Totten Beacons Project

Looking above and below the water line at a lighthouse and a single rod in the foreground — Beacon B at American Shoal is still visible above the water not far from the American Shoal lighthouse, which was completed in 1880. Photo: Matt Lawrence/NOAA

Following more than a decade of ad hoc investigation into the "Totten Beacons," Office of National Marine Sanctuaries archaeologists and cultural resource managers received a grant in 2014 through NOAA's Preserve America Initiative to undertake a comprehensive survey of the beacons and develop interpretive material to convey the importance of the U.S. Coast Survey's efforts to protect life and property in the Florida Keys.

View the Beacon Inventory

A line drawing of a flag-like device attached to a pole — Totten Beacons were an early aid to navigation to warn mariners of the dangerous reef in the Florida Keys. Credit: Office of Coast Survey/NOAA

Supported by NOAA's Office of Coast Survey and the NOAA Central Library, researchers compiled historic information, including locations where beacons were placed in the 1850s and the 1880s. Using previous archaeological survey work, the research team identified priority areas where beacon remains were reported to exist.

Field Work

In August 2014, the field research team spent four days conducting field investigations. The team consisted of Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary staff including Maritime Heritage Coordinator Brenda Altmeier, vessel operators Donald Mooney and Wayne Nowocien, and biologists Lauri MacLaughlin, Todd Hitchins, and Bill Goodwin. Historian J.J. Kennedy volunteered with the sanctuary as part of the Submerged Resources Inventory program. The team also included Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary maritime archaeologists Matthew Lawrence and Deborah Marx. Locally, Mel Fisher Maritime Heritage Society's Director of Archaeology Corey Macom was also a key member of the team.

The team documented beacon remains at five reefs: Eastern Sambo, American Shoal, Pickles Reef, French Reef, and Turtle Reef. The research teams spent approximately two hours at each location recording the extant beacon remains and characterizing the surrounding biology.

Documentation and 3D Photogrammetry

Researchers created scaled drawings of each artifact, recorded the beacon's geographic positions, and collected video and still photography of the beacons above water and underwater. In addition to these more common underwater archaeological techniques, Mel Fisher Maritime Heritage Society Director of Archaeology Corey Macom employed multi-image photogrammetry to create 3D images of beacon remains on the seafloor.

A diver above an object on the seafloor — Diver exploring the beacon at Turtle Reef. Photo: Corey Macom/Mel Fisher Maritime Museum

Digital 3D photogrammetry is based on the principle of "structure through motion," whereby an object or scene is rendered as a three-dimensional model from a series of multiple perspectives. When people see three-dimensionally, it is a result of having two offset eyes to see stereoscopically, and as they move, the brain constantly recalculates the unfolding multiple angles to interpret the structure, shape, and dimensions of the scene and its objects. Photogrammetry utilizes this principle to render multi-perspective, overlapping, two-dimensional digital images into a three-dimensional model. When photographs are created from all angles and perspectives around an object, they can be processed through special photogrammetry software to render a digital representation of the entire piece. The resulting 3D model can then be displayed on a computer screen and viewed from all angles by the person exploring it.

During the 2014 Totten Beacon survey, 13 3D models of a variety of aspects of the now-underwater 19th century aids-to-navigation were created.

an artifact on the seafloor with several black lines connected to blue squares showing the angles that photos were taken from — This schematic shows how three-dimensional models of Totten Beacon remnants on the seafloor were rendered from a series of two-dimensional images taken from different angles. The blue squares represent the various images that were taken.

Project Legacy

The project supported the sanctuary's mission to protect maritime heritage resources, as the archaeological data establishes a baseline for monitoring the condition of the beacons. Furthermore, it helped the Office of National Marine Sanctuaries meet its mandate under federal law to inventory the historic properties under its jurisdiction.

The history of these navigational aids is an integral part of the Keys' overall maritime story, intertwined as it is with natural, living resources found on the reefs that mariners sought to avoid.