Mayor Frank Picozzi went for a ride on Narragansett Bay last week with WPRI meteorologist T.J. Del Santo and returned with a sunny outlook on a project that has been talked about with little or virtually nothing being done for decades. Del Santo joined a group visiting the lighthouse before the start of restoration last year and returned to video the completed job. 

Picozzi was at loss of adjectives to describe the transformation of the Conimicut Lighthouse from a deteriorating structure encrusted with bird poop, boarded up windows, rusted doors that leaked, broken railings and crumbling architectural features to a glimmering, sparkling sentinel to mariners and Narragansett Bay…a gateway to Warwick.

“It’s beautiful,” he said, describing how the restoration project exceeded his dreams and how the contractor Abcore Restoration of Narragansett went beyond the work specified in its $775,000 contract to fabricate and replace a gutter system that was deleted from the agreement to bring the project into budget. Keith Lescarbeau, president of Abcore, said last week he felt the restoration wouldn’t have been complete without that detail and seeing the overall project went as planned, the company took on the extra work at no cost to the city.

He was highly complimentary of Picozzi, saying the mayor spent three hours going over plans for the project and then visited the lighthouse on three occasions. “He was so hands on…the City of Warwick is fortunate to have a mayor like this.”

Picozzi is hopeful his and Lescarbeau’s dedication to preserving the lighthouse will pay off in more ways than the admiration of mariners.

Shortly after Picozzi was elected mayor, U.S. Rep James Langevin put out the word of an Economic Development Initiative grant program. Picozzi immediately thought of the lighthouse that the city took title to from the US Coast Guard in 2004. Initially the city expected to obtain $500,000 in grant funds to do much need maintenance to the light that was erected in 1883 to replace one built in 1868. When that didn’t happen, the administration of former mayor Scott Avedisian advertised requests for proposals and was in negotiations with a company that converted the Borden Flats Light in Fall River offering an over night keepers’ program. The company was interested in doing the same thing with Conimicut Light, but the City Council never approved the lease. The light continued to deteriorate.

Faced with a tight grant deadline, Picozzi pushed for community support to restore the light obtaining letters from community groups and leaders. It paid off. The grant, Langevin’s final federal grant before retiring after 18 years of Congressional service, was approved and finally there was funding for the project.

With the integrity of the structure restored, Picozzi is considering seeking a “partner” for the light once again. He believes there will be considerable interest now that the lighthouse has been restored.

Noting public interest in lighthouses and witnessing how many of the Rhode Island lighthouses his company has restored are being used for tours and bed and breakfast rentals, Lescarbeau expects there would be considerable interest in Conimicut.

Another light in Warwick’s future?

Picozzi sees more to it than giving the city a tourism boost.

He’s hopeful the city’s attention to preserving the light will enhance its bid with the Warwick Neck Improvement Association as the stewards of the Warwick Neck lighthouse that is land based. The United States General Service Administration is reviewing applications to acquire the lighthouse built in 1826 and the nearby light keeper’s house on nearly an acre of property overlooking Narragansett Bay and the bay islands. The government will give the property away.

For Lescarbeau, most of the Conimicut project was preparation. It required careful measurements, assessment of material conditions and the fabrication of railings, doors, window frames and distinctive features such as fennels back at his shop to be transported out to the light and installed. The landside portion of the operation was at Pettis Boatyard in Pawtuxet from where back and forth runs to the lighthouse were made.

It took machine power to bring it together, too.

“You can’t just call in a crane,” Lescarbeau said when it came to hoisting a 3,000 pound compressor to a platform on the light. To lift the compressor used for different aspects of the job including the removal decades of paint from the cast iron plates that make up the cylinder of the lighthouse, they built a support of 6x6 beams cantilevered off the side of the lighthouse.

Lescarbeau said the support was tested for its weight bearing capacity before being installed. Needle guns and pneumatic chisels were used to remove flaked and chipped paint from the cast iron sections of the light bolted into place more than 140 years ago rather than sand blasting that would have required shipping sand to the site and caused clouds of dust. The needling tool about the size of a rolling pin, Lescarbeau explained, has 24 carbide tipped needles that chip away until the raw metal is exposed.

Thick sheets of Lexan capable of withstanding buck shot, which Lescarbeau thought could become an issue during duck hunting season, is being used in place of glass for most windows. He even checked out the brass ball with its skyward spike atop the round roof that caps the light. It had a crack having been struck by lightening. Yes, that was repaired, too.

Lescarbeau is in awe of the engineering that went into designing and building the light long before computers and power tools. He points out that the structure is not only round but also conical posing unique challenges to fitting all the pieces together. 

“It’s an engineering marvel, all hand drawn…a hunk of iron sitting in salt water and its still there 150 years later,” he said. He said conditions were challenging and risky, but fortunately there were no injuries

“The Lord pulled us through,” he said.

While landlubbers had little idea of what was taking place offshore, boaters shouted and waved their approval to workers. Large tankers, tugs, ferries tooted to signal their thumbs up.

Picozzi is uncertain how to showoff such a dramatic transformation. Pictures tell the story, but an in person visit is better yet. He’s hopeful of getting Frederick Mikkelsen the former lighthouse keeper who started at the lighthouse in 1958 and served until 1961 out to see it. After being converted to electricity, the light was automated and in 1963 the keepers were reassigned.

He would also like to show it off to Langevin and what his last grant as a congressman made possible.