Lighthouse Heroine Maria Bray to be Honored on Novemebr 15, 2024
THACHER AND STRAITSMOUTH ISLANDS ASSOCIATION, U.S. COAST GUARD, AND U.S. COAST GUARD AUXILIARY TO HONOR LIGHTHOUSE HEROINE ON NOVEMBER 15, 2024
ROCKPORT, MA – OCTOBER 14 2024: The Thacher and Straitsmouth Islands Association, in collaboration with the U.S. Coast Guard and U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary, is pleased to announce a commemorative graveside ceremony honoring Maria Bray, lighthouse keeper at the Cape Ann Light Station on Thacher Island, Rockport, Massachusetts, and the namesake of the USCGC Maria Bray. The event will be held on Friday, November 15, 2024 at 10 am at the Beechbrook Cemetery, 401 Essex Avenue (Route 133), Gloucester, Massachusetts.
Maria Bray’s husband, Alexander, was the principal keeper of the twin lights on Thacher Island. On December 21, 1864, one of the two assistant keepers fell ill with a fever. Keeper Bray and the other assistant loaded their ailing colleague into a boat and sailed to the mainland for a doctor, expecting a quick return. Instead, gale winds and blowing snow made it impossible for the keepers to return. Maria, assisted by her nephew, managed to keep both lights burning for three nights, carrying gallons of lantern fuel through the winds and snowdrifts and up the 150 steps in each tower. Keeper Bray finally returned on Christmas Eve to relieve his wife.
In addition to her lighthouse duties, Maria was a celebrated author, editor, and physiologist, as well as a noted expert in marine algae. Her expertise was noted in the 1880 publication The Flora of Essex County, Massachusetts and the 1882 book Sea Mosses: A Collector’s Guide and an Introduction to the Study of Marine Algae.
The commemorative ceremony will include a wreath-laying and the placement of a bronze U.S. Lighthouse Service grave marker by members of the U.S. Coast Guard. The U.S. Lighthouse Service, whose origins date from 1789, was incorporated into the U.S. Coast Guard in 1939. Speakers will include Paul St. Germain, author and historian with the Thacher and Straitsmouth Islands Association, and Jeremy D’Entremont, historian with the U.S. Lighthouse Society.
The USCGC Maria Bray, a 175 ft. Keeper-class buoy tender launched in 1999, is named in Maria’s honor. The cutter’s missions include maintaining over 300 aids to navigation from South Carolina to Florida, environmental protection, search and rescue, and maritime security. The Maria Bray is homeported in Jacksonville, Florida.
The Thacher and Straitsmouth Islands Association, formed in 1980, works to preserve the Cape Ann Light Station and its history, as well as the Straitsmouth Island Light Station on nearby Straitsmouth Island. Thacher Island is located about three miles offshore of Rockport, Massachusetts. Cape Ann Light Station is notable as America’s last operating twin lighthouses that still serve as an active aid to navigation. The light station was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 2001.
Please join us in honoring Maria Bray, the heroine of the Cape Ann Light Station. For details, contact the Thacher and Straitsmouth Islands Association at info@thacherisland.org or Allysa Lee Flaherty, Public Affairs Officer, U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary at usaopsa@gmail.com.
The Coast Guard Auxiliary is the uniformed volunteer component of the U.S. Coast Guard and supports the Coast Guard in nearly all its service missions. The Auxiliary was created by Congress in 1939. For more information, visit www.cgaux.org.
