The Keeper Of Lime Rock: The Remarkable True Story Of Ida Lewis, America's Most Celebrated Lighthouse Keeper - Hardcover

Skomal, Lenore

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9780762413096: The Keeper Of Lime Rock: The Remarkable True Story Of Ida Lewis, America's Most Celebrated Lighthouse Keeper

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0762413093 ISBN 13: 9780762413096

Publisher: Running Press, 2002

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Describes the life of Ida Lewis, the lighthouse keeper of Lime Rock, whose rescues of eighteen people made her a celebrity across the country.

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About the Author:

Lenore Skomal is an award winning columnist for the Connecticut Post and the author of Heroes.

We have only one life to live, and when our time comes we've got to go; so it doesn't matter how. I never thought of danger when people needed help. At such times you're busy thinking of other things. -Ida Lewis

When she performed this duty, she had no thought of its being recognized. In fact, I believe if she thought what men would say about it, probably the act never would have been done at all. -Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson

The wintry gale was coming in fast and furious, whipping the water around Lime Rock Lighthouse into a roiling frenzy, and sending icy blasts of wind against the house, clattering the windows of the kitchen.

It was March 29, 1869.

Early spring meant an influx of storms into the harbor, which chopped up the still-icy seas and brought spring thaw in with a vengeance. It was 5:00 P.M., and Ida had taken a few minutes to sit in her favorite chair near the hearth before preparing dinner. She had been sick with a terrible cold, and was trying to collect herself for the night's work ahead. As she soaked her feet in warm water, she heard her mother rustling in the other part of the house. Ida Zoradia--known simply as Zoradia so as not to be confused with her namesake daughter--had gone to her room to lie down. She was weary from taking care of her now almost completely disabled husband and her other daughter, Hattie, whose lungs were never strong and who often suffered through the long winter with an infectious cough.

But Zoradia couldn't rest, being nagged by the sense that something was amiss. Like her daughter Ida, she was uncomfortable being idle, so she decided to check the oil supply for the nightly lamp. She rose from her bed and made her way to the passageway that led to the lantern room. The view atop the cramped lantern room was a familiar one, so the smallest change on the horizon was immediately noticeable and called for closer attention. She checked the oil supply and took one more sweep of the harbor and open sea with her gaze.

She froze and peered through the now-falling snow closely. She spied an overturned boat with what appeared to be two men clinging to its hull and yelling for help. In the fury of the sea, the capsized boat was also drifting toward Goat Island, moving out of the harbor into the open channel toward the ocean. And it was moving swiftly in the billowing waves of the stormy sea.

Filled with terror, she called to her daughter. "Ida, O my God! Ida, run quick! A boat has capsized and men are drowning. Run quick, Ida!" Ida only caught the "drowning men" reference and was on her feet. Her invalid father frantically tried to dissuade her from racing out the door. He shouted after her that it wasn't her duty to fish the "Addled of brain" out of the water. Any sailor who ventures out in a storm knows the danger involved and should expect the worst, he added.

Ida barely heard him. She was already to the boat. She neglected to take the time to put on her button-up boots, hat, overcoat, or even a shawl. She merely grabbed a towel, which she twisted about her neck as she raced toward the boat.

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