By Eric Duvall / sdnews.com / March 5, 2024
La Playa Trail Association presents its next history lecture, “The Restoration of San Diego’s Operational Lighthouse” by authors and twin sisters, Kim Fahlen and Karen Scanlon at Point Loma Assembly, 3035 Talbot St., on Tuesday, March 12. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. with lecture 6-7 p.m. A donation of $10 is accepted at the door.
The leggy iron tower that has stood beckoning ships at the lower tip of Point Loma since 1891 underwent an extensive restoration completed in early 2020. Now the old rust bucket is in good standing for another century.
“And just in time,” says independent contractor Neil Gardis. “Straightening a three-degree tilt of the upper two sections and rooting out layers of lead paint and desecration from rust-jacking was no easy feat. And critical to the survival of the historic and operational structure.”
Fahlen and Scanlon, co-authors of the book “Lighthouses of San Diego” will review the history of Point Loma Light Station and then take us on the precarious journey of restoration. They were on board documenting and photographing the process.
Gardis, senior project manager at O’Hana Industries in Kentucky, will join the conversation if his travel schedule permits. Contracts take him to many distant seacoasts for lighthouse and other engineering work.
The U.S. Coast Guard Finance Office, Oakland, awarded Gardis the Point Loma contract in 2017, and the work was much more extensive than originally budgeted.
“Don’t miss the fascinating images and narrative of our familiar lighthouse. It’s pretty peculiar to see the lantern, watch room, and ventilator ball removed from our tower,” Scanlon says. “But you’ll witness the ‘sad-to-glad’ situation until the first flash of a modern VLB-44 array was sent to sea.”
The sisters have been active for some 20 years at Cabrillo National Monument in tending the lantern and lens of the Old Point Loma Lighthouse. “Fickle old joints have bungled this the past year,” says Scanlon, “but we’ve trained a couple of dedicated helpmates. The park has lots of other places for us to be, too.”
For several years Fahlen worked with Lighthouse Lamp Shop of Florida, a private U.S. lighthouse restoration crew of former Coast Guard lampists. She photographed every nut and bolt and piece of glass during the procedures but also caught glorious images of light as the hours of the day passed. A study of lighthouse optics has taken Fahlen across this country, and many countries of Europe, and soon to Denmark.
Scanlon is a freelance author whose works include maritime history, airships, children/teacher curriculum, and the plots of curious places and people.
“We were suspicious five years ago at seeing what looked like a marshmallow wrapping our lighthouse,” Fahlen said. “And why weren’t we in there documenting what was going on? Sticking our noses in where they belong.”
“It’s surprising what you can do if you ask, especially in the guise of a writer and historian,” Scanlon says. “It has opened so many doors for us, little freckle-faced twins from small-town Ohio. Who would have imagined!”
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