American Flag Gallery

Whitefish Point Lighthouse by Moonlight

The Whitefish Point Lighthouse illumintated by moonlight. Whitefish Point is located at the extreme southeastern end of Lake Superior. It is a critical turning point for all vessel traffic entering and leaving this largest of all the Great Lakes. The Whitefish Point Light Station was established by Congress in 1849; since then, a life-saving beacon has illuminated these dangerous waters for mariners continuously. Today, the Whitefish Point Light is the oldest operating lighthouse on Lake Superior. The present light tower was constructed in 1861 during Abraham Lincoln's administration.'n'nWhitefish Point marks the eastern end of a notorious 80-mile stretch of shoreline from here west to Munising, Michigan, known ominously as Lake Superior's Shipwreck Coast. Of the 550 known major shipwrecks lying on the bottom of the lake, at least 200 of them are in the vicinity of Whitefish Point. The primary causes of shipwreck here are stress of weather and collision; the 1975 loss of the steamer Edmund Fitzgerald with her entire crew of 29 has become a world-wide legend. The wreck of the Fitzgerald lies just 15 miles northwest of Whitefish Point

© Matt Anderson

Flag of Fort Sumter, 1861

Fort Sumter's US flag after the bombardment, as raised in New York in 1861 by Major Anderson, Sumter commander.
Hand-colored woodcut of a 19th-century illustration

© North Wind Picture Archives

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Union headquarters at 26 South Battery Street in occupied Charleston, South Carolina, 1865 (b/w photo)

867771 Union headquarters at 26 South Battery Street in occupied Charleston, South Carolina, 1865 (b/w photo) by American Photographer, (19th century); Private Collection; (add.info.: Union Maj.-Gen. John P. Hatch's headquarters in the villa at 26 South Battery Street in occupied Charleston, South Carolina, guarded by African-American soldiers; note the American flag at half-staff and bunting on the mansion's arcade columns, as a sign of mourning for the recent assassination of President Lincoln in April 1865. The adjacent mansion, at 28 South Battery to the left of this picture, was the home of photographer George S. Cook, and also has bunting displayed on its columns, although the house itself was still shuttered awaiting his return to reoccupy it with his family. Both buildings still stand largely unchanged today, part of a historic-preservation effort in the City of Charleston. This image was enhanced by combining its stereographic pair of wet-collodion glass negatives into a single wide photograph, cleaned and repaired); Battlefields in Motion, Ltd

© Battlefields in Motion, Ltd. / Bridgeman Images