By James Heinz

The current North Point lighthouse in Milwaukee’s Lake Park is not the first lighthouse to be built there. A previous lighthouse was built nearby in 1855. It was abandoned after the current lighthouse was built in 1888. However, the original lighthouse was not dismantled or moved.  And that leaves us with a mystery:

Where is the original lighthouse?

The original lighthouse began operation on November 2, 1855.  It was made of yellow Cream City brick and had a 28 foot tall tower with an iron lantern room at the top that contained a fourth order Fresnel lens made in Paris.  Sitting on top of the bluff put the light 107 feet above the surface of Lake Michigan, which made it the tallest lighthouse on the Great Lakes. The light was replaced in 1868.

One day in the 1870s the keeper awoke to find that 16 feet of his front yard had slumped into the Lake overnight.  He urgently requested a replacement light, and on January 10, 1888, the current lighthouse became operational.

I wrote about the quest for the original lighthouse on the WMHS blog in 2022 which can be found on page 11 at: https://wmhs.org  

At that time Dr. Seth Schneider, a principal investigator with UWM cultural resources, and a crew of volunteers, mostly students, dug two test pits northeast of the current lighthouse that showed evidence that the original lighthouse had been in that general area, although they did not find the foundation stones.

In September 2024 I returned to find that their quest was partially successful.  Two new test pits uncovered several inches below the surface what appeared to be the wooden flooring of the wood utility structure behind the original lighthouse, which can be seen in the accompanying photograph. The ends of the boards can be seen sticking out of the side of the test pit in another accompanying photo.

But where was the original brick lighthouse itself?

Seth said that he had found the original lighthouse foundation stones. He took me to the edge of the bluff and pointed down the slope. “There it is”, he said. All I could see was brush and trees and dirt.

Seth said that it was too dangerous to try to climb down there. Although he is a PhD, I have found that sometimes those three letters stand for Piled Higher and Deeper.  I did not listen to him.  I would regret that.

In my 2022 article I also told the true story of the Lost Treasure of Lake Park and of the efforts of Josh Gates of the TV show “Expedition Unknown” to find it.  On his show Gates often says, “I have a tendency to end up in some very strange places.”  And now, in my Quest for the Missing Lighthouse, so would I.

I returned on another date, and looked down the slope.  It didn’t look that bad. I then began to walk down the bluff, a trip I completed when I slipped on the slope and slid down it uncontrollably on my backside, plowing my way through some of the indigenous brush in a manner not dissimilar to that of my hero Homer J. Simpson, including the “D’oh”.

I came to a stop on a kind of shelf, covered with downed brush, which I rapidly discovered was very good at tripping me and causing me to fall, which I did three times. The last time I fell onto one of the piles, a swarm of angry hornets rose to the defense of their brush pile and stung me. When I told WMHS president Todd Gordon about this, he asked me what kind of hornets they were.

“The stinging kind, Todd,” I replied, “the stinging kind.”

And then finally I found it: The Last Resting Place of the Missing Lighthouse.

It didn’t look like much, but after falling down the slope, thrashing through the brush and being swarmed by the kind of hornets that sting, it looked to me like King Tut’s tomb must have looked to the man who found it.

There were a number of grey foundation stones topped with Cream City bricks, and fragments of cut stone and Cream City brick scattered about. What I thought was a piece of broken glass bottle from the original lighthouse turned out to be a piece of a modern Budweiser bottle. The presence of other beer and soft drink bottles proved I was not the first person there.

Seth Schneider told me that he had no idea which part or side of the original lighthouse he had found. And he is unlikely ever to know, since the Parks Commission prohibits digging on the bluff itself, as that could cause erosion of the bluff, the thing that caused the abandonment of the original lighthouse. But at least the mystery of the missing lighthouse has been solved.

Actually, part of the original lighthouse can still be seen today without falling down the bluff in Lake Park or being stung by venomous insects. All you have to do is look up.  The lantern room from the original lighthouse was removed and, in an early example of recycling, placed atop the current lighthouse, where it remains today.

Having found my personal Holy Grail, I was now faced with the challenge of getting back up the slope. The slope was much steeper and slipperier than it had looked, and there were no handholds that I could use.  After much slip sliding away, I found a way to crawl up the slope to the top, which relieved me of the humiliation of having to call the Fire Department, an option I was seriously considering. A 67 year old man with a bad knee should have known better.

DO NOT DO WHAT I DID.  I did not listen to Seth Schneider and I regretted it, and if you do not listen to me, you will regret it too.  You have been warned.  If you do decide not to follow my advice, all I can do is say to you the same thing my mother said to me when I did stupid things as a child:

“If you break your neck and kill yourself, don’t come crying to me.”

In the future, I will listen to the PhD.  And my mother.

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James Heinz is the Wisconsin Marine Historical Society’s acquisitions director. He became interested in maritime history as a kid watching Jacques Cousteau’s adventures on TV. He was a Great Lakes wreck diver until three episodes of the bends forced him to retire from diving. He was a University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee police officer for thirty years. He regularly flies either a Cessna 152 or 172.

Photos by James Heinz unless noted otherwise

The original lighthouse courtesy of North Point Lighthouse

The first test pit now filled in

The floor boards of the original lighthouse courtesy of Seth Schneider

The foundation stones of the original lighthouse

Cream city bricks from the original lighthouse

The slope and site of the original lighthouse