Dennis Lyall (American, B. 1946) "West Quoddy Head Lighthouse" Signed lower right. Oil on Canvas. Provenance: Collection of James A. Helzer (1946-2008), Founder of Unicover Corporation. This artwork originally appeared on the Fleetwood First Day of Issue Maximum Card for the U.S. 25c West Quoddy Head stamp issued April 26, 1990. In the American Light-House Guide of 1850, author Robert Mills described the West Quoddy Lighthouse -- located on Passamaquoddy Head, the easternmost point of the United States -- as a "harbor light ... seen at a distance of seven leagues in clear weather... Attached to this lighthouse is a bell weighing one thousand pounds, which in foggy weather will strike ten times in a minute, and may be heard at the distance of five miles in calm weather. If bound into West Quoddy passage, give the Sail Rocks, which lie directly off the light, a birth of half a cable's length, then haul directly round the head ... A stranger should not attempt to go through this passage without a pilot." The fog bell placed at West Quoddy Head to warn of danger when the light was obscured was one of the first along the coast of Maine. The keeper at the lighthouse was paid sixty dollars extra a year to ring the bell in fog to warn ships away from the treacherous Sail Rocks. Despite West Quoddy's loud and trustworthy signal which regularly pierced the fog with its warning of peril, there was one particularly demanding sea captain by the name of Joseph Smith who wasn't satisfied with its tenor. Captain Smith had a grander idea: "a sharp-toned bell of four thousand pounds weight, struck by machinery properly constructed and proportioned to the bell, would answer all the purposes of a work of this description." Image Size: 12.5 x 17.5 in. Overall Size: 14 x 19.5 in. Unframed. (B12268)