Little Hope Island Lighthouse

Little Hope Island Lighthouse once stood near the centre of Little Hope Island, off Port Mouton on the South Shore, an exposed offshore station in the Atlantic Ocean along the Lighthouse Route. A wooden daymark had been placed on the low island before 1857, and a proper square wooden tower with living quarters for the keeper followed in 1865, showing a fixed light that was made revolving in 1889.

Fire destroyed that first tower in 1906, and during the summer of 1907 a far more substantial replacement was completed: a 77-foot circular reinforced-concrete tower strengthened by six concrete ribs, painted white, carrying a second-order Fresnel lens whose double white flash repeated every ten seconds. The last keepers left in 1948 when the light was automated, and the tower stood alone on the island for decades afterward, minus the lantern room that had been removed years before.

The tower's end was dramatic: it was badly damaged by Hurricane Juan on 29 September 2003 and then crashed into the ocean during a vicious winter storm on 7 December 2003, with no plans to replace it. Nothing remains standing today, and Little Hope Island is now marked only by its history, best appreciated from boat passages off Port Mouton.