How High Above the Water Was the Original Lighthouse?

Illustration depicting the lighthouse overlooking the ocean.

Above us there is the Coast Guard's current rotating radar station used to track present-day ship traffic. It is built close to the site of the original Point Bonita Lighthouse. It stands 450 feet above sea level. The original lighthouse stood 306 feet above sea level. This radar tower is 125 feet tall, whereas the lighthouse tower was about a quarter of that height at 56 feet.

The lighthouse graphic on the sign here is of the elegant slender brick lighthouse built in 1855. Because of its commanding height, it was expected to be visible far out to sea. This, at least, was the plan but the plan was flawed. It turned out that this original Point Bonita Lighthouse was placed far too high.
Unlike the East Coast of the United States, the West Coast has dense high fog.

This shroud of fog, can swallow up the brightest light (Sound of cannon firing: BOOM) and often did, leaving the lighthouse ineffective and forcing the lighthouse keepers to use sound (BOOM) instead of light, as a warning. (BOOM) A cannon was fired every 25 minutes in dense high fog. They used an Army surplus 24-pounder siege gun, (BOOM), the very first fog signal on the West Coast. (BOOM) On August 5th, 1855 a retired Army Sergeant, Edward Maloney, was hired to fire the cannon. On one instance, Maloney stayed up for three days straight with only two hours of sleep. Exhausted by the ordeal, (BOOM) he quit.

Please continue down the trail, and stop at the sign before the white-railed cement bridge.

(Sound of glass clinking together in a cart) So the solution was to move the light to a lower location. In 1877 the first lighthouse was abandoned and the precious light and lantern room was disassembled and carefully transported down this road to a new, lower lighthouse only 124 feet above sea level and well below most fog.