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Na bitterly cold and stormy winter night about fifteen years ago, a seaman of the schooner J. H. Eells, wrecked off the dreaded Pollock's Rip, off the Massachusetts coast, was frozen to death in the rigging. The next day the owner of that schooner, Capt. Albert F. Eells of Rockport, Me., stood on the shore, and looked at the body of his comrade swinging stiff aloft in the crosstrees. In the presence of death, Captain Eells swore to devote the rest of his life to devising protection for the sailor from the sandbars and the shoals which strew our Atlantic coast.

Acting Secretary of the Treasury, stated that the probable cost of erecting a permanent light on Diamond Shoals according to the best plans then proposed would be $1,588,000. The ship-owning and seafaring people throughout the country clearly realized the importance, to their property and lives, of the work entrusted to Captain Eells and his asso

The fruit of his labor and the labor of his associates, was a bill passed unanimously by the Senate and the House of Representatives, and signed by President Roosevelt on the morning of his inauguration, contracting with Captain Eells and his associates for the building of a lighthouse on the outer Diamond Shoal, off Cape Hatteras, N. C. The bill appropriated $750,000 for the lighthouse, and $30,000 additional for the lens and equipment considerably the largest amount ever appropriated in this country for a single lighthouse. It was also the second contract ever entered into directly by Congress with a private individual, the first having been with James B. Eads for the construction of the jetty system at the mouth of the Mississippi.

Engineering Difficulties

In their report of 1888, the Lighthouse Board stated that the erection of a permanent lighthouse off Cape Hatteras would be an engineering task of great magnitude, the most difficult and dangerous ever attempted by the Government. To carry it to a successful conclusion, would require the highest skill, supported by the best appliances and by ample means. In 1902, O. L. Spaulding,

ciates. The petition to Congress for the passage of the act, contained the names of 15 marine insurance companies, 15 national banks doing the business of marine men, and 209 steamship lines and miscellaneous miscellaneous organizations. Captain

Dow, who was sent to Washington as the representative of the American Association of Masters and Pilots, said before the Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce: "I represent an organization of 10,000 seamen, and they come into my office and say, 'If it is possible for you to do anything for us in Washington to have a permanent lighthouse off Cape Hatteras, for God's sake do it for us.'

Senators and Representatives realize that, in the words of Congressman Kluttz, "this is no mere local question,

but one which ought to enlist an interest and a sympathy as broad as humanity. It seems to me," continued Mr. Kluttz, "that every man who votes against this proposition takes upon his hand and upon his head the blood and the life of every seaman who shall go down to his death in those treacherous waters because of the failure to enact this law." At a time when the pressure of public business is so great that a single objection in either house, a mere point of order, or a formal motion to table would inevitably kill a measure, and when almost every member sees in each moment of time devoted to its consideration the failure of some bill for whose passage he has worked hard, not a man withheld his willing help.

H

FINAL LETRY

STORAGE

SCUTTLED, SETTLING, PUMPING BALLAST.

A Great Marine Highway It is a safe prediction that before very long there will be a large increase in the number of vessels to pass Cape Hatteras. The opening of the Panama Canal will mean a much greater volume of traffic by water from the ports of our eastern seaboard to the Pacific coast of both American continents and to the Orient. Every vessel which passes Cape Hatteras down southward is, under present conditions, in imminent peril. Fourteen miles off shore, the Gulf Stream sweeps northward at a rapid rate of speed. Only six miles of safe water intervenes between this powerful current and the tip of Diamond Shoals. The vessel going north passes outside the lightship, and floats with the Gulf Stream. The vessel going south must cast between the lightship,

now located at the edge of the stream, and the Shoal. the Shoal. A heavy storm may easily drive her out of the straight and narrow way, to certain destruction. It is quite impossible to place a lightship on those shoals, although ordinarily covered with from twelve to thirty feet of water. In a storm, the sand itself is often laid bare. That means, that, with each complete wave, a vessel will be lifted up forty to fifty feet above the bottom, and dropped with shattering force upon terra firma. No keel or ribs in the world are strong enough to stand such pounding.

Passing of the Lightship

In less than three years a great light -one of the most powerful in the world -is to cast its beams across these troubled waters. That light will be stable. Its location will not vary at the will of wind or wave, as is the case with a lightship swinging on its cable. The distance at which the light can be seen will not be subject to the variation caused by rising and falling upon the waves. During a storm, when certainty is most needed, the distance at which the light of a lightship can be discerned is fully five miles. greater if the ship happens to be on the top of the wave, than if it happens to be in the trough. The mariner will have one simple rule for his guidance-to keep outside the light.

In fact, the successful operation of this light will spell the gradual disappearance of the lightship. At present, thirty-three dangerous shoals on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts are now guarded by lightships. Lighthouses of the new construction will gradually replace these ships. Economically, the annual charge for the maintenance of the lighthouse is less than one-fourth that of the lightship. A recent Senate document states that, for a little over four years, the expenditure for the Diamond Shoals lightship was fully $100,000. Furthermore, each such lighthouse is a government station available for weather reports and the purposes of the Life-Saving Service. Each will bring a life-saving boat precisely where it is most needed-on the dangerous shoals themselves. The lighthouse is a fixed, immovable station. It is not subject to a change of location in a storm, as is the

lightship. If the captain of a vessel finds that he absolutely must be driven ashore, he can steer straight for that light, with the assurance that he will know just where he is going to strike, and that he will be within reach of help.

A Caisson Foundation

The building of this lighthouse will be under the patent granted to Captain

FINAL LEVEL

PUMPING, DREDGING, SINKING, FILLING, SUPPLYING.

Eells, providing for the construction of submarine foundations for lighthouses, and providing means by which that structure can be located at points ordinarily inaccessible. The foundation for the lighthouse will be a massive steel caisson in the form of the lower portion of a cone, with a cylindrical base. Upon this will be erected the lighthouse proper, a platesteel cylinder with a slight batter from base to top, supporting a light of the first order at 150 feet above tide level. This foundation it is proposed to build at some shipyard having facilities for constructing battleships, although the difficulty of construction in comparison with shipbuilding is greatly minimized from the fact that the parts of the lighthouse are similar and are made in multiple lots, whereas almost every plate and frame for a war vessel is moulded to a different pattern and shape. The caisson will be. 108 feet in diameter at the bottom, 80 feet high, and 50 feet in diameter at the top. It will have a double shell of steel plates, parallel to each other and about 6 feet apart, attached to 24 upright, in

clined plate girders, which will divide the space between the shells into 24 watertight compartments. It will have a double bottom about 7 feet above the outer bottom edge of the caisson. This space between the two floors is divided into 24 sections by frames or trusses extending from near the bottom of the outer inclined girders horizontally on the radial lines to within 8 feet of the center of the caisson. The central part of the caisson will be in the form of an open vertical shaft, 16 feet in diameter, extending from top to bottom, enclosed by steel plates riveted together and attached or riveted to the steel girders that extend horizontally from this shaft to the inner edge of the inclined girders above described. These horizontal girders, being about 13 feet one above the other, act as temporary floor-beams that will divide the caisson into 5 large circular rooms.

The outer shell is formed of rolledsteel plates about one-half inch thick, riveted together and covering the inclined girders from top to bottom. Also, similar steel plates are riveted together and connected to the inside edge of the inclined girders forming the double conical shell separated into the 24 air-tight and watertight sections above referred to. horizontal floor girders at the bottom of the caisson are covered above and below, thus forming a double shell floor made of rolled-steel plates riveted together and to the floor girders.

The

BASE COMPLETE, BUILDING LIGHTHOUSE, UNLOADING MATERIAL.

made of curved rolled-steel plates attached to the ends of the horizontal floor girders and to the bracing.

These various parts, when riveted together, form the caisson into a self-contained vessel of circular shape, built sufficiently strong to stand its sea voyage and the wind and wave pressure after its final settlement into the sands of the Diamond Shoal. All the inside horizontal girders are covered at the different elevations, to make temporary floors and rooms in the caisson; and it is proposed to place in these rooms at the time of towing, the boiler, engines, pumps, derricks, dredging apparatus, concrete-mixing machinery, water, sand, and cement, and the different materials necessary for sinking and filling, as well as supplies and equipment for the workmen.

Towed to the Shoals

It is proposed to fill a portion of the space between the plates of the outer

shell, and part of the bottom, with concrete, before leaving the shipyards, so that the caisson will draw about 21 feet of water; and when all is in readiness, tugboats will tow it to the location on the shoals. If a storm arrives during passage, its draught may be increased by partial scuttling, leaving a smaller area exposed to the wind and waves above the surface of the water. In case of its going ashore, it would then ground in deeper water, where it could be easily floated again after the storm by forcing the water out by air-pressure or by pumping, until it again draws about 21 feet. It may then be towed to its location, where it will be held in place by suitable anchors and cables. It will immediately be scuttled by pumping water into the interior compartments sufficient to sink it so as to rest on the sand in about 24 feet of water, leaving the top or deck at this time about 56 feet above the surface of the ocean. The difference in tide at this location is only about 2 feet; and the Shoal at the location selected for the lighthouse on the 4-fathom contour covers an area about 2 miles long and 1 mile wide, gradually deepening on the seaward side.

The edges of the caisson, with the additional weight from scuttling, will at once settle into the sand some few feet. Water ballast will then be pumped into the compartments above sea-level; and, in case of uneven settlement, the floor will be kept horizontal by pumping more water into the wells on one side than on the other. It is then proposed to sink the foundation caisson as quickly as possible, by a combination of dredging and