Michigan Has More Lighthouses Than Any Other State

Quick — which state has the most lighthouses? Maine? Nope. North Carolina with its Outer Banks? Try again. It’s Michigan, and it isn’t close.

As Guinness World Records puts it, “the state with the most lighthouses is Michigan with approximately 130 current lighthouses… Historically the state may have had as many as 250 active lighthouses.” The reason is simple geography: Michigan touches four of the five Great Lakes and has roughly 3,200 miles of shoreline — the longest freshwater coastline in the world. All that water, all those rocky reefs and busy shipping lanes, demanded a dense network of beacons to keep sailors safe.

And what a variety they are: tall and skinny, short and stout, perched on piers or marooned on lonely reefs. The oldest is the Fort Gratiot Light in Port Huron, first lit in 1829, which still guards the spot where Lake Huron funnels into the St. Clair River. The most remote is Stannard Rock, which Guinness recognizes as “the most remote lighthouse in a lake” — sitting in Lake Superior about 24 miles from the nearest land. And one of the strangest is the William Livingstone Memorial Light on Detroit’s Belle Isle, the only marble lighthouse in the entire country.

Each one has its own light pattern and its own story. You could spend a whole summer chasing them.