1887 Cape Lookout Lifesaving Station

Story
Decoys
Credits

🟡 AVERAGE RESEARCH VOLUME

OWNERS

1887 Lifesaving Service
Cape Lookout National Seashore

1887

OTHER ASSOCIATIONS

Tract 105-30 (1)

LCS ID 91835 Structure #CGV-8

Kelly Willis 1957

Sammy and Sara Daniels-prior leaseholders
LOCATION
Cape Lookout Village–Southern Core Banks

Story

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Title

Built in 1887 and manned in 1888–it was replaced by and moved for the new CG Station in 1917. It was used for the Navy Barracks in WWII to house the radio beacon operators.

The upstairs dormers were added during the WWII years.

“In 1957, the Coast Guard decided to surplus a number of the old structures at Cape Lookout, and the old life- saving station was acquired by Kelly Willis, a long- time resident of Carteret County. The following year, using a mule and capstan, Willis took a week to move the building about 500 yards northeast of its original site at the Coast Guard Station. At that point, it is reported, the building became mired in the sand, and there it stayed.

Deemed a Historic Structure 0n 6-30-2000 as part of the Cape Village National Registry.

The 25 year lease extended until 06/02/2001–for $1 a year.

Cape Lookout Life-Saving Station, 2004 (pdf, 18. MB)

Follow the link above to read the Historic Structure Report on the !887 Lifesaving Station

“Willis made few alterations (or repairs) to the old building after it was moved and, like most of the cape’s other property owners, used the house as a weekend and vacation retreat until his death.

In 1969, Samuel L. and Sara D. Daniels acquired the house from Willis’ heirs and, over the next few years, continued to use the house as a part- time residence. In April 1976, the Daniels conveyed title to the old life- saving station to the State of North Carolina who conveyed it to the Federal government for inclusion in the National Seashore in June 1978.

The 1887 Cape Lookout Lifesaving Station

In its new position down the road

Time taking a toll on “beautiful bones”

The completed structure followed original plans for the most part

The design and plan of the new station at Cape Lookout followed those developed in 1882, with only slight variations from the typical plan Like the stations built in the 1870s, the Cape Lookout station incorporated a boat room and the crews’ living quarters into the same building. A privy was also included on the original plans, and other support buildings would be added on the site between 1888 and 1896.

The station was completed by the end of August 1887, but William Howard Gaskill (1857-1914) was not appointed Keeper until December His first crew reported for duty on January 24, 1888, which brought the station into full operation. That first crew included Denard Guthrie, Abraham Moon, Israel S. Wade, Alexander Moon, Valentine Gaskill, David Jones, and John G. Hudgins.

The wreck of the 387- ton, three- masted schooner Sarah D. J. Rawson in February 1905, loaded with lumber and a crew of seven, was the Cape Lookout crew’s most- famous rescue.

Gaskill and his crew, most of them ill with influenza, set out for the wreck within twenty- five minutes of the sighting and, by four o’clock in the afternoon had reached the stranded vessel.

For their heroic efforts, gold medals were awarded to the men of the Cape Lookout Life- Saving Station on April 12, 1905.

While Keeper Gaskill rarely had difficulty recruiting his seven- or eight- member crew in the 1890s, the demise of Diamond City made it increasingly difficulty to keep a full crew, since few were willing to undergo the isolation and hardship of service at such a remote location.

As a site for a new station, the decision was made to build on the site of the old life-saving station.