Its strong black-and-white diagonal day-mark stripes coupled with its stark-red light tower create a very strong presence for this light, as it really serves as the heart and center focus of this community. The lighthouse can be seen from many different locations around town and always seems to be watching over both the town and the sea.

Many travelers driving north on Route 1A are star-struck in their cars as this massive landmark rises bold and stark out in front of them and grows in majesty as they approach it.


A beautiful 1855, first-order Fresnel lens is still in use in the lens tower!

The lens is constantly white, when lit, with a bright flash every 60 seconds, but what makes this lens unique is that the midsection of the lens where the bull's-eyes are located rotates, while the upper and lower thirds of the lens stay motionless. This lens is so powerful that when it was first installed and the lens did not move, the sun glare off the lens would start brush fires around the lighthouse and the concentrated sunlight hitting the lens would damage the light source inside of it. Thus its need for motion.

In the summer of 1565, a Spanish fleet lead by Pedro Menendez de Aviles landed on the shores of northeastern Florida and established an European settlement in the New World. This colony, which Menendez named in honor of St. Augustine, was established more than 40 years prior to the English settlement in Jamestown and gave St. Augustine its claim to fame as being the nation's "oldest city"!

This young "city" grew in importance to Spain as a shipping port to the New World, and in the 1580s a wooden watchtower was established on Anastasia Island (which was inside the St. Augustine inlet) to aid the Spanish fleet in its commerce.