DeTour Light Listed on Historic Register

The St. Ignace News reports on the DeTour Reef Light Station:

The DeTour Reef Light Station in Chippewa County was officially listed on the National Register of Historic Places Tuesday, March 15, the National Park Service reported.

Built in 1931, and standing a mile offshore in northern Lake Huron at the far eastern end of Michigan�s Upper Peninsula, the DeTour Reef Light rises 83 feet above the water. The structure, sitting on a 60-foot square, 20-foot high concrete crib, is a steel-framed square tower of three distinct levels. It marks a dangerous reef to help guide ship traffic from and to Lake Huron and Lake Superior via the strategic St. Mary's River. The Light was automated in 1974. In 1997, the lighthouse was declared surplus property by the U. S. Coast Guard due to sophisticated navigational systems aboard ships, and the Coast Guard's not having the funding to care for the structure in accordance with historic preservation guidelines.

In 1998, local citizens formed the DeTour Reef Light Preservation Society (DRLPS) to restore and preserve the lighthouse between the communities of DeTour Village and Drummond Island. The society completed major interior and exterior restoration of the lighthouse in 2004, and public tours to this historic structure will begin in July.