The United States of America is a federal union of 50 states and a capital district. The state of Maine is located in the northeastern corner of the nation bordering the Canadian provinces of Québec and New Brunswick. The coast of Maine is rugged and deeply indented with many small harbors and about 70 lighthouses. Maine is divided into sixteen counties. This page includes lighthouses of the southern coast of Maine, from the Camden and Rockland area south to the border of New Hampshire, including western Knox County and Lincoln, Sagadahoc, Cumberland, and York Counties. This includes the regions known in Maine as the Mid Coast and the South Coast. Lighthouse preservation is very strong in Maine, as evidenced by the large number of local preservation societies and trusts. The Maine Lights program, passed by Congress in 1996, led to the transfer of 28 lighthouses from the Coast Guard to local preservation groups or other agencies and served as a model for the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act of 2000. Except for eight privately-owned towers, all but a handful of Maine's lighthouses now have local support groups. In addition, two powerful national forces for lighthouse preservation, the American Lighthouse Foundation and Lighthouse Digest magazine, are based in Maine. Aids to navigation in Maine are maintained by the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Northern New England and its Aids to Navigation Team based at Southwest Harbor, but ownership (and sometimes operation) of historic lighthouses has been transferred to local authorities and preservation organizations in many cases. ARLHS numbers are from the ARLHS World List of Lights. Admiralty numbers are from volume J of the Admiralty List of Lights & Fog Signals. USCG numbers are from Vol. I of the USCG Light List.
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Western Knox County Lighthouses
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Lincoln County Lighthouses
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Burnt Island Light, Boothbay Harbor, September 2020 Instagram photo by Bob Trapani for Maine Lights Today |
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Sagadahoc County Lighthouses
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Cumberland County (Portland Area) Lighthouses
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York County Lighthouses
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Inland (Kennebec County) Lighthouse
Information available on lost lighthouses:
Notable faux lighthouses:
Adjoining pages: North: Eastern Maine | South: New Hampshire
Return to the Lighthouse Directory index | Ratings key
Posted May 16, 2001. Checked and revised May 13, 2024. Lighthouses: 40. Site copyright 2024 Russ Rowlett and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.