Holiday Fun

“Christmas in a lighthouse! How romantic!”

“Not always,” I say to myself, thinking how unlikely it is that early lightkeepers working in drafty, leaking buildings ever felt like they were living a life of romance.

I think of those early keepers and their families waiting for the good ship, (which served B.C. lighthouses from 1912 to 1969), to chug up the coast with three months’ worth of groceries and freight. Precious Christmas cards, letters, gifts and culinary ingredients would be on the final ship of the year, often in late October. In 1928, one lightkeeper and father of seven drowned while trying to row out to the ship in heavy seas, so desperate was he to please the family waiting for him on Kains Island. I spoke to his 97-year-old daughter by cellphone while his granddaughter bought my memoir of becoming a lighthouse keeper. I’ve worked three different times