The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

Forgotten Lighthouse died at his post later that year. Dorothy tells of having to join her mother at the lighthouse and wait for the arrival of the "funeral people". When they arrived, it was obvious to Dorothy that they had little if any experience with removing a body into a boat. In a testament to the stoicism and self-reliance of lighthouse people, she tells us that "None of the men knew how to tie a knot that wouldn't slip. . . Ended up that I went out and tied it so that they could lower it into the rowboat. Just had to forget it was my father in it." Incredibly, Dorothy's mother continued on as the sole keeper of the light for three more lonely years. The successors to the Harrises did not fare much better on the station, but they stuck it out for 24 years. Alfred and Annie Dickenson arrived at Capilano in 1925, relieved to be back in civilization after manning the Kairns Island Lighthouse in Quatsino Sound. Annie appears to have been as able a keeper as Alfred. While they could never go out anywhere together, each could get some time off occasionally and visit West Van, or even the big city lights of downtown Vancouver. While those infrequent trips to town may have made life on the station seem less like an "Alcatraz", the responsibilities on the station were daunting. Because they were the sole operators of the foghorn, they had to make sure it was functioning whenever needed. That meant that if it broke down in fog conditions, they would have to use a hand-operated device, and keep it going all night if necessary. And "Lizzie", as they called the horn, did break down, again and again. For eight years Dickenson's log is filled with entries of barely contained rage over wrestling with the contraption to keep it going. Responsibility didn't end with maintaining the light and foghorn. Even with the signal operating, Dickenson reported 42 groundings in 20 years. Any lost souls driving by in disabled boats in rough water had to be rescued, and while he saved several lives, - continued Dickenson couldn't save everyone. In 1938, with the completion of the Lions' Gate Bridge, came another unenviable duty: rowing out to look for suicides. At times, the couple were themselves almost in need of rescuing. The sea in the narrows is often rough, with 16-foot tides and fast currents. Railings were broken in storms, shingles blew off the roof in gales, sea tides came over the porch, the building was pounded by logs and snags. Five earthquake jarred the station. Little wonder that by 1944, Dickenson declared that he wanted off "this moth-eaten outfit"! By 1946 the National Harbours Board seems to have gotten his message, and electrified the station, shifting his operation to a tower on the Lions' Gate Bridge. Dickenson, now 61 years old, asked for and was granted, a transfer to a lighthouse near Sooke. It didn't seem to improve his outlook, but at least it was on dry land. In October of 1947, the little house was sold and removed from the station. The deserted lighthouse stood until it was destroyed by fire 22 years later, in February, 1969. Today, nothing remains but a concrete beacon a short distance from the original lighthouse. The electronic foghorns we hear occasionally now are on the ships. Yet for those of us who lived here in those times, there remains an unmistakable sound etched in our memories of West Van, as heartening to us now as it would have been then to a ship searching for a safe harbour. The Capilano Lighthouse in the winter of 1964. Photo by John Moir page 5