Show FOR SEVERAL CENTURIES lighthouses on the nation’s coastlines LAKESHORES AND RIVERWAYS GUIDED MARINERS NOW THE GOVERNMENT IS GIVING AWAY THESE PRECIOUS LANDMARKS IF YOU QUALIFY YOU CAN I YJ EORGE BERNARD Shaw once said “I can think of no other edifice New London Harbor Light Conn constructed by man as A altrui&c as a lighthouse They were buih only to serve” Technology has come a tong way since Shaw's youth when seafarers were guided by whale-o-il fires burning in wateiside k towers Today global positioning and L radar make die lighthouse largely So what’s to become of our government’s 300 lighthouses whose services often are no longer needed? Rather than sell the structures the federal government has decided to give them away Today through PARADE the Department of the Interior and the Coast Guard are announcing the second installment of the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Program in which 20 of these lighthouses are free to those who can take good care of them Six were given away earlier this summer to nonprof- it groups and local govern- irrel-evan- mrro exactly tnctyDCOf orgarazaUoiutfic Interior Department would like to own the next 20 "We don’t need to main- - Newport News Middle Ground Light Via Thia lighthouaa hi ona of tho wortda buaiort harbora haa a throo-ator- y keeper's quartan The NATIONAL HISTORIC LIGHTHOUSE PRESERVATION PROGRAM ALLOWS COMM UNITIES TO PROTECT THE LIGHTHOUSES THAT ONCE KEPT THEIR SHORES SAFE tton as we used to and tax-payers can’t really afford to maintain all of those light houses in the way we'd like” says bnerior Secretary Gale Norton who oversees die program and has the ultimate decision in divvying out lighthouses "So it made sense to give them to die great many people who are willing to protect the lighthouses” Applicants will have to pass a gruel- - ing vetting process to prove they can maintain the structures according to B Y I The fourth IlghthouM built in the CofoniM ttw Nw London IHarbor Light saw action In both tho Revolutionary War and tho War of 18121 ’ Norton’s specific restoration guidelines The new owners also must open their lighthouses to the public which means those with dreams of a quiet retirement in a free lighthouse need not apply Even with the strict guidelines and the heavy expenses of restoring a lighthouse Norton says her agency was flooded with calls and pledges of support akin K A T H COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY RICHARD CUUUlWCORBIS to love letters from people all over the country during the first round of giveaways "It’s the setting” Norton says "Lighthouses are in beautiful waterfront locations But the interest is more than thaL They capture the spirit of the adventurers and tap into the call we all have inside us to be adventurers” The National Buk Service says public Y N sea-fini- ng interest in lighthouses has increased steadily since the 1960s and has burgeoned in the last ftov yean “It’s the idea of someone watching over you bringing you safely home that captures the imagination of so many people” says Sandra Shanklin of Fort Walton Beach Fla Lighthouses ignited a spaik in Shank-li- n and her husband Boh After the cou- - W A L L A C E MQK4 It lOOa PMADI MMAZM i |