Breeches Buoy

Peering through my windshield and the torrents of rain gushing past the wipers to follow the fog line (where there is one) on the shoulder of the road as I drive home on these dark, gusty nights reminds me that countless ships through the years have depended on the aid of lighthouses and their keepers to avoid running aground in stormy weather. One of the four lighthouses we visited while on the coast of New Jersey, Hereford Inlet Lighthouse in North Wildwood, NJ, houses an interesting and informative museum. One fascinating exhibit there included this photo of rescue by Breeches Buoy, which stirred in me memories of several lighthouse-inspired hymns of previous centuries . . . .



. . . . and one in particular, Love Lifted Me, an old hymn many people today have probably never heard, and those of us who have heard it have perhaps never connected with lighthouses and the terrifying experience of near death by drowning.

I was sinking deep in sin, far from the peaceful shore,
Very deeply stained within, sinking to rise no more,
But the Master of the sea, heard my despairing cry,
From the waters lifted me, now safe am I.
Love lifted me! love lifted me!
When nothing else could help, love lifted me!

Souls in danger look above, Jesus completely saves,
He will lift you by His love, out of the angry waves.
He's the Master of the sea, billows His will obey,
He your Savior wants to be, be saved today.
(1st and 3rd verses and chorus of Love Lifted Me
by James Rowe, 1912)

This photo at Flickr.com makes me wonder if perhaps the Breeches Buoy was the inspiration for Johnny-Jump-Up door bouncers for babies!

Besides life-saving, the Breeches Buoy was sometimes also used to actually build, equip, and man lighthouses that were constructed off the coast in places inaccessible by boat; one example is the lighthouse on Tillamook Rock, nicknamed "Terrible Tillie" because of the violent storms it withstood on its rock about a mile and a half off the Oregon Coast. Read about Terrible Tillie at LighthouseFriends.com; the print is painfully small, but the story is worth the effort.