The Prince's Bay Light (officially: John Cardinal O’Connor Light) is an active lighthouse on the highest point of the southern shoreline of Staten Island, New York, in the Pleasant Plains neighborhood. It is situated on an bluff overlooking

Raritan Bay Raritan Bay is a bay located at the southern portion of Lower New York Bay between the U.S. states of New York and New Jersey and is part of the New York Bight. The bay is bounded on the northwest by New York's Staten Island, on the west by Per ...

with an attached brownstone cottage which served as the lightkeeper's house. The bluffs are part of the southern

terminal moraine A terminal moraine, also called end moraine, is a type of moraine that forms at the terminal (edge) of a glacier, marking its maximum advance. At this point, debris that has accumulated by plucking and abrasion, has been pushed by the front edge ...

formed by the

Wisconsin Glacier The Wisconsin Glacial Episode, also called the Wisconsin glaciation, was the most recent glacial period of the North American ice sheet complex. This advance included the Cordilleran Ice Sheet, which nucleated in the northern North American Cord ...

which receded 10,000 years ago.

History

The current lighthouse was constructed in 1864 for the sum of $30,000 which was approved by Congress. The attached lightkeeper's cottage was completed in 1868. Both buildings were designated as NYC Landmarks on June 28, 2016. The Prince's Bay Lighthouse was deactivated in August 1922 after the installation of acetylene lights in Raritan Bay made the former lighthouse obsolete. The Mission of the Immaculate Virgin at Mt. Loretto, a Catholic orphanage founded by Father

John Christopher Drumgoole John Christopher Drumgoole (August 15, 1816 – March 28, 1888) was an Irish American Roman Catholic priest who was known for his work in caring for and educating orphaned and abandoned children in New York City, especially homeless newsboys. I ...

, purchased the lighthouse, the cottage and an additional outbuilding in 1926. In 1953, a rear

range light Leading lights (also known as range lights in the United States) are a pair of light beacons used in navigation to indicate a safe passage for vessels entering a shallow or dangerous channel; they may also be used for position fixing. At nigh ...

was put up on Mt. Loretto, southeast of the lighthouse. The United States government paid $32 per year to lease the small parcel of land from the mission.Northeast Lights: Lighthouses & Lightships, Rhode Island to Cape May, New Jersey by Robert G. BachandPublisher: Sea Sports Pubns (September 1993) Language: English The lighthouse, the bluffs and of surrounding upland and were purchased in 1999 from the Archdiocese of New York by New York State and the

Trust for Public Land The Trust for Public Land is a U.S. nonprofit organization with a mission to "create parks and protect land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come". Since its founding in 1972, the Trust for Public Land has compl ...

. The area, now known as the Mount Loretto Unique Area, is open to the public and maintained by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. The lighthouse cottage currently serves as the residence for the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation Forest Ranger Police Officer. The tower received a VRB-25 optical system which was placed on top of the lighthouse in 2006.

References

{{Authority control Lighthouses completed in 1864 Houses completed in 1868 Lighthouses in Staten Island New York City Designated Landmarks in Staten Island