{"id":2272,"slug":"cape-may-lighthouse-cape-may-point-new-jersey","story":[{"heading":null,"paragraphs":["The Cape May Lighthouse is the third tower on ground the Atlantic keeps taking. The first, raised in 1823, was surrounded by water within twenty-four years; its site is now a hundred yards offshore. The second, badly built in 1847, was torn down and its stump capped into an icehouse before the sea took that too. The present 157-foot tower lit its first-order Fresnel lens on Halloween night, 1859 — the light that held.","The haunting is the most-photographed kind — climbers on the cast-iron spiral stairs report a woman in a flowing white gown, a lantern in one hand and a child in the other, fixed on the lower landing as if she can't climb higher. Nobody has ever put a name to her — the honest version of the story is the unsettling one. Below or above her, climbers hear heavy boots on the iron steps when they're alone in the tower.","The light still works — the original lens went to the county museum in 1946, replaced by a rotating beacon the Coast Guard still maintains, and the tower restored and climbed since 1986 by the arts center that runs it. The two earlier lighthouses stand somewhere under the water off the point — the woman on the stair and the boots in the tower keeping company over ground the ocean already took twice.","The Cape May Lighthouse is the archive's third-tower file — the 1859 light whose predecessors lie underwater off the point, haunted by a lantern-carrying woman with a child stuck on the first landing."]},{"heading":"Why this file matters","paragraphs":["The Cape May Lighthouse is the archive's white-lady file — the third tower at the point, lit Halloween 1859, where climbers meet a woman in a white gown with a lantern and child on the spiral stairs and hear boots that aren't there.","A lighthouse that buried two predecessors keeps its stairs — the file's suggestion being that Cape May's hold is the landing: the woman fixed on the lower stair, carrying the lantern, in a tower the sea has already taken twice before."]}],"name":"Cape May Lighthouse","aliases":[],"type":"LIGHTHOUSE","type_label":"Lighthouse","cats":["LOCAL_FOLKLORE","HISTORIC_SITE","HAUNTED_LIGHTHOUSE"],"groups":["legends","maritime"],"desc":"The 1859 Jersey Shore light—two earlier towers lost to the sea.","full_desc":"Cape May Lighthouse is a lighthouse in Cape May Point, New Jersey, built in 1859. The 1859 Jersey Shore light—two earlier towers lost to the sea. Its accounts name only a collective — the keeper. The dossier holds 1 reported claim, 1 legend, 1 documented fact and 1 named or described presence — documented record and retelling kept side by side. The site is open to visitors.","address":null,"city":"Cape May Point","county":null,"state":"New Jersey","postal":null,"region":"Northeast","lat":38.936909,"lon":-74.965374,"coord_kind":"CITY","status":"HISTORIC_SITE","access":"PUBLIC","access_notes":null,"ownership":null,"website":null,"phone":null,"year_built":1859,"year_opened":1859,"year_closed":null,"year_demolished":null,"designation":null,"current_use":null,"research_notes":"Haunted lighthouse batch; VERIFY task auto-queued.","stage":"SOURCE_RESEARCH","quality":{"level":"MEDIUM","score":59.4,"dims":{"location_confidence":0.75,"identity_confidence":0.65,"historical_confidence":0.8,"source_quality":0.3999999999999999,"paranormal_claim_provenance":0.8,"coordinate_confidence":0,"current_access_confidence":0.7,"freshness":0.65}},"claims":[{"id":1659,"type":"APPARITION","description":"Climbers report a presence on the stairs and voices in the watch room. The figure answers to The keeper in the retellings. Maritime lore is the oldest ghost file there is; Cape May Lighthouse in Cape May Point, New Jersey is a fully credentialed entry. Local lore carries the account; no documentation has ever caught up with it. The report is preserved in sources like 'Cape May Lighthouse'. Whatever walks there, it walks often enough to keep the reports coming.","evidence":"LOCAL_FOLKLORE","evidence_label":"Local folklore","entity":"The keeper","where":null,"first_report":null,"approx_date":null,"confidence":0.8,"conflict_notes":null,"source":{"name":"Cape May Lighthouse","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_May_Lighthouse","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4},"conflicting_source":null,"variants":[]}],"history":[{"description":"The 1859 tower replaced two earlier lights lost to erosion; still an active aid to navigation. The vessel's documented service record is the record the rest of the file stands on. The fact is historically verified — the part of the file that doesn't need hedging. The detail is preserved in 'Cape May Lighthouse'. Documented ground is what separates this file from pure legend — this is part of it.","evidence":"HISTORICALLY_VERIFIED","date_start":"1859","date_end":null,"confidence":null,"source":{"name":"Cape May Lighthouse","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_May_Lighthouse","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"legends":[{"name":null,"summary":"Climbers report a presence on the stairs and voices in the watch room. Crews leave marks on vessels long after they muster out, and Cape May Lighthouse in Cape May Point, New Jersey had crews enough. Local lore carries the account; no documentation has ever caught up with it. 'Cape May Lighthouse' carries the account. The legend does what legends do — it explains the place in a way the records can't.","earliest":null,"evidence":"LOCAL_FOLKLORE","source":{"name":"Cape May Lighthouse","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_May_Lighthouse","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"entities":[{"name":"The keeper","claimed_identity":"The keeper","verified":null,"summary":"Climbers report a presence on the stairs and voices in the watch room. The file calls it The keeper. The vessel's reports concentrate where the work was hardest — ships and lights keep their own roll call. The report is preserved in sources like 'Cape May Lighthouse'. Named presences persist where anonymous reports fade — the file's name here is The keeper.","behavior":"Climbers report a presence on the stairs and voices in the watch room.","area":null,"first_ref":null,"source":{"name":"Cape May Lighthouse","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_May_Lighthouse","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}}],"events":[],"investigations":[],"encounters":[],"media":[],"persons":[],"visitor":{"tour_availability":"Verify before visiting","notes":"Lighthouse site; tower climbs, if offered, are usually seasonal and may require tickets.","last_verified_at":"2026-09-18 11:32:55","source":{"name":"HauntHunt generic access guidance","url":"https://haunthunt.com/about#access-guidance","publisher":"HauntHunt editorial","type":"DIRECTORY","authority":2}},"sources":[{"name":"Cape May Lighthouse","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_May_Lighthouse","publisher":"Wikipedia","type":"ENCYCLOPEDIA","authority":4}],"conflicts":[],"wiki":{"title":"Cape May Lighthouse","url":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_May_Lighthouse","desc":"Lighthouse in New Jersey, United States","extract":"The Cape May Lighthouse is a lighthouse located in the U.S. state of New Jersey at the tip of Cape May, in Lower Township's Cape May Point State Park. It was built in 1859 under the supervision of  U.S. Army engineer William F. Raynolds, was automated in 1946, and continues operation to this day.\nCape May Lighthouse is the third fully documented lighthouse to be built at Cape May Point.  The first was built in 1823 and the second in 1847. The exact locations of the first two lighthouses are now underwater due to erosion. There are 199 steps to the top of the Lighthouse. The view from the top extends to Cape May City and Wildwood to the north, Cape May Point to the south, and, on a clear day,","img":"https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/06/Cape_May_Lighthouse_in_Cape_May%2C_New_Jersey%2C_USA.jpg/960px-Cape_May_Lighthouse_in_Cape_May%2C_New_Jersey%2C_USA.jpg?utm_source=en.wikipedia.org&utm_campaign=api&utm_content=thumbnail","score":104,"lat":38.933,"lon":-74.96041667},"counts":{"claims":1,"history":1,"legends":1,"entities":1,"sources":1}}