Cedar Point Lighthouse

History

The first light at the tip of Cedar Point went up in the late 1830s; Wikipedia dates it to 1838, while Ohio Sea Grant and the Lighthouse Directory give 1839.^[2,3,4] Within a few years it was paired with a second light to form a range, a pair of lights that a pilot lines up, one behind the other, to stay in a channel. The sources differ on the date, 1849 or 1853.^[4,2]

The building that survives was completed in 1862: a one-and-a-half-storey keeper's house of limestone with a wooden light tower centred on its roof.^[2,4] Ohio Sea Grant describes it as a six-room stone house and gives the whole structure a height of about 38 feet.^[3] It worked as a navigational light for roughly half a century. Wikipedia and Ohio Sea Grant say it was retired in 1909, when the tower was taken off the roof; the Lighthouse Directory puts the end of the light in 1904.^[2,4]

The station stayed in federal hands long after the light went out. It served as a buoy depot, then a radio-beacon station, and finally a search-and-rescue boat station until 1975, when those duties moved to the Coast Guard station at Marblehead.^[2] The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.^[5]

Cedar Point Amusement Park bought the property in 1987. It refurbished the house, rebuilt the missing light tower, and in 2001 opened the site as part of a lakeside cottage resort called Lighthouse Point, which uses the lighthouse as its emblem.^[2,3] The house itself is not open for tours, but the restored building can be seen at the end of the peninsula.^[3]

How to see it

View from shore Best seen from a public park, beach or pier nearby.

Best public viewpoint

From the Lighthouse Point area at the western tip of the Cedar Point peninsula, on amusement-park property; the building is not open for tours.^[3]

Tower climbs

No public tower climbs have been offered, as far as our sources show.

Operator

Cedar Point Amusement Park (Lighthouse Point)

Last verified

Last verified 2026-10

Access details last verified 2026-10. Hours, tours and ownership change. Check the operator before you go. Pier and breakwater lights can be dangerous in wind and waves; obey posted closures and never enter private or Coast Guard property.

Questions people ask

Can you go inside the Cedar Point Lighthouse?

No. Ohio Sea Grant says the restored keeper's house is not open for tours. It stands at Lighthouse Point, on amusement-park property at the western tip of the peninsula.

Is the Cedar Point light still working?

No. It stopped serving as a navigational light early in the twentieth century (1909 in most sources). The tower on the roof today was rebuilt during the park's restoration.