BlockBefore
Photograph of Newburyport Harbor Light
Photograph by Adavyd, CC BY-SA 3.0. Via Wikimedia Commons.

Newburyport Harbor Light

Built in 1788. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987. A historic map-sheet match is not published yet. The record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.

From the record

“The Newburyport Harbor Light, also known as Plum Island Light, built in 1788, is a historic lighthouse on Northern Boulevard in Newburyport, Massachusetts.”

Wikipedia article Newburyport Harbor Light, CC BY-SA 4.0.

one of 350 National Register listings in Essex County · listed in 1987 · category: Structure · built in 1788 · one of 2 National Historic Landmarks in Essex County.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

  • What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 structure as contributing to the listing.
  • Address. Northern Blvd., Newburyport, 01950
  • When was it listed? 1987-06-15
  • Category. structure
  • Also known as. Lighthouses of Massachusetts TR
  • Township. Newburyport city
  • When was it built? 1788
  • National Register reference number. 87001485 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

47 since 2007

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 47 fires within 5 miles of Newburyport Harbor Light between 2007 and 2020, burning about 20 acres in total. None started naturally. 8 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause Fires
Debris and open burning9
Arson/incendiarism8
Fireworks7
Missing data/not specified/undetermined5
Recreation and ceremony5
Power generation/transmission/distribution4
Smoking3
Misuse of fire by a minor3
Railroad operations and maintenance1
Other causes1
Equipment and vehicle use1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

DateCause SizeReported by Name on the report
3 September 2007Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreParker River National Wildlife RefugeSALT PANNES
23 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
2 September 2017Fireworksunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
8 August 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
8 August 2016Recreation and ceremonyunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlSALISBURY
5 August 2016Recreation and ceremony2.0 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlSAILSBURY
27 August 2016Other causesunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlNEWBURY
4 July 2020Fireworksunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named

Every fire recorded in Essex County

Specimens collected near this property

12 of 2,251 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 2,251 specimens collected within 10 miles of Newburyport Harbor Light between 1800 and 1975: 1,392 Plantae, 559 Animalia, 186 Fungi, 101 Chromista, 7 Unrecorded, 4 Protozoa, 2 Bacteria. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A A Eaton, A. A. Eaton, A. A. Eaton; R. G. Leavitt and others. Each is a physical object with a catalogue number, and each entry opens the museum's record. This is what was collected and kept, not a survey of what lives here - nothing can be concluded from a species being absent.

Image SpeciesYear Collected by Where, as recorded
Specimen of Hypnum curvifolium Hedw.Hypnum curvifolium Hedw.1900John W. Huntington
Specimen of Plagiotheciella latebricola (Schimp.) M.Fleisch.Plagiotheciella latebricola (Schimp.) M.Fleisch.1900John W. Huntington
A photograph of the species Rhodobryum roseum, not of this specimenRhodobryum roseum (Hedw.) Limpr.1800J. W. HuntingtonAmesbury
A photograph of the species Dichelyma capillaceum, not of this specimenDichelyma capillaceum (Dicks.) Myrin1833J. W. Huntington
A photograph of the species Dumetella carolinensis, not of this specimenDumetella carolinensis (Linnaeus, 1766)1833J.S. AppletonWest Newbury
A photograph of the species Glyceria obtusa, not of this specimenGlyceria obtusa (Muhl.) Trin.1838W Oakes
A photograph of the species Clethra alnifolia, not of this specimenClethra alnifolia L.1840OakesHerbariumRowley
A photograph of the species Euphorbia polygonifolia, not of this specimenEuphorbia polygonifolia L.1840Wolle, J.Ipswich
A photograph of the species Iva frutescens, not of this specimenIva frutescens L.1840Oakesad Ipswich
A photograph of the species Potentilla anserina, not of this specimenPotentilla anserina L.1840Wolle, J.Ipswich
A photograph of the species Sisymbrium officinale, not of this specimenSisymbrium officinale (L.) Scop.1840OakesIpswich
A photograph of the species Dasya C.Agardh, not of this specimenDasya C.Agardh, 18241842Collector unknownLittle River near Old Town, 6 miles from the sea

All 2,251 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Storms near this property

13 since 1997

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Newburyport, the town this property stands in, in 13 storm reports between 1997 and 2023: 8 thunderstorm wind, 3 hail, 1 heavy rain, 1 lightning. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
July 2011Thunderstorm WindNewburyport$10,000Trees and large limbs on Roosevelt Place and Forrester and Merrimac Streets were downed by thunderstorm winds.
June 2015Thunderstorm WindNewburyport$5,000The Weatherflow reporting station at Plum Island recorded a wind gust of 69 mph. Wires were downed onto Sunset Drive in Newburyport from these thunderstorm winds.
July 2020LightningNewburyport$3,000In Newburyport, a house on High Street was hit by lightning. There was smoke coming out of the electrical box in the basement.
June 2018Thunderstorm WindNewburyport$2,000At 5:43 PM EST two trees were down on High Street near Newburyport High School.
June 2017Thunderstorm WindNewburyport$1,000AT 148 PM EST, a tree was down on wires on Lime Street in Newburyport.
July 2023Thunderstorm WindNewburyport$800In Salisbury, a tree and wires were down on a car near Elm Street (Route 110).
August 2019Thunderstorm WindNewburyport$500In Newburport, due to thunderstorm winds, wires were down across a span of three houses on Harrison Street.
June 2021HailNewburyport-In Newburyport, a CoCoRaHS observer reported half dollar size hail.
July 2014HailNewburyport-Dime sized hail was reported in Newburyport.
August 2014HailNewburyport-no account filed
October 1998Heavy RainNewburyport-no account filed
September 1998Thunderstorm WindNewburyport-no account filed
August 1997Thunderstorm WindNewburyport-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Essex County

Newspapers printed here

0 digitised pages

1 paper published in this town, digitised by the Library of Congress and free to read: 0 issues, 0 pages. Every page is searchable, so a name or a street can be looked for directly in what the town printed about itself at the time.

NewspaperPublished
The Essex Journal, and New-Hampshire Packet1775 to 1776

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

From the nomination file

2,193 words on record

When this property was proposed for the National Register, someone wrote the case for it: what the building is, and why it matters. That document is a federal record in the public domain. It is reproduced in full on its own page, word for word and never summarised. The text was read off the scanned case file by machine, so the occasional stray character is the recogniser's and the 1970s typewriter's.

The whole case file for this property - 2,193 words, 13 pages, reproduced complete.

Quoted from the National Register nomination for reference 87001485, 13 pages, held by the National Archives in Record Group 79. See the catalogue record.

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Sources for this property

National Archives recordThe nomination case file for reference 87001485 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia articleCommunity-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Essex CountyAll 350 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

  • Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
  • Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
  • How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
  • Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
  • Specimens. Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), https://www.gbif.org/. Only records licensed CC0 or CC BY are used. Records licensed CC BY-NC are excluded because this site carries advertising. Images are checked individually and any whose licence is non-commercial, no-derivatives or unreadable is refused.
  • Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.