Conneaut West Breakwater

In 1896, a project was authorized for the construction of two detached, converging breakwaters to shelter the entrance to the parallel piers at Conneaut. On June 28, 1902, Congress appropriated $8,400 for a new lighthouse on the detached west breakwater and for modifying a light on the west pier to serve as a rear range with the breakwater light. As all the received bids for constructing the new lighthouse were excessive, the necessary material was purchased on the open market, and the lighthouse was built at the Buffalo lighthouse depot. After the War Department completed a new pierhead on the breakwater in 1906, the new lighthouse was placed upon it that October, and the old rear pier light was relocated to the outer end of the pier to range with the new breakwater light.

The 1906 breakwater light was a wooden, cylindrical tower covered with iron and painted white. A wooden winding stairway provided access to the second floor from which an iron ladder led to the lantern room. The lighthouse measured thirty-one-and-a-half feet tall and showed a fixed white light using a fifth-order Chance Brothers lens.

In 1920 the lighthouse was replaced with a new structure. A second-order lens was employed in the lantern room to produce two white flashes every twelve seconds, while the diaphone fog signal sounded a group of two blasts every thirty seconds when necessary. A fog bell was used at the new lighthouse until the diaphone fog signal was in place. The total cost for the lighthouse and other improvements to navigational aids for the harbor came to $89,667.

In 1934, the 980-foot-long, east-west section of the west breakwater was removed, and a 852-foot, rubble-mound, lakeward extension of the west breakwater was built. As a result, the 1920 cement lighthouse was blasted from its bedrock grip on the breakwater using dynamite and replaced by a new, sleek tower costing $70,000. The square, steel tower stands sixty feet tall, and its light and fog signal, which were originally operated by electric power transmitted through a submarine cable, were commissioned on April 1, 1936.

Originally painted white, the tower was later given a horizontal black band as a daymark. The lantern room from the prior lighthouse was used atop the modern tower until 1972, when the light was automated and a modern beacon replaced the lantern room. Today, the tower produces alternating red and white flashes with a five second period.

In May 2007, Conneaut West Breakwater Lighthouse, deemed excess by the Coast Guard, was offered at no cost to eligible entities, including federal, state, and local agencies, non-profit corporations, and educational organizations. It is now owned by the Killilea family.