<<back to Florida>> | <<back to Map>>

Cape Canaveral Light

Cape canaveral, FL

Built in 1868, this one hundred and thirty-seven foot sentinel shows two white flashes every twenty seconds and can be seen for twenty-four nautical miles.

The original Cape Canaveral Lighthouse was built in 1843 and completed in 1848.   The Civil War caused Keeper Captain Mills O. Burnham to dismantle the light to discourage Union shipping.  He buried the vital parts in his orange grove on the Banana River. 

Erosion took its toll of the tower and in 1868 she was rebuilt inland on her present site.  Construction was completed in 1894.

Captain Burnham died in 1886, but his descendants tended the light until 1952.  She is an active aid to navigation and is now managed by the Coast Guard.

In more recent times, Dr. Wernher von Braun, the noted space physicist often used the lighthouse tower to observe rocket launches – even though the vibrations and debris made it somewhat unsafe during operations.