Point Arena

Point Arena Lighthouse

Located about 130 miles north of San Francisco in Mendocino County is Point Arena, California. The 115-foot tall lighthouse tower currently standing here dates from 1908. The original lighthouse built of brick and mortar at this location was destroyed in 1906 along with the earthquake that devastated San Francisco. The tower that exists today was built by a smoke stack construction company that constructed it of concrete and reinforcing steel to withstand earthquakes, the first constructed like this on the west coast. Due to the high cost of construction at the time, much of the work had to be done by the lightkeepers and their families. The sandbar on which the lighthouse is built extends about 1/2 mile out into the Pacific Ocean from the mainland and is the closet point on the west coast to Hawaii. A fog horn signal originally accompanied the lighthouse to aid in navigation.

The original first order Fresnel lens produced a light that could be seen 19 miles out to sea, was made in France and consisted of 666 hand ground glass prisms weighing 12,000 lbs. This optic lens was supported by a solid brass framework which as a total assembly was valued at $3.5 million in 1908. The lens turned by way of a clockwork mechanism suspended in the center height of the tower that had to be hand cranked to the top of the tower every 75 minutes by the "wickies", or keepers. The light was produced by a "Funks" hydraulic oil lamp and required refueling every four hours.

It is recorded that in the waning days of WWII, the Japanese had plans to invade the US mainland and one of the key locations for this invasion was Point Arena. The Owens family that were the keepers at the lighthouse from 1932 to 1952 found rice bowls, plasma bags and Japanaese sandals strewn on the beach for several hundred yards shortly after the end of the war.

Three movies have been filmed at the lighthouse - the movie Treasure in 1982, the Mel Gibson 1992 movie Forever Young and the 2014 movie Need For Speed.