Elleda Wilson: 'Sad sea'

Feb. 2—A morsel from The Daily Astorian, Feb. 2, 1881:

—From a private letter received in this city from Mr. Albert Roeder, head keeper at the lighthouse on Tillamook Rock ... (who) says the wind seemed to shake the entire rock. It lifted sacks of coal and hurled them from the rock like sacks of feathers. The seas struck with such force as to throw the spray a considerable distance above the top of the lighthouse, completely burying it for several minutes at a time as if beneath a mighty deluge.

Note: The lighthouse had just opened, on Jan. 21, at that point, so this must have been a terrifying welcome for Roeder. Not surprisingly, he only lasted a few months. According to the Seaside Aquarium, he left, insisting that "too much of the 'sad sea' did not agree with him, and vowing that it would be a long time before he 'made himself a hermit again.'"

Roeder was only the first of many lighthouse keepers who could not take the isolation, tight quarters, noisy fog horns and violent storms at Tillamook Rock that earned her the name Terrible Tilly, according to LighthouseFriends.com.

Later lighthouse keepers would become so tense they passed notes to each other at dinner instead of speaking, not to mention the keepers who were removed for "mental instability," and Keeper Charles Bjorling (from 1883 to 1884), who tried to kill the head keeper by putting ground glass in his food.