Ashtabula's first lighthouse was built in 1836 on a wooden crib about 40 feet square with a hexagon-shaped tower connected by a ramp to the east pier of the Ashtabula River, and its first keeper, Captain Bigelow, maintained seven lamps fueled by sperm whale oil. In 1876, because new dock facilities were constructed, a new lighthouse was built on the west pier head with a Fourth Order Fresnel fixed red light lens and a first class siren fog signal, and this four-sided, pyramid-shaped building with wooden clapboard siding served the harbor until a new lighthouse was built in 1905 after the river was widened and new dock construction was completed. Built about 2,500 feet north of the river entrance and the 1876 lighthouse, the 1905 lighthouse followed a river-widening project that left the 1876 structure 60 feet out in the river, creating the appearance of a floating lighthouse; during construction, the 1876 lighthouse was actually moved off its island or dock and placed on a barge until the 1905 lighthouse was completed. After that, both the old and new lighthouses could be reached only by boat, and until 1915 civilian keepers living at the Walnut Boulevard house that is now the Ashtabula Maritime and Surface Transportation Museum alternated duties and relief trips by boat. Fayette E. Walworth served as keeper from February 6, 1894, until resigning for physical reasons on November 1, 1905, and Charles W. Anderson served until 1915, when responsibility passed to the U.S. Coast Guard. In 1916 the light was moved about 1,750 feet north-northeast of the previous site, the structure was doubled in size, a new 50-foot concrete crib was built to support it, and the two-story steel building with iron plate was able to house the keepers; the new light had a focal plane height of 51 feet, and a radio beacon tower was built beside it. An addition to the 1905 stone breakwall was built in 1915 from Walnut Beach, and the 1916 enlargement and move also created space for an emergency generator and a large air compressor with air storage tank. In 1959 the U.S. Coast Guard installed a new Fourth Order Fresnel lens light that rotated and emitted a three-second white flash visible up to 19 miles on a clear night; made in France in 1896, it remained in use until 1995, when it was removed for permanent display at the Ashtabula Maritime Museum. The lighthouse also had a foghorn that blew two blasts every minute, a fog signal identified in 1994 as an original siren Diaphone, and an automatic radio that transmitted a dash-dash-dot signal at a specific period, all important aids to ships entering and leaving the harbor. Although the beacon light was electric, the foghorn required immediate supervision, and the lighthouse remained manned by the U.S. Coast Guard until it was automated in 1973, at which time it was the last remaining manned light on Lake Erie.