Lighthouse Archives

(A Non-Profit Organization)

"If We Don't Do It, Who Will?"

This non-profit site is dedicated to the preservation of archival photographs and history of the U.S. Lighthouses.

For many years, we, Bob & Sandra Shanklin, "The Lighthouse People", have traveled and photographed all the standing lighthouses of the United States. It has been mostly at our own expense, but we have had help from many people including our friends. Grants from Harbour Lights sent us to Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico.

Now our interest has turned to saving the archival photos of U.S. lighthouses, many of which are gone. In the past few years, floods, hurricanes and other natural disasters have placed much of our lighthouse history in jeopardy. Also many of the old black and white photos are fading away.  With a scan, we can stop the loss at that point, and in many cases bring the photo back.

In 2005, much of the history of the Gulf Coast was lost in Hurricane Katrina, including the archival photos at the Coast Guard Headquarters in New Orleans. It makes us feel our goal is even more pressing.

Our current project is scanning and saving digital images of archival lighthouse photos to share with the lighthouse community. In October 2006, we had hoped to go to Washington D.C. to continue scanning at the Coast Guard Historian's Office. Our funding fell through. We have been there twice before with help from grants. We feel there is much more work left to do there.

We finally went on April 18th for 7 days work. We had (at our own expense), airline tickets to D.C.  We had received help to pay for our lodgings, and some transportation.  We still needed help with  misc. (including food, local transportation, etc) expenses.  We  had a garage sale and also sold personal items on ebay to help pay for this.  And of course, out of our own pockets. We ate the cheapest meals possible, rode the metro, buses, etc.  My daughter Colleen Turner and I (Sandra) went and Bob stayed home to continue the work.  Colleen is disabled and I am a Sr., so we were able to get cheap rates on the buses, etc. A few weeks after that, Colleen got a job "catsitting" in the D.C. area and we were able, at our own expense to go back for a week.  (no lodging expense) We have scanned all the important (to us) photos at the Coast Guard Historian's Office and have started researching at the National Archives.

Fall of 2007, I went to the National Archives in Seattle, stayed with friends, so expenses were low and scanned all the lighthouse photos they have. 
   Colleen and I, end of Nov., flew to San Francisco buying our own airline tickets, although we had donations enough to cover hotel, meals, transportation.
   We went to the National Archives in San Bruno for one day and to Nautical Research Centre in Petaluma for two days. We got every photo the National Archives had, but in two days were not able to scan everything at Nautical Research.  We ran out of money for lodging and food.

We have a group of volunteers, including us, that will need only expenses paid to go into any area and scan archival photos and documents. All scanned material will be digitized and saved.  We, and our group, have all given our time freely and will continue to do so.

We look forward to your donation of archival material to add to our files. (Archival material includes old photos, old letters from lighthouse families and old lighthouse postcards). Please contact us to donate or to help. If you would like to send us scans of your archival material, please scan full size at 600dpi.

If you would like us to digitize your treasures but would like to keep them, please send them to us. We will scan them and return them to you.

Remember, if we don’t do it, WHO will? This is something that needs to be done and needs to be done NOW!

We are finding start-up is more costly than first thought.  We can use all the financial help you can give us.  We need money for a phone line, insurance and other business expenses.  At this time ALL of our help is by volunteers.   Even your smallest gifts are certainly needed.

Most people (including us) felt that black and white photographs were permanent archival objects.  As we work with thousands of photos we are finding they too, fade with age.

As we scan the images and digitize them, we instantly stop that aging process.  (If only we could stop human aging that easily.)  After saving those images, many times we can perform miracles in Photoshop that restores some of the lost image detail.

Some of the samples on this page demonstrate how much of our lighthouse history is being lost.  In a few more years many of these photographs will be no more than blank pieces of paper.

After saving these images, copies will be sent to several places to be stored safely. We will keep a working copy with us as well, to share photos with researchers and organizations.  They will be available to books and magazines for a research fee.

Many of our lighthouses and much of their history has been lost in the sands of time.  In just one year, 2005, we lost 5 lighthouses on the Gulf Coast.  Often it is not only the lighthouses themselves but also family photos, library archives, even old photos at the lighthouses.

When these are lost, part of us (our America) has also been lost.  It is up to us to save everything we can.  Please help.

Bob feels that the project is so important that he plans on devoting the rest of his life to this program.   Any help you can give will certainly be appreciated.