Mind The Light, Kate

Robbins Reef Lighthouse with New York City and Statue of Liberty

By Marilyn Turk

When Kate Walker first arrived at Robbins Reef Light in 1883 with her Lighthouse Keeper husband John Walker, she threatened to leave him. She had never expected to live in a home surrounded by water. The lighthouse was the type often called a "sparkplug" style, due to its resemblance. It was built on a reef in the middle of a body of the channel leading to the New York City Harbor. Eventually, though, Kate got used to living in the lighthouse and became her husband's assistant keeper. She served in that capacity until John died three years later. His last words to her were, “Mind the light, Kate.”

Robbins Reef, 1917

Several men were offered the position John had vacated as keeper, but they refused, saying the location was too lonely. So Kate, the forty-year-old mother of two, applied for the position. Objections were raised against her appointment due to her petite size, assuming she was unable to handle a man’s job. At four-foot-ten and 100 pounds, the task seemed too large for a woman, not to mention, a tiny one.

It took four years and several men turning down the position before Kate received the appointment. But Kate's work ethic soon proved she was as good at the job as any man. Not only did she keep the light burning, she also rescued at least fifty people whose boats wrecked on the reef during storms. When fog rolled in, she went down into the basement to start the engine that sent out siren blasts. When the motor sometimes broke down, Kate climbed to the top of the tower to bang a huge bell.

Kate on the ladder to the first floor of the lighthouse.

Every day, Kate rowed her children to school, recorded the weather in the logbook, polished the brass, and cleaned the lens. At night, she wound up the weights multiple times to keep the fourth-order lens rotating, trimmed the wicks, refilled the oil reservoir, and in times of fog, she started up the engine in the basement to power the fog signal. As her son Jacob matured, he helped with the tasks and was made an official assistant keeper in 1896.

Kate was keeper of the light for thirty years, retiring at the age of 73. The U.S. Coast Guard commemorated her commitment to her position and diligence to the work by erecting a buoy in her honor and in 1996, a Coast Guard buoy tender bearing her name was launched.

Silencing her critics, Kate proved that despite her small size, she was more than capable of “minding the light.”

USCG Tender Katherine Walker

The Statue of Liberty

A Symbol of our Freedom

by Martha Rogers

I have never been to New York City, but I’ve heard about the Statue of Liberty all my life. Imagine the thrill of those immigrants in the late 19th century coming into the harbor and seeing her for the first time. I’m sure I’d be as much in awe now

as people were back then. She is a symbol of freedom and liberty to people all over the world, yet the story of her structure is one that covers a number of years and some controversy.

Frederic Auguste Bartholdi was named to design a sculpture for the statue with a deadline of 1876 to coordinate with America’s centennial.

He chose the robed figure of a woman to represent Libertas, Roman goddess of liberty. She holds a torch above her head with her right hand and carries a tablet in her left. The tablet is inscribed in Roman numerals with “JULY IV MDCCLXXVI” (July 4, 1776), the date of the U.S. Declaration of Independence. At her feet lies a broken chain representing freedom, thus leading her to become the icon of freedom and a welcome sight for those immigrants coming to America. Here is a close up of her face and crown.

Because Bartholdi needed an engineer to help with the design, he enlisted Alexandre Gustave Eiffel of Eiffel Tower fame to provide assistance with structural issues. His expertise helped to make the final structure stand upright.

In the beginning, funds were hard to come by and tedious for both Americans and Frenchmen. Entertainment, public fees, and a national lottery were means used to help with the fund in France. In America, things did not go as smoothly or quickly. Auctions, entertainment, and even fights were arranged to help. Joseph Pulitzer became a catalyst to get the American movement going. He wrote an editorial for his newspaper and put pressure on the rich and middle class to help provide funds.

In 1885, the finances for the pedestal were completed, and the construction completed in April of 1886. The statue had been finished and waiting in France since 1884. In order to get here her, she had to be broken down into 350 pieces and packed in 214 crates. Now that’s a big statue. 

The picture at right is the torch that was first used, but it has since been replaced because of the age and

deterioration of the first one.  It is on 
display there at the museum. 







Here is how it looks today. 

Ten years later than the 1876 target date, on October 28, 1886, she was dedicated and placed on the granite pedestal within the star-shaped walls of Fort Wood. New York City’s first ticker-tape parade took place and President Grover Cleveland presided over the dedication.

Various groups have been assigned to her care and upkeep. Until 1901, that responsibility fell on United States Lighthouse Board. In 1903, the Emma Lazarus Poem, “The New Colossus”, was written for the statue and engraved on a bronze plaque, 20 years after it was written.

“Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door:”

Those words give me chills even as I read them today. So many thousands of people have come to our shores for the very reasons stated in the poem.

After the Lighthouse Board, the war department took over in 1901. On October 15, 1924, she was declared to be a National Monument by Presidential Proclamation that included Ft. Wood.  In 1933 she was placed in care of the National Park Service which later expanded to include Bedloe Island. In 1956, the name was changed to Liberty Island.

Not until 1965 was Ellis Island transferred to the National Park Service to become part of the monument. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan began a campaign to restore the monument at the cost of $87 million dollars. In 1984, the Statue of Liberty was declared as a World Heritage Site by the United Nations. Reconstruction was completed on July 5, 1986, one hundred years after her first dedication.

Originally, tourists could explore all parts of the statue, including the arm and torch she held high. The crown contained observation windows for tourists to look out over the harbor.  In 1916, the arm and torch area were declared unsafe and shut off from tourists.

In order to comprehend how huge the statute is, remember it was shipped in 214 crates. Parts of her were sent to various places to be on display. The Centennial Exposition in 

Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia in 1876 displayed the torch and arm. Other parts were displayed elsewhere. This is her foot to give you some perspective of her colossal size. 

After September 11, 2001, she was closed for 100 days. The grounds re-opened, but the statue remained closed until August of 2004. Today visitors may tour the island and go to the pedestal observation deck to view the harbor. Tourists also have access to a promenade, museum, Fort Wood and Ellis Island. Although I have never seen the Statue of Liberty in person, her image still brings a lump to my throat and thankfulness for this country to my heart. 

My new novella, Freedom's Journey tells the story of a young woman who came as an immigrant in 1887 will be released in February.

After her grandmother's death in England, Rosemary Beckett is left with only a house and no means of support. An old friend of her deceased father offers her a position as governess to his grandchildren. He pays her passage and Rosemary embarks on her journey. When they arrive in New York Harbor, she meets a charming young man who catches her interest, but because he's a first class passenger, she flees the ship without revealing her identify. Alexander Cartwright finds her again when he visits his brother and sees her as the governess. He believes this is God's answer to his prayers to find her, but her heart is locked against any relationship with a family member. He is determined to break that lock and set her heart free for love.

Martha Rogers is a multi-published author and writes a weekly devotional for ACFW. Martha and her husband Rex live in Houston, Texas where they are active members of First Baptist Church. They are the parents of three sons and grandparents to eleven grandchildren and great-grandparents to four. Martha is a retired teacher with twenty-eight years teaching Home Economics and English at the secondary level and eight years at the college level supervising student teachers and teaching freshman English. She is the Director of the Texas Christian Writers Conference held in Houston in August each year, a member of ACFW, ACFW WOTS chapter in Houston, and a member of the writers’ group, Inspirational Writers Alive.

Find Martha at:  www.marthawrogers.com