Frozen Lighthouse, St. Joseph North Pier, Lake Michigan, North America

After the War Department had extended the north pier, the range lights and steam whistle were relocated 1,000 feet lakeward in 1904. The present set of range lights on the north pier was constructed in 1907. The front tower consists of steel framing covered with metal sheets and tapers from a diameter of eight feet, three inches at its base to seven feet, three inches at its nine-sided lantern room. The tower was originally equipped with a fifth-order Barbier and Benard lens the produced a fixed red light.
The rear tower consists of a twenty-four-foot-square steel structure whose pyramidal roof is surmounted by an octagonal tower and circular lantern room with helical bars. A fourth-order lens manufactured by Chance Brothers was used to produce a fixed red light. The pier’s original ten-inch steam whistle, constructed by J. P. McGuire of Cleveland, Ohio, was transferred to the lower portion of the new structure. A diaphone fog signal was installed in the rear tower in 1933.
A Lighthouse Depot for the ninth district of the United States Lighthouse Service was built alongside the river in 1893. After a depot was built in Milwaukee, the one at St. Joseph became less important and was transferred to the Navy in 1918.
In 1908, a duplex, with seven rooms in each of its two apartments, was constructed at the inner end of the north pier for the keepers. The 1859 lighthouse remained in operation until 1919, when an acetylene light was established atop a red, skeletal tower on the south pier. No longer needed, the lighthouse was sold to the City of St. Joseph in 1936. Over the years, the structure housed offices for the American Red Cross, the American Cancer Society, and the Society for Crippled children, but in 1955 local preservationists lost their battle to preserve the historic lighthouse, and it was razed to make room for a parking lot.