NORTH WEST SEAL ROCK, Pacific Ocean — The lighthouse stands atop a sheer rock surrounded by nothing but the cold, churning Pacific, six miles off the foggy coast of Del Norte County. It can be accessed only by helicopter and has been mostly abandoned for 50 years.
The perfect place to catch some shut-eye.
I slept in the assistant keeper’s room last month, with its peeling paint, warped wooden floors and metal fixtures corroded by briny air. A chill filled the unheated space, as did the sounds of barking sea lions and waves crashing against the rocks.
(Kirsten Rasmussen-Lee, Alaska Ultimate Safaris)
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The light went out a year ago. And until late last month, no one had been able to reach the St. George Reef Lighthouse, a 150-foot-tall granite beacon constructed in the late 1800s, since summer 2024.
But over this rocky, treacherous stretch of coastline, its beam is shining once again.
A lifeline for a dilapidating relic 
Richard Hoff, vice president of the St. George Reef Lighthouse Preservation Society, places a plaque next to the lamp at the lighthouse, which was re-illuminated in late February after having been dark for about a year. The plaque honors volunteers who contributed to the lighthouse’s restoration.
(Hailey Branson-Potts / Los Angeles Times)
I wrote last fall about the St. George Reef Lighthouse Preservation Society, a tiny group of volunteers — median age 75 — working against steep odds to fully restore the architectural masterpiece, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Shortly after my story published, a group of well-funded, energy drink-chugging YouTubers reached out to them, wanting to shoot a horror film.
The preservationists found a pair of married helicopter pilots from Alaska. And they shared the cost of a week of flights in late February with the online film crew, which paid for transportation for a handful of preservationists until public tours began that weekend.
The lighthouse was in rough shape. Some doors and windows had blown open. Three inches of seawater covered the floors. While the YouTubers filmed with fake blood (beet juice) and a cacophony of screams, the volunteers worked all week.
They stretched out cots and sleeping bags in the damp, pitch-black keepers’ quarters and engine room, rose at dawn and fired up a generator. They swept up water, boarded up windows and hauled out waterlogged trash. They cleaned the lamp and replaced the little LED light that shines for miles.
Inviting the public back in 
(Kirsten Rasmussen-Lee, Alaska Ultimate Safaris)
I hopped aboard a tiny red helicopter in Crescent City for the 10-minute flight to North West Seal Rock and joined the volunteers as they readied the lighthouse for its first public tours since 2023. The occasional tours help fund the repairs.
Forty-five visitors (paying $395 each) came on Feb. 28 and March 1. Most were locals, including a camouflage jacket-clad grandfather who beamed when his 17-year-old granddaughter said she wanted to stay forever.
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Richard Hoff, a 66-year-old osteopathic therapist who is vice president of the preservation society, choked up as he led visitors up and down the original 19th century spiral staircase. What a gift, he said, to share this place.
He laid his iPhone on the ground, with a measurement app showing that — after decades of tsunamis and earthquakes and monster waves — the lighthouse is perfectly level.
“It’s an engineering marvel,” Hoff said. “How can we let an engineering marvel just fall off and be destroyed?”
Deadly history and enduring awe
There is little financial incentive to preserve historic relics, but humans have always been drawn to symbols of their ancestors’ triumphs. That was on display as volunteers spoke of the lighthouse’s history in hushed, reverent voices.
Construction of the stone sentinel was spurred in 1865 after the S.S. Brother Jonathan struck rocky St. George Reef and foundered, killing 225 people.
The lighthouse took a decade to build. Giant waves swept men off the rock, and one worker fell to his death. Seamen needed their boats hoisted out of the water by a hook and boom to access the lighthouse — a process that killed three members of the U.S. Coast Guard in 1951 when their rope snapped and they were plunged into the frigid water.
The capstone at the St. George Reef Lighthouse reads 1891, the year construction was completed. It is pictured along with the granite tower and the wooden boom pole, which lifted seamen’s boats out of the water and onto the offshore rock on which the beacon stands.
(Hailey Branson-Potts / Los Angeles Times)
In the engine room, Hoff spoke of how some keepers went mad because of the foghorn blasting every few seconds.
He said the lighthouse’s future depends on young people joining the preservation effort. Enter 23-year-old father-to-be Robert Smith, who camped out all week to help. Smith is from Bandon, Ore., a town whose Coquille River Lighthouse is easily accessible, and, therefore, well-maintained. He first saw St. George through binoculars while visiting Crescent City and was captivated.
“It made me really sad, seeing it in disrepair,” he said. The preservation society happily put him to work. He joked that he brought the median age down to 40.
After visiting for the first time that week, Del Norte County Supervisor Valerie Starkey said it felt like a “burning importance” to get schoolkids out there to learn their local history.
“Stories matter,” she said. “To get out there and actually feel that history around you? We owe it to the men who put their blood, sweat and tears into it.”
Today’s top stories 
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(Samuel Corum / Getty Images)
The war in Iran and soaring gas pricesRecord-breaking temperatures coming to SoCalRising temperatures over the next few days have the potential to break heat records, raising concerns of an early start to Southern California’s fire season.The region will start warming up on Wednesday, but the real heat will hit Thursday and Friday with temperatures reaching into the 90s along the coast and in the valleys with some areas reaching 100 degrees.Oscars 2026Get your ballots ready, the 98th Academy Awards event returns Sunday at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.Here’s how to watch and everything else you need to know.With plenty of categories coming down to the wire, our awards columnist Glenn Whipp makes his final Oscar predictions.More big storiesCommentary and opinionsThis morning’s must readOther great readsFor your downtime 
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(Gary Coronado/For The Times)
Going outStaying inQuestion of the day: What are some of your favorite things to do during spring in California?
Email us at essentialcalifornia@latimes.com, and your response might appear in the newsletter this week.
And finally … the photo of the day 
Ethan Marks, 34, plays trumpet inside S.C. Mero’s latest street art project, a faux electrical box theater in downtown’s Arts District.
(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)
Today’s great photo is from Times photographer Kayla Bartkowski at a new DTLA theater — inside a fake electrical box.
Have a great day, from the Essential California team
Jim Rainey, staff reporter
Hugo Martín, assistant editor
Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor
Andrew Campa, weekend reporter
Karim Doumar, head of newsletters
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