Accessibility: 
Geographic coordinates: 44° 21' 40" N 68° 05' 13" W
Nearest town: Winter Harbor. Located on four-acre Mark Island at the entrance to Winter Harbor, off the west side of the Schoodic Peninsula.
Established: 1856. Present lighthouse built: 1856. Deactivated: 1933.
Previous optic: Fifth-order Fresnel lens. Present optic: none.
Winter Harbor was long a favorite safe harbor for mariners seeking shelter from storms. In 1856, a lighthouse was built for $4,000 on Mark Island to guide vessels into the harbor and to warn of dangerous ledges nearby. The first keeper was Frederick Gerrish.
In the light’s seventy-eight years of active service, nine keepers and their families lived here. In 1933, the light was discontinued and replaced by a lighted buoy to the southeast. George Harmon of Bar Harbor bought the property.
Three years later, the property was bought by writer Bernice Richmond and her husband, sociologist Reginald Robinson. Richmond wrote two books about the years she and her husband spent on Mark Island: Winter Harbor and Our Island Lighthouse. In the second book, she wrote, “I couldn’t explain how I looked forward each morning to that first rush of salty air through my kitchen door, to the early tour I take over the vein-like paths to the gardens.”
In the 1950s, René Prud-Hommeaux, an author of children’s books, bought the island. It was later owned for a time by playwright Gerald Kean. Writer and retired banker William C. Holden III bought the property in 1995. While he lived on Mark Island, Holden renovated the property and wrote several novels. He sold the property in late 2004.
The lighthouse can be seen distantly from the loop road on Acadia National Park’s Schoodic Peninsula, especially from off-road lookouts between 0.8 and 1.2 miles south of the park entrance. The best views are from the water. The “Lighthouse and Park Tour” offered by the Bar Harbor Whale Watch Company (207-288-9800, www.barharborwhales.com) provides an excellent view. You can arrange a trip with Sea Venture Custom Boat Tours (207-288-3355, www.svboattours.com) in Bar Harbor to see this and other area lighthouses.
Fascinating Fact 
Winter Harbor gets its name from the fact that it rarely freezes over in the winter months. The harbor still has a substantial fleet of lobster boats.
