Most of the waterbound lighthouses of the Bay are built on top of caissons, essentially cast-iron cans sunk into the soft bottom. The third photo from the left shows such a light on Sandy Point Shoal, just north of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. Next is the famous Thomas Point Shoal lighthouse, recently refurbished and opened to visitors. It was built on "screwposts" augured into the bottom. This cheaper method proved not be be as successful a method as the caissons, because ice floes kept knocking the screwpost structures loose. The Thomas Point Shoal light now has a lot of riprap around it to protect it. The next photo, of the Sharps Island lighthouse, shows that even the caissons were not safe from drifting ice. Next is the Pooles Island light. Although it is on land, you cannot get to it because it is on Army property, part of the Aberdeen Proving Ground. On the far right of the top row, a "range light" stares at you with one beady eye beneath two solar-panel brows. Rather than warn mariners away, it is meant to guide them into port by giving them their position, or range. When mariners see this bright light directly beneath another one, higher behind it on land, they know they are right in the middle of the Craighill Channel leading into Baltimore.
The bottom row of photos above was taken during a regatta staged for city kids who get a chance to learn how to sail and compete, a kind of Outward Bound program on the water. Seems kind of a shame only one picture could be used. In the photo at right, two young sailors show off a prize.