Longform - Cape Cod - Joseph Lee
THREE WHITE, ONE RED
BY JOSEPH LEE
EVERY 15 SECONDS, a gentle flash of white light sweeps over Aquinnah. A moment later, it is followed by a dim red light that brushes over the scrubby trees, rolling hills and sandy dunes of the town. For over 150 years, the red and white lights of the Gay Head Lighthouse have punctuated the sky in Aquinnah, Martha’s Vineyard’s smallest town. Although the town name was changed from Gay Head to Aquinnah, the original Wampanoag name, in 1997, the cliffs and lighthouse still carry the American name. The light, which flashes 24 hours a day, is mostly invisible during the day but becomes a familiar, faintly illuminating pattern at night.
I grew up spending summers at my grandparents’ house in Aquinnah. My family and I are members of the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head (Aquinnah), the Indigenous people who have called the island home for thousands of years. I felt that history at tribal summer camp, where my brother and I learned our Native language and culture alongside our tribal cousins. We ran around town, traipsing through tall grass and over dunes, hunting for snakes, clams and interesting rocks. After camp, my brother and I would bike up to the cliffs, where there are a half-dozen Wampanoag-owned shops and restaurants. My parents run Hatmarcha Gifts, a seasonal gift shop that my grandparents opened in the 1970s. We’d hang out at the store or get ice cream and french fries from our cousin’s restaurant next door. The lighthouse, just a few hundred feet away along the cliff edge, was part of that summer mythology, that deep feeling of history and belonging.
For countless generations, the ocean has sustained Wampanoag people. Whales, in particular, have played a pivotal role: Wampanoag legend says that the cloudy red color in the famous Gay Head Cliffs came from whale blood. Our giant leader Moshup would pluck whales from the ocean with his bare hands and kill them by slamming them against the cliffs. While their blood seeped into the clay cliffs, the enormous whales would feed the entire tribe.
When the whaling industry exploded in the 19th century, sailors and fishermen were suddenly in high demand. Whale oil sparked the long voyages Wampanoag men made around the world, but it also fueled the beacon guiding their way home. The Gay Head Lighthouse, like many industrial-era machines, was powered by whale oil. Built in 1855, the red-brick lighthouse at the western tip of the island–equipped with a first-order Fresnel lens made in France–towered over the cliffs, flashing its distinctive three white, one red light pattern toward the horizon.
Despite the dramatic views from the top of the lighthouse, the inside was always more interesting to me. My great-grandfather Charles Vanderhoop was the first and only Wampanoag principal keeper of the lighthouse. Because of this, I always felt a kind of claim to it. As I gingerly climbed up the narrow, winding stairs, clutching the metal railings whenever I could, I imagined my great-grandfather making the same journey as part of his daily duties. One year, my family volunteered as temporary lighthouse keepers. My brother and I took stuffed panda bear toys with tiny parachutes and tossed them o the edge of the tower, watching them wobble down to the grassy land below. Inside, we encouraged guests to sign the guestbook. I imagined that somewhere, there must be a dusty archive full of guest books going back to my great-grandfather’s time as keeper.
Like many other Wampanoag men of his generation, my great-grandfather initially left the island for work. He ended up on another island–Nantucket, about a dozen miles across Nantucket Sound–where he worked as an assistant lighthouse keeper at Sankaty Light. In 1920, he returned to Martha’s Vineyard, becoming the principal keeper of the Gay Head Lighthouse. My mom says my great-grandfather was so proud to be keeper and loved wearing his official uniform. In the few photos I’ve seen of him, he is always standing upright, staring solemnly into the distance, the buttons on his double-breasted jacket gleaming. Back then, there were few paths for Wampanoag people to achieve a position that commanded that kind of respect. Everyone says that my great-grandfather was a great storyteller, regaling visitors with local stories. President Calvin Coolidge was one of these visitors, a huge point of pride for my great-grandfather. In 1921, my grandfather Charles Jr. was born in the keeper’s house that stood next to the lighthouse.
In 1960, that house was demolished. A few years earlier, the town had received electricity. One of the last towns to be electrified in the state, Gay Head was transformed. The lighthouse, which once required a multiple-person team to maintain and supervise it, became automated–eliminating the need for a full-time keeper and assistants. The new electric light also changed to the simpler one red, one white pattern it has today. The lighthouse is now open to visitors, who can enjoy the spectacular views of the cliffs and ocean from the top.
I’ve only known this version of the lighthouse: a museum, a relic of the history I always took for granted on the island.
There was such ease and inevitability to my summer days on the island that it was di cult for me to grasp just how fragile the Aquinnah I knew and loved was–and how much it cost to create it. Although I knew the tribe had faced challenges, including isolation and colonization, I always thought of it as immutable, reliable. It had always been there, and it always would be. For most of my life, I thought of the lighthouse in the same way. The building was so imposing, so absolute, that I couldn’t imagine an Aquinnah without its familiar light steadily turning.
When I was in college, the erosion of the Gay Head Cliffs, which had been steadily accelerating for years, suddenly became catastrophic. After another chunk of cliff tumbled into the ocean in 2010, the lighthouse was in increasing danger of falling over the edge. A massive planning and fundraising e ort began. My mom appeared in a few documentaries, talking about our family history with the lighthouse. She helped organize a 10K road race to raise money. We sold “Save the Gay Head Light” T-shirts in the store. Meanwhile, organizers were soliciting private and public funds and coordinating the move–no easy feat for a 400-ton, 52-foot, 150-year-old building. After they’d raised over $3.5 million, their e orts culminated in 2015, when the lighthouse was moved–very slowly, a few feet at a time–130 feet away from the cliff edge to a more secure location. The lighthouse, we were told, would be safe in its new location for about 150 years.
At first, I thought that sounded so short. Why not move the lighthouse farther back, to a location that would ensure its survival? But when I think about how much has changed in the past 150 years, it seems like an eternity. The original Fresnel lens is in the Martha’s Vineyard Museum. The house is gone. The lighthouse was never permanent, and maybe that’s OK. We don’t know what the next 150 years hold for the lighthouse or for the rest of Aquinnah. But I do know that the Wampanoag people’s complex, dynamic relationship with land and water will continue to find ways to endure and surprise.
JOSEPH LEE is an Aquinnah Wampanoag writer based in New York City.
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