager director of Save Alligator Lighthouse, which took over the lighthouse’s title in late 2021. “And now our Statue of Liberty is lit as soon as once more.”
