Arbroath
Books
- Eleven Miles Out Robert Stevenson, John Rennie, and the Building of the Bell Rock Lighthouse · Liszt Think
Eleven miles off the Scottish coast, a reef lies submerged for twenty hours a day. In the early nineteenth century, raising a granite tower on this treacherous foundation seemed impossible.
- The Rock and the Reckoning…. The preparations consumed months. A site was needed for the workyard, where granite would be cut and dressed before shipment to the reef. Arbroath, on the Angus coast, offered harbourage and stone quarried nearby. Courses were laid out there, each block numbered and shaped to interlock…
- The Engineer’s Apprenticeship…ter Logan as master mason, establishing a partnership that would last through the Bell Rock and beyond. He hired James Dove, a foreman from Arbroath, whose skill with difficult stone would become essential. And he developed the administrative habits the Board’s system required: weekly re…
- A Ship Moored Over the Reef…r could regain control. He could not. The Smeaton drifted eleven miles in the gale, taking the better part of a day to reach the coast near Arbroath. The ship was not lost—its master eventually managed to anchor in shallow water, and the crew was safe—but the men on the reef were alone.…