My name is Steven Allen.

I am the Executive Director of the Crooked River Lighthouse.

I have been in this position for a year.

Before that, I was the president of Carrabelle Lighthouse Association.

It was the nonprofit that formed five years ago to save the tower.

So the Crooked River Lighthouse was built in 1895.

But in order to tell the story of the lighthouse, we have to talk about Dog Island, and the three lighthouses that were there.

So in 1938, we built the first lighthouse on Dog Island.

It survived four years and was destroyed by a storm.

And then they built another one.

And that survived eight years and was destroyed by a storm.

And then they built another one.

And, and then the Civil War happened, and they burned, and messed with the tower and the stairs in order to keep it out of the hands of the Union, fleet.

And so then it was fought to put back together, and then it destroyed in 1810.

In 1872.

So the U.S., the Congress had approved, reconstruction of a new lighthouse on Dog Island.

You got to understand that during this time, these lighthouses were key points about navigation.

Before Flagler went down to South Florida, North Florida, from Saint Augustine to Pensacola was where a lot of the shipping that went all of the world came to.

In fact, in 1899, four years after the tower was erected, Carrabelle is recognized as being the busiest port in Florida.

And that's hard to believe today because it's a sleepy old fishing village.

But back then it was very important.

In 1872, they had approved the rebuilding of a lighthouse, and about the same time, the first agency in the US Treasury was created to deal with lighthouses at the US Lighthouse Board.

And they began to look at whether it was worthwhile to put another tower out on the island.

Well, the board decided and began to question whether it was feasible or advisable to do that.

And so someone suggested that maybe building a lighthouse on the mainland would be safer and more secure and last longer and, be better.

So they identified this lot, and began building that lighthouse in 1895 or 89 for its campaign in 1895.