Every May the US General Services Administration (USGSA) offers up its stock of lighthouses for sale and this year one very close to home is going on the auction block.
You can say this is the ultimate waterfront property!
The Stratford Shoal Lighthouse is one of four lighthouses up for sale. The lighthouse is affectionately known around these parts as “The Middle Grounds,” “Middleground” or “Middle Ground” Light to boaters and fishermen alike because it sits about halfway between Long Island and Connecticut in the Long Island Sound.
Another six lighthouses across the country are being given away for free.
You read that correctly! For the right price, the “Middle Ground” Stratford Shoal Light can be yours.
This year, according to a statement from the USGSA, a record number of lighthouses are being offered to the public, ten in all. The annual event, aka “lighthouse season” has raised over $10 million dollars for the US Coast Guard (USCG) to reinvest in its Aids to Navigation mission since its inception in 2000.
According to the official USGSA listing, the Stratford Shoal Light is located in East Setauket. It’s approximately 5 nautical miles from Old Field Point light and 5.5 nautical miles from Stamford, CT. The lighthouse is only accessible by boat.
The starting bid for The Stratford Shoal Light is $10,000 and will begin on June 12, 2023. You can pay for your winning bid by credit card or wire transfer. Click here to join the auction.
It seems that technology - like your GPS tracker - has made lighthouses essentially obsolete for official purposes.
“While the USCG may continue to maintain active aids to navigation at or near specific lighthouses, the structures themselves are often no longer critical to the USCG’s mission needs,” the USGSA said in a statement. “To protect the history and heritage of lighthouses, Congress passed the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act (NHLPA) in 2000.”
The NHLPA program - a partnership among the USCG, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Interior, National Park Service (NPS), and GSA - transfers these historic landmarks from the USCG to new owners.
A lighthouse could be transferred to a Federal or local government, nonprofit or other agency who must be financially able to maintain the historic light station, and make the station available for educational or cultural purposes to the public. But if an owner isn’t found through this process, the lighthouse is offered for competitive sale to the public through an online auction.
Nick Korstad, a lighthouse enthusiast and preservationist, who owns Big Bay Point Lighthouse in Michigan and Browns Head Light in Maine, kept watch over the Stratford Shoal Light for about eight years.
“Nick was awarded stewardship of the lighthouse eight years ago,” explained Pam Setchell, president and director of Huntington Lighthouse Preservation Society for the past 30 years. “Since it’s been through the process it’s now going out to public auction.”
This year, GSA has issued these six historic lighthouses in five states for its free process to agencies:
- Lynde Point Lighthouse, Old Saybrook, Connecticut.
- Nobska Lighthouse, Falmouth (Woods Hole), Massachusetts.
- Plymouth/Gurnet Lighthouse, Plymouth, Massachusetts.
- Warwick Neck Light, Warwick, Rhode Island.
- Little Mark Island and Monument, Harpswell, Maine.
- Erie Harbor North Pier Lighthouse, Erie, Pennsylvania. (NOA period recently closed.)
Additionally, USGSA is offering four historic lighthouses for sale by auction:
- Penfield Reef Lighthouse, Fairfield, Connecticut
- Stratford Shoal Light, East Setauket, New York
- Cleveland Harbor West Pierhead Light, Cleveland, Ohio
- Keweenaw Waterway Lower Entrance Light, Chassell, Michigan
Over 150 lighthouses have been transferred to new owners through the program, including 81 lights to local governments and nonprofit entities through no-cost transfers and about 70 sold via public auction, which raised over $10 million dollars. Auction sales have ranged from $10,000 to $933,888.
Costs for upkeep of lighthouses are relative to what the new owner plans to do. Most lighthouses do not have any utilities, so there would be a cost associated with making the lighthouse livable.
But, if you’ve ever had the romantic notion to own your own lighthouse, here's your chance.
Photo: Detail view of cupola, showing original metal roof and paneling, and modern beacon, looking northeast - Stratford Shoal Lighthouse, Long Island Sound, Bridgeport, Fairfield County, CT Photos from Survey HAER CT-173. Brewster, Robert, photographer. Historic American Engineering Record (Library of Congress). Work of U.S. government.
Extra! Here are some crazy facts about the Stratford Shoal Light:
- The lighthouse is located on Stratford (or Middleground) Shoal which is a little over a mile in diameter
- Adriaen Block, the first European to map Long Island Sound, identified two low islands at the site of the current Stratford Shoal during his 1614 voyage
- These islands were eroded below the surface of the water within a century of two
- The shoal was first marked for navigation in 1820 by a pair of buoys placed on its north and south ends
- Congress appropriated $10,000 for the construction of a "floating light for Middle Ground, Long Island Sound" in the early 1800s
- The vessel was built in 1837 but proved ineffective as it drifted
- The Stratford Shoal lighthouse was completed in 1877 to replace the lightship on a manmade island over the natural shoal
- Lighthouse keepers were stationed there to maintain it
- The lighthouse was automated in 1970
- Read more about the Stratford Shoal Light here
Correction: A previous version of this story said that Nick Korstad owned Borden Flats Lighthouse in Massachusetts and Spectacle Reef Lighthouse on Lake Huron. He is the former owner of those lighthouses but has since sold them.
