Mary Alice Snetsinger

Mary Alice Snetsinger is a conservation biologist now working in Kingston.

Mary Alice Snetsinger may have more articles on our old site. Click here to visit our old site.

  • 10 posts

Windmill Point Lighthouse

Windmill Point Lighthouse is one of only three that remain standing today, a testament to its strength – weathered but enduring. It was here that “The Battle of the Windmill" took place in 1838.

Volume 19, Issue 10, October 2024
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Tibbett’s Point Lighthouse

The oldest of the lighthouses in the Thousand Islands, Tibbett’s Point was first built in 1827, and was so named because the 3-acre lighthouse site was once part of a 600-acre parcel of land granted to Capt. John Tibbett (or Tibbetts).

Volume 18, Issue 10, October 2023
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Grenadier Island Lighthouse

Grenadier Island was a busy farming community well before the government established its lighthouse in 1856.

Volume 18, Issue 7, July 2023
Mary Alice Snetsinger

The Burnt Island Lighthouse

Burnt Island saw two women appointed as lightkeepers, including the first woman officially recognized as a lightkeeper anywhere in the Thousand Islands. . . .

Volume 17, Issue 7, July 2022
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Rock Island Lighthouse, Part II

William (Bill) Johnston has a storied history in the Thousand Islands, and it is sometimes difficult to separate the man from the legend – or from the mythologized “pirate” celebrated at the annual Alexandria Bay “Bill Johnston Pirate Days” festival.

Volume 17, Issue 3, March 2022
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Rock Island Lighthouse, Part I

Rock Island is most likely the most famous light station on the River. Read all about it!

Volume 17, Issue 2, February 2022
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Crossover Island Lighthouse

Crossover Island is located a bare 1/5th of a mile south of the border, close to the point where the shipping channel crosses the international boundary. The lighthouse was needed to safely guide ships through the cluster of shoals and islands . . .

Volume 16, Issue 7, July 2021
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Sunken Rock Light

Marking the largely submerged rock formation known as Bush Island, Sunken Rock is a little workhorse of a lighthouse built in 1847, and still in service today.

Volume 16, Issue 5, May 2021
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Spectacle Shoal and Red Horse Rock Lighthouses

Spectacle Shoal and Red Horse Rock were among nine lighthouses established in 1856 when the government decided that lighting the Canadian Thousand Islands was a priority.

Volume 14, Issue 7, July 2019
Mary Alice Snetsinger

Sister Island Lighthouse

The history of Sisters Lighthouse on Sister Island located 6 1/2 miles from Alexandria Bay and just south of the International border. Construction began in 1870.

Volume 14, Issue 2, February 2019
Mary Alice Snetsinger