Maryland Official Visitors Guide - 2026 Maryland Official Visitors Guide
Your Guide to Maryland Lighthouses
2025-11-04 05:07:50
Scavenger-Hunt Style
Dozens of lighthouses dot Maryland’s 3,190 miles of gorgeous coastline, and each has a fascinating history and loads of Chesapeake Bay charm. Check out these favorites as you follow our lighthouse scavenger hunt, which offers some — dare we say “enlightening”? — maritime trivia.
Set sail to p. 66 to find more ways to see Maryland lighthouses with our Chesapeake Bay Storytellers.
Love ’em from a distance.
1. Concord Point
Built: 1827
Trivia: Meet the oldest lighthouse in Maryland open to the public.
2. Turkey Point at Elk Neck State Park
Built: 1833
Trivia: Four of its 10 lighthouse keepers were women.
3. Pooles Island
Built: 1825
Trivia: Off-limits to the public, the island was used by the U.S. military for shelling practice from 1918 to the early 1960s and is riddled with unexploded bombs and shells.
4. Lightship Chesapeake
Built: 1930
Trivia: After ending its Coast Guard service in 1971, the lightship served as a floating National Park Service classroom for 10 years and became a museum in 1982.
5. Seven-Foot Knoll
Built: 1856
Trivia: This 200-ton lighthouse was relocated from the mouth of the Patapsco River to Baltimore’s Inner Harbor via barge in 1988.
6. Lazaretto Point
Built: Original 1931, replica 1985
Trivia: In 1914, Lazaretto became the first electrified Chesapeake Bay lighthouse.
7. Fort Carroll
Built: 1854
Trivia: The lighthouse sits on a fort and was named for Charles Carroll, one of the four Maryland signers of the Declaration of Independence.
8. Craighill Channel Range
Built: 1875 & 1886
Trivia: There are four Craighill Channel lights, two pairs marking each of the Craighill Channels, and all are still in use.
9. Baltimore Harbor
Built: 1908
Trivia: The last lighthouse constructed on the Chesapeake Bay, Baltimore Harbor took 18-plus years to build due to a string of unfortunate circumstances and events.
10. Sandy Point Shoal at Sandy Point State Park
Built: 1883
Trivia: This is the second Sandy Point Shoal lighthouse, built after the first iteration was found to be too far away for ships to see the light or hear the fog bell.
11. Thomas Point Shoal
Built: 1875
Trivia: Accessible only by boat, this National Historic Landmark is the Bay’s only intact screwpile lighthouse that remains at the site of its original construction.
12. Bloody Point Bar
Built: 1882
Trivia: There are numerous stories about how the lighthouse got its name, ranging from the tragic massacre of Native Americans by English colonists to a French pirate who was hanged.
13. Hooper Strait at Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum
Built: Original 1867, rebuilt 1879
Trivia: The original sank in 1877 when ice moved the lighthouse off its foundation and it floated away with the keepers inside. They lived to tell the tale.
14. Fort Washington
Built: Tower in 1870; lighthouse in 1882
Trivia: In 1872, Keeper Edward Kelly resigned after not receiving a requested raise from $300 to $480 per year.
15. Sharps Island
Built: 1838, 1866, 1882
Trivia: The first lighthouse was rebuilt due to erosion and the second was swept 5 miles away (with its keepers inside) by ice floes. The keepers survived.
16. Choptank River
Built: Original 1871, replica 2012
Trivia: The replica is the Bay’s youngest lighthouse.
17. Cove Point
Built: 1828
Trivia: You can spend the night in the lighthouse keeper’s quarters.
18. Drum Point at Calvert Marine Museum
Built: 1883
Trivia: This is one of five remaining screwpile lighthouses on the Chesapeake Bay.
19. Blackistone
Built: Original 1851, replica 2008
Trivia: Reachable via water taxi, the lighthouse sits on St. Clement’s Island where Maryland’s first colonists arrived.
20. Piney Point
Built: 1836
Trivia: The sunken WWII U-1105 Black Panther German submarine lies just offshore.
21. Point No Point
Built: 1905
Trivia: During construction, there was an accident that led to the lighthouse floating miles down the Bay.
22. Solomons Lump
Built: 1875
Trivia: The lighthouse went dark for three days in 1938 when the keeper was unable to work due to rheumatism.
23. Point Lookout
Built: Original 1830, replica 2008
Trivia: Point Lookout is known for its paranormal activity.
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