Cape Lookout Lighthouse - West and South Elevations - Blue - Framed & Mounted Print

The Cape Lookout Lighthouse (constructed between 1857 and 1859) was the prototype of the great lighthouses erected along the North Carolina coast by the U. S. government during the mid-nineteenth century replacement of earlier, smaller lighthouses. The lighthouse was given a distinctive black-and-white-diamond pattern in 1873. It is a contributing resource to the Cape Lookout Light Station, which was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1972 as an important physical and historical maritime feature of the nineteenth century development of the Outer Banks. The lighthouse is also a contributing resource to the Cape Lookout Village Historic District, which was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2000. The district, which contains twenty-one principal resources, is anchored by the Cape Lookout Lighthouse at the north end and by the former U. S. Coast Guard Station to the south.