Indian Island Light

The town of Rockport is located on the western shore of Penobscot Bay in central Maine. Its harbor is sheltered by Beauchamp Point, a peninsula extending roughly southward. Indian Island is, at 4.5 acres (1.8 ha), the largest of a short chain of islands that extend south from the point. Indian Island Light is located at the southern tip of Indian Island. The station consists of a tower, keeper's house, shed, and oil house. The tower is a squat tapered square brick structure, surmounted by a square lantern house ringed by a catwalk and railing. A small workroom projects from the south side of the tower, sheltered by a gabled roof. The keeper's house is set just south of the tower; it is a 1-1/2 story structure, with the original 1850 brick block augmented by a frame addition. East of the tower is a large shed, consisting of two gable-roofed structures joined at a gable end; one is finished in board-and-batten siding, the other in shingles. Northwest of the tower stands a small brick oil house.^[3]

The light station was authorized and established in 1850, and was the principal aid to navigation marking the entrance to Rockport harbor, which was then a major shipbuilding and lime rock processing center. The light was originally mounted on top of the keeper's house,^[3] with a fourth-order Fresnel lens installed in 1856. The light was deactivated in 1859 but restarted in 1861. In 1874-75 the present tower was built, with the oil house added in 1904.^[1] The property was sold by the United States Coast Guard in 1932,^[3] with the light deactivated in 1934.^[1] The light station is in private ownership.

• National Register of Historic Places listings in Knox County, Maine