Browns Head Light stands in Vinalhaven, Maine, on a promontory at the western entrance to the Fox Island Thoroughfare, a busy passage between Vinalhaven and North Haven in Penobscot Bay. A light station was established there in 1832, and the present cylindrical granite tower was built in 1857 as part of broader efforts to improve navigation along Maine’s coast. Linked by a covered passage to the keeper’s house, the station is a well-preserved pre-Civil War lighthouse complex. The light was originally fitted with a fifth-order Fresnel lens, was automated in 1987, and remains in service.