Florida's oldest masonry lighthouse and one of the country's most-investigated paranormal sites
100 Red Cox Drive, St. Augustine, FL 32080
Age
All Ages; tower climb requires children to be 44 inches tall and climb under their own power
Cost
$$
General admission with tower climb is typically around $20-25; the seasonal Dark of the Moon Ghost Experience is $29.95 for adults and $24.95 for children 7-12. Check the museum website for current rates.
Access
Limited Access
Paved museum grounds; tower has 219 steps with no elevator
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1874 · National Register of Historic Places (1981) · Florida's Oldest Masonry Lighthouse · First-Order Fresnel Lens
St. Augustine has marked the entrance to its inlet since the Spanish colonial period, when a wooden watchtower stood on the north end of Anastasia Island. The current lighthouse was authorized in the 1860s after years of beach erosion threatened the older Spanish-era tower, which eventually fell into the ocean. Construction on the new lighthouse, located further inland, ran from 1871 to 1874 and was overseen by superintendent Hezekiah Pittee. The tower was first lit on October 15, 1874, with a first-order Fresnel lens that remains in service today.
During construction in the summer of 1873, a railway cart used to haul supplies from the shore to the lighthouse site rolled into deep water with four children aboard. Three of the children drowned: two of Hezekiah Pittee's daughters, Mary and Eliza, and a young friend, the daughter of a worker. The accident is documented in period newspapers and in the museum's archival materials, and the Pittee daughters remain at the center of the site's paranormal reputation.
The Coast Guard transferred the lighthouse to local stewardship in 1980, and a 1986 fire damaged the keepers' house extensively. The restoration of the keepers' quarters in the 1980s, conducted in part by overnight crews protecting the building from vandalism, is also where the modern wave of staff and contractor encounters originates. The lighthouse was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1981 and today operates as the St. Augustine Lighthouse and Maritime Museum.
Sources
The St. Augustine Lighthouse's paranormal reputation is anchored in a documented tragedy. On July 10, 1873, two of superintendent Hezekiah Pittee's daughters and a worker's daughter drowned when a railway cart hauling construction supplies rolled into the inlet. The Pittee daughters figure in nearly every staff account collected since the keepers' house restoration began in the 1980s. Visitors and staff have reported the sound of girls' laughter on the tower stairs and grounds, glow sticks moved between rooms during the museum's nighttime tours, and shoelaces found tied together after the keepers' house has been empty.
A second cluster of accounts concerns a man reported in the basement of the keepers' house and a hanging figure occasionally reported in an upper room. The lighthouse staff treats these accounts with archival caution and is open about the limits of historical attribution. Some retellings name a keeper or worker said to have died on site, but the documentary trail for these figures is thinner than the railway-cart record and the museum does not treat them as confirmed identifications.
The lighthouse hosted a 2006 investigation by The Atlantic Paranormal Society (TAPS) on the Sci-Fi Channel's Ghost Hunters; the resulting episode is among the show's most-cited investigations. Investigators with Ghost Adventures and a long succession of independent paranormal groups have followed. The museum publishes its own ghost-stories archive on its website and runs the seasonal Dark of the Moon Ghost Experience tour, which moves visitors through the keepers' house and tower after sunset by glow stick.
The most-told staff anecdote remains the appearance of a small girl in nineteenth-century clothing, watching restoration crews in the 1980s from the doorway and vanishing when noticed. The story circulates in multiple independent first-person accounts collected by the museum staff and has formed the public face of the site's paranormal narrative for four decades.
Notable Entities
Media Appearances
A working 1874 lighthouse with a 219-step climb to the gallery deck and a maritime museum housed in the restored keepers' quarters. Exhibits include the Pittee family history and the 1873 construction-railway accident that anchors much of the site's paranormal reputation.
An after-dark glow-stick-lit exploration of the lighthouse tower and keepers' house, with stories of the Pittee daughters and other long-reported activity. The lighthouse has hosted the TAPS team and Ghost Adventures and continues to publish its own paranormal-investigation findings.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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