Screwpiles: The Forgotten Lighthouses

Ron Pack with the plans for his replica of the Hooper Strait screwpile lighthouse. The replica is the focal point of the Smithfield Station hotel, restaurant, and marina in Smithfield, Virginia.

Enter Stevenson, who, in addition to managing the golf courses, took on the mission of recreating the Old Plantation Flats Lighthouse that once stood about two miles off Bay Creek’s western shore. In 1962, a skeletal tower replaced the original 1886 square screwpile lighthouse. Stevenson researched tirelessly, e-mailing and talking with scores of people who could describe the construction and furnishings of the old lighthouse. He scoured

antique shops for furnishings, from the period cast-iron skillets to the bedsteads. He contacted the company that manufactured the original water cisterns and had them replicate those cisterns for the new lighthouse. He found an authentic fog bell that had come from a retired buoy. The completed replica lighthouse, built in a pond adjacent to the golf course at a cost, according to Stevenson, of close to $1 million, opened in 2004 to visitors by appointment.

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