HOME





Cape Elizabeth Lights
Cape Elizabeth Light (also known as Two Lights) is a lighthouse in Cape Elizabeth, at the southwestern entrance to Casco Bay in Maine. Only the eastern tower of the two that made up the light station until 1924 is active. Until recently, the eastern light used a second-order Fresnel lens. The western tower is deactivated, but it is still standing and is privately owned. The facility is adjacent to Two Lights State Park, a state facility which allows a view of, but not access to, the grounds of the lighthouse. The park was the Cape Elizabeth Military Reservation, part of the Harbor Defenses of Portland, in World War II. During that war the former western lighthouse was a fire control tower. Cape Elizabeth Light, designed in the Gothic Revival style, was added to the National Register of Historic Places as Two Lights on December 27, 1974. History The area is known as "Two Lights" due to the history of the station. It was originally built in 1828 as two rubble stone towers apa ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Fresnel Lens
A Fresnel lens ( ; ; or ) is a type of composite compact lens developed by the French physicist Augustin-Jean Fresnel (1788–1827) for use in lighthouses. It has been called "the invention that saved a million ships." The design allows the construction of lenses of large aperture and short focal length without the mass and volume of material that would be required by a lens of conventional design. A Fresnel lens can be made much thinner than a comparable conventional lens, in some cases taking the form of a flat sheet. The simpler dioptric (purely refractive) form of the lens was first proposed by Count Buffon and independently reinvented by Fresnel. The '' catadioptric'' form of the lens, entirely invented by Fresnel, has outer elements that use total internal reflection as well as refraction; it can capture more oblique light from a light source and add it to the beam of a lighthouse, making the light visible from greater distances. Description The Fresnel len ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Schooner
A schooner () is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: fore-and-aft rigged on all of two or more masts and, in the case of a two-masted schooner, the foremast generally being shorter than the mainmast. A common variant, the topsail schooner also has a square topsail on the foremast, to which may be added a topgallant. Differing definitions leave uncertain whether the addition of a fore course would make such a vessel a brigantine. Many schooners are gaff-rigged, but other examples include Bermuda rig and the staysail schooner. The origins of schooner rigged vessels is obscure, but there is good evidence of them from the early 17th century in paintings by Dutch marine artists. The name "schooner" first appeared in eastern North America in the early 1700s. The name may be related to a Scots word meaning to skip over water, or to skip stones. The schooner rig was used in vessels with a wide range of purposes. On a fast hull, good ability to windward was useful for pri ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Lighthouses On The National Register Of Historic Places In Maine
A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid, for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways. Lighthouses mark dangerous coastlines, hazardous shoals, reefs, rocks, and safe entries to harbors; they also assist in aerial navigation. Once widely used, the number of operational lighthouses has declined due to the expense of maintenance and has become uneconomical since the advent of much cheaper, more sophisticated and effective electronic navigational systems. History Ancient lighthouses Before the development of clearly defined ports, mariners were guided by fires built on hilltops. Since elevating the fire would improve the visibility, placing the fire on a platform became a practice that led to the development of the lighthouse. In antiquity, the lighthouse functioned more as an entrance marker to ports than as a warning signal for reefs and ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

National Register Of Historic Places Listings In Cumberland County, Maine
__NOTOC__ This is a list of the National Register of Historic Places listings in Cumberland County, Maine. This is intended to be a complete list of the properties and districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Cumberland County, Maine, Cumberland County, Maine, United States. Latitude and longitude coordinates are provided for many National Register properties and districts; these locations may be seen together in a map. There are 245 properties and districts listed on the National Register in the county, including 12 National Historic Landmarks. 150 of these properties and districts, including 5 National Historic Landmarks, are located outside Portland, and are listed here, while the properties and districts in Portland are National Register of Historic Places listings in Portland, Maine, listed separately. Two once-listed properties outside Portland have been removed. Current listings Portland Outside Portland ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Comber Wave
In fluid dynamics, a breaking wave or breaker is a wave whose amplitude reaches a critical level at which large amounts of wave energy transform into turbulent kinetic energy. At this point, simple physical models that describe wave dynamics often become invalid, particularly those that assume linear behaviour. The most generally familiar sort of breaking wave is the breaking of water surface waves on a coastline. Wave breaking generally occurs where the amplitude reaches the point that the crest of the wave actually overturns—the types of breaking water surface waves are discussed in more detail below. Certain other effects in fluid dynamics have also been termed "breaking waves," partly by analogy with water surface waves. In meteorology, atmospheric gravity waves are said to break when the wave produces regions where the potential temperature decreases with height, leading to energy dissipation through convective instability; likewise, Rossby waves are said to break when ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Cape Elizabeth Lights ME
A cape is a clothing accessory or a sleeveless outer garment which drapes the wearer's back, arms, and chest, and connects at the neck. History Capes were common in medieval Europe, especially when combined with a hood in the chaperon. They have had periodic returns to fashion - for example, in nineteenth-century Europe. Roman Catholic clergy wear a type of cape known as a ferraiolo, which is worn for formal events outside a ritualistic context. The cope is a liturgical vestment in the form of a cape. Capes are often highly decorated with elaborate embroidery. Capes remain in regular use as rainwear in various military units and police forces, in France for example. A gas cape was a voluminous military garment designed to give rain protection to someone wearing the bulky gas masks used in twentieth-century wars. Rich noblemen and elite warriors of the Aztec Empire would wear a tilmàtli; a Mesoamerican cloak/cape used as a symbol of their upper status. Cloth and clothing ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Edward Hopper
Edward Hopper (July 22, 1882 – May 15, 1967) was an American realism, American realist painter and printmaker. While he is widely known for his oil paintings, he was equally proficient as a watercolor painting, watercolorist and printmaker in etching. Hopper created subdued drama out of commonplace subjects 'layered with a poetic meaning', inviting narrative interpretations. He was praised for "complete verity" in the America he portrayed. His career benefited significantly from his marriage to fellow-artist Josephine Nivison, who contributed much to his work, both as a life-model and as a creative partner. Biography Early life Hopper was born in 1882 in Nyack, New York, a yacht-building center on the Hudson River north of New York City. He was one of two children of a comfortably well-off family. His parents, of mostly Dutch people, Dutch ancestry, were Elizabeth Griffiths Smith and Garret Henry Hopper, a dry-goods merchant.Levin, Gail, ''Edward Hopper: An Intimate Biog ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]