History of Europe

The last one turns the light off

by Levke Heed, NDR.deFerdinand Denzien, last West German lighthouse keeper, turns off the light in 1986.

"Ready to extinguish - Eckernförde beacon. Delete Eckernförde beacon," says the district headquarters in Travemünde. Just in time for sunset on September 30, 1986, lighthouse keeper Ferdinand Denzien turns off the light in the Klintbarg beacon. The profession of lighthouse keeper belongs to history in West Germany.

Electronics are replacing the lighthouse keeper

A fully automatic beacon for Eckernförde Bay, just a few hundred meters from the old location, replaces the last manually operated lighthouse. A new building had become necessary because the old beacon was at the level of the Bundeswehr's torpedo firing path and brought the ships too close to the firing range. The new lighthouse is remotely controlled from the district headquarters in Travemünde.

Electronics displace people:The 57-year-old Ferdinand Denzien has to experience this for the second time in his professional life:In 1979 the Marienlicht on Fehmarn was switched to electronic operation, and here too he was the last lighthouse keeper after seven and a half years of work.

Around the clock

Lighting the beacon as darkness falls, patrol around 10 p.m., switching off the beacon after sunrise in the morning and constant maintenance of the devices. The life of the lighthouse keepers was ruled by the sun. "Like the chickens," Denzien, a qualified electrician, once joked in an interview.

From the outset, only married men were hired to work on the lighthouses, because wives had to step in in the event of illness or vacation. You were trained as a so-called auxiliary beacon keeper. So does Friedel Denzien:When her husband was absent for several weeks due to a heart attack, she took over the command of the lighthouse.

The Eckernförde lighthouse at the Klintbarg is a raised residential building.

Lighthouses have a long tradition in Germany:the lighthouse in Cuxhaven was completed in Germany in 1805 - the starting signal for lighthouse construction in Germany. In the years that followed, a chain of lighthouses was built along the coasts of the North and Baltic Seas, which ended in 1918 with the lighthouse near Behrensdorf on the Baltic Sea. After that, only replacement or supplementary fires are created.

Neither round nor red and white

The lighthouse in Eckernförde was built in 1907. Neither round nor red and white, but gray and angular:The lighthouse at Klintbarg (latitude 54 degrees 28' north, longitude 09 degrees 51' east) does not have the classic appearance. It is an elevated residential building, 40 meters above sea level. There is room for two lighthouse keepers and their families. Since the beacon is initially powered by petroleum, two people are needed to constantly monitor the fire. When petroleum was replaced by gas and electricity made its appearance in the mid-1920s, only one lighthouse keeper remained at home at Klintbarg. A total of six lighthouse keepers worked in Eckernförde until 1986.

Otterblende give identification

How does the identification for shipping in the Eckenförde Bay work? A 1,000-watt bulb is amplified sixfold using the so-called Frenzel technique. The identifier is created by the so-called otter shutters, slats that open and close at certain intervals. To do this, before the automation, a 120-kilogram weight has to be cranked up every day in order to activate the drive mechanism, similar to clockwork. Around 120 revolutions are necessary for this. A prerequisite for smooth operation of the screens is an approximately constant temperature in the guard room. In the event of irregularities, the lighthouse keeper is immediately alerted with the help of a bell. When the gearbox threatens to fail on a cold night, Friedel Denzien uses a hairdryer and her husband operates the gearbox by hand - until everything is running smoothly again.

A new phase of life

For the Denzien couple, switching off the lighthouse on the Klintbarg marks the beginning of a new chapter in their lives:"I've always loved my freelance work. But going out in the evenings wasn't possible for us. We had to watch out for the fire. Now we're happy, too to be able to visit acquaintances," says Denzien. He will not be retired yet:until he retires, he will take care of the maintenance of the automatic fire from Kiel.

The automation of the lighthouses on the west German coast has thus come to an end. It began in the Baltic Sea in the late 1960s and continued in the North Sea in the 1970s. Today all lighthouses are automated and managed by district headquarters. The lighthouse on the Klintbarg is now used for recreation and houses four holiday apartments, which the social work of the Federal Ministry of Transport rents out to its members.

In East Germany it's over in 1998

In 1998 the era of German lighthouse keepers came to an end in East Germany too.

Since 1998, the profession of lighthouse keeper has definitely been a thing of the past, even in East Germany. After 110 years, automatic technology is moving in on the island of Hiddensee. Walter Hoerenz, the last of his status in all of Germany, is retiring.

There are still around 200 lighthouses on the German North Sea and Baltic Sea coasts. The majority is managed by the Water and Shipping Directorates North and Northwest (WSV) in Kiel, 195 are still in operation.