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A fun day on Lightship Overfalls

Volunteers provide navigation projects and tours of historic Lewes vessel
Lightship Overfalls volunteer Sue Tolbert helps Rhys Bunting, left, and his brother James, of Lewes, assemble a moon phase project during the ship’s Aug. 18 family fun day.
Ron MacArthur
August 19, 2021

The Lightship Overfalls Foundation hosted a family fun day with a theme centered around navigation Aug. 18 on the historic ship docked in Canalfront Park in Lewes. The museum ship has been completely restored by a dedicated group of volunteers called the Dirty Hands Gang, who got to work during the summer of 1999. It’s one of a small number of restored lightships open to the public.

The lightship in Lewes was in service as the Cornfield from 1938 to 1957 off the coast of Connecticut, the Cross Rip from 1958 to 1962 off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, and then as the Boston from 1962 to 1972 in Boston Harbor. When it was donated by the U.S. Coast Guard to the Lewes Historical Society in 1973, it was renamed Overfalls to commemorate the closest lightship station to Lewes. That station at the mouth of Delaware Bay was in service from 1898 to 1960.

See a complete history of the National Historic Landmark at overfalls.org.

Jim O’Leary, a retired astronomer and volunteer, shows children making a moon phase dial what it should look like.
Overfalls volunteer Pete Hansot prepares to lead a tour of the historic lightship docked at Canalfront Park in downtown Lewes.
Volunteer Jim O’Leary leads a program during the Lightship Overfalls family fun day.
OK, which way does the sun move? Volunteer Jim O’Leary helps fun day participants understand how the sun crosses the sky.
Families stop on the deck of the lightship during a tour of the historic vessel.
From left, Shelby, Josephine and Sidney Soles of Arlington, Va., take the wheel on the Overfalls bridge.
Another stop on the tour is the large anchor room.
Children taking a tour of the Overfalls crowd into the galley to learn about life on the ship from volunteer tour guide Steve Tolbert.
Overfalls volunteer Steve Tolbert asks children taking a tour to find the ship’s compass in the bridge.
Volunteer Steve Tolbert explains who occupied the ward room below deck on the lightship.
Lightship Overfalls volunteer Pete Hansot explains that the large pipe allowed fresh air into the interior of the ship.

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