Hallerby Light

I · The reef

A tower paid for in bricks

The Ansgar went onto the Hallerby reef in a November gale in 1881, carrying nine men and a hold full of bricks bound for the new grain elevators up the coast. Seven made it onto the rock and sat there for two days. The bricks are still down there; on a calm morning you can see them, a rust-coloured square on the bottom, neater than anything else in the water.

The county took three years to agree on a tower. When it came it was modest: twenty-two metres of granite, a second-order lens from Barbier & Fenestre in Paris, and a keeper's cottage with a single stove and a window facing the wrong way.

The character of the light — two white flashes, a twelve-second period — was chosen so that it could not be confused with Gråskär to the south, which shows one long flash every fifteen. Fishermen say you can tell them apart by mood. Gråskär is patient. Hallerby is in a hurry.

II · The mechanism

A weight, a chain, a hollow tower

The lens floats on a bath of mercury and is turned by clockwork. The clockwork is driven by a cast-iron cylinder of a hundred and forty kilograms that descends the hollow core of the tower on a chain. Fully wound, it runs a little over two hours. The keeper winds it at dusk, at midnight, and again before the false dawn, sixty turns of a brass crank each time.

There is no spring, no motor, no battery. If nobody winds it, the weight reaches the bottom of the shaft, the governor stalls, and the lens coasts to a stop. The flash goes from twelve seconds to twenty, to forty, to none.

Ships have learned to read that. A slow Hallerby means the keeper is asleep, or ill, or gone.

III · The keepers

Five names in a hundred and forty years

1. 1884 – 1911Nils Åkerlund Came from the pilot station at Varberg. Kept bees on the rock; none survived a winter.
2. 1911 – 1946Ester and Vilhelm Broms She held the post on paper after he lost a hand to the chain in 1929. The log changes handwriting mid-sentence.
3. 1946 – 1971Gösta Lind Painted the tower's seaward face white without asking anyone. It is still white.
4. 1971 – 1998Maj Hallerby No relation, she said, every time. Refused electrification twice.
5. 1998 –Volunteers, in fortnights Mostly retired sailors, a few students, one composer who came for a week and stayed for three years.

IV · From the log

Entries, chosen for their honesty

1. 14 October 1902

   Wind NNE, force 7. Weight run down at 02:10, my fault. Twenty-three minutes dark. The Freja passed at 02:40 and did not signal, so I think she did not notice. I have noted it anyway.

2. 2 March 1929

   V. caught in the chain while winding. Doctor from Hallerby by 09:00. I wound the clock myself at midnight and again at four. The light did not stop. — E.B.

3. 24 December 1963

   Ice on the gallery, half a hand thick. Mercury sluggish, lens slow, period fourteen seconds by my watch. Put the stove door open and the tower warmed a degree by dawn. Herring for supper.

4. 11 May 1998

   Last night as keeper. Wound the clock for the last time at 23:50 and then, because I could, again at 23:55. It made no difference to the light. It made a difference to me. — M.H.