This curious structure sits along the east side of the Kennebec river several miles south of Bath, Maine. It is the Fiddler’s Reach fog station, an artifact of Maine coast navigation in years past.

It dates from 1914 and was constructed to house a bell (not shown) and bell wringing gear system. The original bell is now on display on the campus of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, CT. The advent of fog horns that would be automatically sounded ended the days where an attendant was needed to rewind the gear system every four hours. The fog signals stopped in 1982. This structure is a reconstruction from 2009.

In the world of historic places, this is not something many people would see, and its location reinforces this notion!