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Courtesy Split Rock Lighthouse Historic Site
Lee Radzak
Lee Radzak stands where you’ll often find him – on the spiral staircase heading to the top of the Split Rock Lighthouse tower and its Fresnel lens. Lee helped to spearhead a funding effort to preserve the lens.
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Courtesy WDSE-WIRT Public Television
Lee Radzak
Lee Radzak and his expertise were instrumental to WDSE-WIRT TV when the public station in Duluth produced “Split Rock, A Superior Light.” You can watch or buy the documentary at www.wdse.org/specials/splitrock.
More Than a Keeper of the Light
It’s almost closing time November 10, the anniversary of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. A crowd is still lined up outside Split Rock Lighthouse to visit on the one night each year that the Fresnel lens is lit while the tower is open.
The chill air creates a sort of Minnesota line dance as we all shuffle side to side and bounce discreetly up and down to keep warm.
Out of the darkness emerges a black-coated man with a sun-bright smile. He walks the line, warming the moment by chatting with people, encouraging patience and, as always, answering lighthouse questions.
After more than three decades as the keeper of Split Rock Lighthouse, Lee Radzak can answer almost any Lake Superior or lighthouse question you throw at him.
Lee’s official title is site manager for the Minnesota Historical Society’s Split Rock Lighthouse Historic Site, but you don’t live 32 years on the grounds of an impressive 104-year-old lighthouse without becoming its true keeper.
Lee has always embraced with enthusiasm his roles as protector of a historic site and as a good North Shore neighbor.
The one thing he hasn’t done, jokes WDSE-WIRT producer/writer Greg Grell, is age.
“The guy hasn’t changed in 30 years,” teases Greg, who worked closely with Lee on production of “Split Rock, A Superior Light” to celebrate the lighthouse’s 2010 centennial. “Living along Lake Superior must keep you young. Maybe it’s something in the water or in the spray.”
John Crippen, director of historic sites and museums for the historical society, appreciates Lee’s gregarious nature.
“Lee’s skill with people and in honoring the history of the site have helped him serve the millions of people (yes, millions – in 2014, we passed the 4 million mark for number of visitors served during Lee’s tenure!) at Split Rock over his long career.
“He leads an energetic staff through the ups and downs of the seasons on the North Shore, helps keep a high level of integrity with the story told there, ensures the preservation of the many buildings on site and is a great ambassador to the community – both locally and to the broader lighthouse community around the world.”
Lee took on the job of site manager in 1982, moving into the center home of the three keepers’ quarters with his wife, Jane. He is the only historical society manager to live on site. Their children, John and Anna, now 29 and 27, were born and grew up there.
Technically, Lee is the sixth in a line of civilian keepers that started in 1910 with Orren P. “Pete” Young. There were a few years when Coasties – U.S. Coast Guardsmen – served as keepers, from 1961 to the light station’s decommissioning in 1968. After that, the state DNR managed the light until 1976, when the Minnesota Historical Society took over the site.
Lee is responsible for research and retention of the site’s history, but also for overseeing maintenance of its structures, including the fussy fog horn and the intricate Fresnel lens floating on a thin layer of mercury. After hours at the remote station, Lee must be the emergency plumber and electrician when needed.
Lee has promoted and overseen many projects during his tenure, starting with the 1986 construction of the first site visitor center.
Completed in 2010 was a three-year major restoration of the lighthouse and adjacent dwellings that included replacement of mortar and bricks and stabilizing of the structures. This year, the culmination of another major project debuted – a new film about Split Rock Lighthouse with high-definition video and a focus on the dramatic role of shipwrecks at the site.
Keeping structures solid and the light working echoes to keepers past, but Lee enjoyed another focus of his work that was only a distraction to the original keepers. Lee and his staff shine in handling the visitors attracted to the light.
“In 2010, Lee led us through a wildly successful centennial anniversary celebration for the site,” says John, “which included a reunion of past Split Rock keepers and families, special guest programming throughout the year and a once-in-a-lifetime fireworks display to mark the occasion.”
Lee also does unsolicited extras. An avid photographer, he developed a map showing the best points from which to shoot the lighthouse.
His concern about creating a good visitor experience extends beyond the 25-acre site he manages and even beyond the 2,260-acre Split Rock Lighthouse State Park surrounding it.
Almost from its inception, he’s been involved with the Gitchi-Gami State Trail, a paved pathway Lee calls a “community sidewalk/bike trail” that is frequented by rollerbladers, joggers, dog walkers, bicyclists and an array of users. It eventually will span 88 miles from Two Harbors to Grand Marais along the shore.
Lee served on the board of that trail’s volunteer association from 2000 to 2009, and as its president from 2003 to 2006.
Bikes with a throttle fascinate Lee as much as those with pedals. He has ridden motorcycles since the 1970s, so it’s no wonder he’s working with Ride Lake Superior, an initiative out of Tourism Thunder Bay, to promote motorcycling around the Big Lake.
“We’re really promoting Ride Lake Superior,” says Lee. Split Rock visitor center carries its own biker T-shirt, and Lee has written about riding his section of the Lake Superior shore for Motorcycle Cruiser.
Lee definitely has been a worthy keeper of one of Lake Superior’s treasures and a solid community resource. In 2013, the Association for Great Lakes Maritime History acknowledged just that, honoring Lee with its Award for Historic Preservation, citing: “Radzak has worked tirelessly to preserve one of the true icons of the region’s history, the Split Rock Lighthouse, including managing three major restoration projects while continuing to keep the historic site open to visitors.”
Lee foresees a few more projects ahead. He’s trying to make more of the historic site accessible, while maintaining its historic integrity. He’d like to get enough funding to recreate a missing garage building, one of the 10 original structures that burned down in the 1960s. Of course, he’ll also keep the light working.
“We like to say,” John relates of Lee’s tenure, “that he is now the longest-serving residential ‘keeper’ in the history of Split Rock, at 32 years and counting.”
We count on more years before this stellar keeper leaves his light.
Read more about Lee in this story from the August/September 2001 issue: Meet Split Rock's Current Keeper and His Family.