ADAPTIVE LEGACY: THE TRANSITION OF LIGHTHOUSES FROM SYMBOLS OF POLITICAL-ECONOMICAL STATEMENTS TO ICONS OF CULTURAL IDENTITY

Abstract

Lighthouses on the eastern coast, North Carolina are iconic monuments of the scenic and historic landscape of the Outer Banks. The job for which these lighthouses were specifically designed was to aid mariners in navigating treacherous waters. The advancement of modern navigational equipment has diminished the necessity of these lighthouses for that function. However, the lighthouses also have a separate complex and symbolic purpose connected to the values and ideology of the organizations that fund and supported them. Historically, their purpose was to project the ideologies of the government responsible for their construction, design, and maintenance to the foreign and national mariners that relied upon them. Today, the National Parks Service, private organizations, and community associations manage the lighthouses on the Outer Banks for heritage tourism with the goal of positively increasing public interest in lighthouse history. With the increase in public access to the lighthouses, there is the potential hazard of compromising the structural integrity of the buildings. This thesis will study the historic preservation management strategies of three North Carolina lighthouses as case studies: Bald Head Island (Old Baldy), Cape Hatteras, and Currituck Beach lighthouses. The study evaluates the historic function and purpose of these lighthouses to understand the circumstances of their creation, examines the level of public access and management actions taken to date to determine the effectiveness of their preservation, and the values and opinions of the local community members towards these sites as cultural and historical resources. By studying the transition of their purpose, lighthouses may be seen simultaneously as historic properties with significance that extends beyond their function as navigational aids and includes their purpose as symbols of an institutional ideology and cultural identity.