Macquarie Lighthouse was Australia's first and longest operating lighthouse. It is located on Cape Dunbar, 2 kilometres south of the Southern Cape, near the entrance to the Sydney Harbour. It was there that navigation equipment was located since 1791, and a lighthouse operated since 1818. The current lighthouse was built in 1883 - it's still in operation and is under the jurisdiction of the Australian Maritime Safety Authority. Up until 2008, the lighthouse's image could be seen on the coat of arms of Macquarie University.
In July 1816, the then Governor of the colony of New South Wales, Lachlan McWire laid the foundation stone for a lighthouse, which he named McWire Tower. It was designed by Francis Greenaway, the famous exiled architect, and was built of loose sandstone. The first light was lit on the lighthouse on 30 November 1818.
The loose sandstone proved to be short-lived, and as early as 1823 the structure began to to crumble. To prevent the lighthouse from collapsing, it was braced with huge steel hoops. In 1881, 4 metres away from the old lighthouse, the construction of a new one, which was operational within two years. The new structure, designed by James Barnett, was identical to its predecessor, but was constructed of stronger material. The light chamber of the lighthouse was larger, allowing the use of larger and more modern equipment. Every minute, the lighthouse flashed a white light for eight seconds, which could be seen 46 kilometres away. In good weather, the lighthouse was fuelled by a gas burner, in bad weather it used electricity. One of those generators, a switchboard and one electric arc lamp are still in the building of the lighthouse.
It was not until 1976 that Macquarie Lighthouse was fully automated, and the last employees left in 1989. Two buildings stand next to the lighthouse - the lighthouse warden's cabin lighthouse superintendent's cottage, built in the 1840s, and his assistant's cottage, built in 1881. Interestingly, in 2004 the lighthouse keeper's cottage was put up for sale for 1.95 million Australian dollars.
