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Although it was never intended as a beacon for a lighthouse, had it ever been installed in one, ships could have seen it for who knows how many miles.
We have been unable to locate a lot of information on the searchlight, but following is what we found, from several sources, which may or may not be totally accurate.
It made its first appearance at the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893. That’s where Thaddeus Lowe, a California entrepreneur first saw it. Lowe was a savvy businessman and owned a popular mountain top resort and tourist observation post at the top a mountain that was only accessible by his “incline railroad”. How he raised the money to buy it is unclear, but somehow or another he got the U.S. Army involved and they might have footed part of the expenses. And why not, the 6,000,000 candlepower searchlight, built by General Electric could prove vital in coastal defense and other areas of warfare.
It was reported that the lamp itself weighed 400 pounds and the reflector weighed 700 pounds.
When it arrived in Pasadena in August of 1864, it was placed on its temporary home at the top of Echo Mountain at Lowe’s own, “White City”.
When it was first lit at the top of Mt. Lowe on January 1910 the Los Angeles Express newspaper reported that hundreds of people were able to attend who night not have otherwise gone, thanks to the railroad ticket price being lowered from $2.50 per person to $2.00. The final day before the event, women, staffing booths in local department stores, sold several hundred last minute tickets to people wanting to make the trip from sunshine to the top of the snow covered mountain and watch the display. The result was several thousand people showed up. In fact so many school-teachers bought tickets that special cars had to be added to the railroad train just for them.
What happened to the searchlight in later years is unclear. If any of our readers have any information to share with us, we would appreciate hearing from you. We’d love to do a follow up story.
This story appeared in the February 2001 edition of Lighthouse Digest Magazine. For subscription information about the print edition, click here.
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