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Description
Camille Mackenzie Morgan found her way into a beachfront lifestyle for quite cheap, but with lots of strings attached. She is the majority owner of the Cabeza Light, a lighthouse on the Texas Gulf Coast. The United States Coast Guard has the rest of the lighthouse’s ownership and supervises and supports Camille as she lives on-site and maintains the light. The lighthouse is located near the town of Cabeza near the mouth of Texas’ iconic Brazos River.

The Cabeza Light was built in 1938 as a WPA project. The builders chose to paint it in black and bay yellow with red roofs. On the roof of the attached cottage, the town’s name was painted in big white letters. The structure was designed with a total of 6 rooms: the tower itself, the keeper’s office, a living room, a quarter bathroom, a kitchen, and a basement where the backup generator and running gear for the foghorn assembly are. Less than a year after the lighthouse was commissioned, the U.S. Coast Guard took over the U.S. Lighthouse Service, which had been responsible for all public lighthouses in the country. During World War II and into the Cold War, the Cabeza town council considered the lighthouse’s basement as a potential bomb shelter. Around 1992, a carport was built just up the beach.

But in the early 2020s, the lighthouse was facing demolition. Navigability of the Brazos River mouth had been improved over the years by dredging, as had the technology of navigation itself. What’s more, the lighthouse was also at the end of a dirt road through a marshy area, making it virtually impossible to reach without a 4x4 vehicle. The structure had deteriorated on the inside and was in serious need of remodeling. The foghorns had not been sounded since 1996.

Luckily for lighthouse lovers across the Gulf Coast, Camille — who had lived in nearby Lake Jackson her whole life — stepped up to become the lighthouse’s keeper and 80% owner at the age of only 19. The town council wanted $43,000 for a private share in the decrepit lighthouse. Camille had worked at ALDI since she was 16 and saved up $11,000. Her parents gave her $15,000 to help her buy the lighthouse. She then got a small mortgage from a bank in San Antonio for $25,000, which would cover the rest of the cost plus some of her renovations to make it livable again.

Shortly after Camille bought her share in the lighthouse’s ownership, the U.S. Coast Guard gave her a list of conditions for being allowed to live full-time in the lighthouse as part of her deal. One of these was that she take periodic water safety and rescue classes and wear swim-ready attire while on duty. She was also to maintain the lamp and all of the automated systems in working condition and give tours to the public. In exchange, the Coast Guard would replace the old landline phone line with a modern fiber optic internet cable, give her free non-lamp-related maintenance and repairs for the first 10 years, unlimited lamp maintenance, and pay her a salary of $21 an hour.

As a modern lighthouse keeper and part owner, Camille has the basic overarching responsibility of keeping her light on. She has to ensure the automatic lamp changer and its load of powerful bulbs are in tip top condition and request a replacement from the Coast Guard if the changer is low on bulbs. If the light were to go out due to circumstances she could have controlled, she risks getting a warning letter from the Coast Guard and having to pay a large penalty. She also needs to maintain the foghorn assembly. The lighthouse’s systems are controlled from a mainframe and mostly automated. In case of a power outage, there is a backup generator.

Compared with historical lighthouse keepers, Camille actually has it very, very easy. For centuries, keepers usually lived far from civilization and were faced with limited food and supplies. They also got bored very easily and had no contact with the outside world for weeks or months on end. Their tasks were often dangerous, such as repainting their lighthouse or climbing the tower to maintain the lamp during a storm that could sweep them away or even destroy the lighthouse.

Camille is the first American civilian lighthouse keeper in many decades, and probably the youngest lighthouse keeper in the world today. In modern times, lighthouses have been replaced with GPS or other, less expensive marine navigation aids. Almost all of the few that still exist are fully automated. But in Camille’s case, someone still needs to maintain these automated systems. The Cabeza Light’s control mainframe is connected to her own computer.

That computer is a MacBook Pro with a 14-inch screen and M2 chip. When off duty or there is nothing going on around the Brazos River mouth, Camille likes to play games like GTA V, Terraria, or Roblox but is not that all that hardcore for gaming. Although the mainframe is Coast Guard property, Camille owns her computer. This means she can cover her laptop in stickers as she sees fit. She doesn’t need to worry about her lighthouse’s control mainframe sapping her computer of precious gaming power. The mainframe itself does all the work involved in controlling the whole lighthouse, and her laptop just acts as a terminal for it when she needs to change a setting or update the mainframe software.

Her MacBook normally sits on her desk in the old keeper’s office in the lighthouse. This desk is a stately old black oak one from World War II. By complete contrast, her chair is a modern, cute, pink gaming-style chair. In the back corner of the room is the mainframe, where some cables run through a hole in the wall behind it and into the tower and light itself. In front of her chair is a glass table with two guest chairs. On a table by the mainframe is her small office water cooler. Camille is normally a nice, gentle, patient, and knowledgeable person but if you break her water cooler, she might beat you up.

Camille adores a mixture of nautical and vaporwave aesthetics. In fact, upon stepping into the front door of Cabeza Light, you’ll likely be greeted with a vaporwave track playing. The living room itself is adorned with those glass blocks, fake tropical plants, a minimalist grandfather clock with an aquarium of fake plastic fish, and a pink neon sign of an anchor. The lighthouse as a whole also has imitation marble kitchen countertops, glass-top tables, and red velvet chairs and curtains. Aside from vaporwave, Camille will also listen to pop music. She is a slight fan of Olivia Rodrigo.

Camille has straight honey blonde hair that comes down to the shoulder blades. She wears a bay yellow and black one piece swimsuit while on duty to match her lighthouse. This is usually accompanied by a necklace of pink, blue, and green rocks with a gold-colored shark tooth pendant. If she is having a meeting with the Coast Guard, she may wear a fancy dress. She has dark blue eyes and her skin is vibrant and medium-tone.

Camille drives a 2005 Chevrolet Silverado 2500HD crew cab 4x4 pickup truck. When she traded her first car — a Civic — for the truck, it had been hit by a hailstorm but still ran and drove perfectly. Camille’s grandfather and father helped her replace the hood and repaint the entire truck yellow to match her lighthouse. But she wanted to have the damaged roof removed to create an optimal beach experience, so she had a body shop cut it off and replace it with a roll cage with a roll-up tarp. Camille’s truck has the Texas license plate “LKPR03”, meaning “lightkeeper 2003”. Camille parks the truck in the carport near the lighthouse. The town of Cabeza is just up the dirt road from the lighthouse. The town is an hour away from Houston, where Camille might go to shop or have fun on off-duty days.

Cabeza is located opposite the Brazos River from the larger town of Freeport and the even larger town of Lake Jackson is to the north. Texas State Highway 288 connects this area with Houston. Cabeza has a population of about 4,280. The local geography prevents the town from expanding beyond its current borders. The Brazos River and Gulf of Mexico form natural boundaries to the east and south. To the west is a state nature preserve.

Before effectively buying the lighthouse in Cabeza, Camille lived with her parents in their house on 1472 Waxwing Drive. Her grandfather and uncle Zeke have also proven to be invaluable mentor figures to her.

OC created by me.

Description
Camille Mackenzie Morgan found her way into a beachfront lifestyle for quite cheap, but with lots of strings attached. She is the majority owner of the Cabeza Light, a lighthouse on the Texas Gulf Coast. The United States Coast Guard has the rest of the lighthouse’s ownership and supervises and supports Camille as she lives on-site and maintains the light. The lighthouse is located near the town of Cabeza near the mouth of Texas’ iconic Brazos River.

The Cabeza Light was built in 1938 as a WPA project. The builders chose to paint it in black and bay yellow with red roofs. On the roof of the attached cottage, the town’s name was painted in big white letters. The structure was designed with a total of 6 rooms: the tower itself, the keeper’s office, a living room, a quarter bathroom, a kitchen, and a basement where the backup generator and running gear for the foghorn assembly are. Less than a year after the lighthouse was commissioned, the U.S. Coast Guard took over the U.S. Lighthouse Service, which had been responsible for all public lighthouses in the country. During World War II and into the Cold War, the Cabeza town council considered the lighthouse’s basement as a potential bomb shelter. Around 1992, a carport was built just up the beach.

But in the early 2020s, the lighthouse was facing demolition. Navigability of the Brazos River mouth had been improved over the years by dredging, as had the technology of navigation itself. What’s more, the lighthouse was also at the end of a dirt road through a marshy area, making it virtually impossible to reach without a 4x4 vehicle. The structure had deteriorated on the inside and was in serious need of remodeling. The foghorns had not been sounded since 1996.

Luckily for lighthouse lovers across the Gulf Coast, Camille — who had lived in nearby Lake Jackson her whole life — stepped up to become the lighthouse’s keeper and 80% owner at the age of only 19. The town council wanted $43,000 for a private share in the decrepit lighthouse. Camille had worked at ALDI since she was 16 and saved up $11,000. Her parents gave her $15,000 to help her buy the lighthouse. She then got a small mortgage from a bank in San Antonio for $25,000, which would cover the rest of the cost plus some of her renovations to make it livable again.

Shortly after Camille bought her share in the lighthouse’s ownership, the U.S. Coast Guard gave her a list of conditions for being allowed to live full-time in the lighthouse as part of her deal. One of these was that she take periodic water safety and rescue classes and wear swim-ready attire while on duty. She was also to maintain the lamp and all of the automated systems in working condition and give tours to the public. In exchange, the Coast Guard would replace the old landline phone line with a modern fiber optic internet cable, give her free non-lamp-related maintenance and repairs for the first 10 years, unlimited lamp maintenance, and pay her a salary of $21 an hour.

As a modern lighthouse keeper and part owner, Camille has the basic overarching responsibility of keeping her light on. She has to ensure the automatic lamp changer and its load of powerful bulbs are in tip top condition and request a replacement from the Coast Guard if the changer is low on bulbs. If the light were to go out due to circumstances she could have controlled, she risks getting a warning letter from the Coast Guard and having to pay a large penalty. She also needs to maintain the foghorn assembly. The lighthouse’s systems are controlled from a mainframe and mostly automated. In case of a power outage, there is a backup generator.

Compared with historical lighthouse keepers, Camille actually has it very, very easy. For centuries, keepers usually lived far from civilization and were faced with limited food and supplies. They also got bored very easily and had no contact with the outside world for weeks or months on end. Their tasks were often dangerous, such as repainting their lighthouse or climbing the tower to maintain the lamp during a storm that could sweep them away or even destroy the lighthouse.

Camille is the first American civilian lighthouse keeper in many decades, and probably the youngest lighthouse keeper in the world today. In modern times, lighthouses have been replaced with GPS or other, less expensive marine navigation aids. Almost all of the few that still exist are fully automated. But in Camille’s case, someone still needs to maintain these automated systems. The Cabeza Light’s control mainframe is connected to her own computer.

That computer is a MacBook Pro with a 14-inch screen and M2 chip. When off duty or there is nothing going on around the Brazos River mouth, Camille likes to play games like GTA V, Terraria, or Roblox but is not that all that hardcore for gaming. Although the mainframe is Coast Guard property, Camille owns her computer. This means she can cover her laptop in stickers as she sees fit. She doesn’t need to worry about her lighthouse’s control mainframe sapping her computer of precious gaming power. The mainframe itself does all the work involved in controlling the whole lighthouse, and her laptop just acts as a terminal for it when she needs to change a setting or update the mainframe software.

Her MacBook normally sits on her desk in the old keeper’s office in the lighthouse. This desk is a stately old black oak one from World War II. By complete contrast, her chair is a modern, cute, pink gaming-style chair. In the back corner of the room is the mainframe, where some cables run through a hole in the wall behind it and into the tower and light itself. In front of her chair is a glass table with two guest chairs. On a table by the mainframe is her small office water cooler. Camille is normally a nice, gentle, patient, and knowledgeable person but if you break her water cooler, she might beat you up.

Camille adores a mixture of nautical and vaporwave aesthetics. In fact, upon stepping into the front door of Cabeza Light, you’ll likely be greeted with a vaporwave track playing. The living room itself is adorned with those glass blocks, fake tropical plants, a minimalist grandfather clock with an aquarium of fake plastic fish, and a pink neon sign of an anchor. The lighthouse as a whole also has imitation marble kitchen countertops, glass-top tables, and red velvet chairs and curtains. Aside from vaporwave, Camille will also listen to pop music. She is a slight fan of Olivia Rodrigo.

Camille has straight honey blonde hair that comes down to the shoulder blades. She wears a bay yellow and black one piece swimsuit while on duty to match her lighthouse. This is usually accompanied by a necklace of pink, blue, and green rocks with a gold-colored shark tooth pendant. If she is having a meeting with the Coast Guard, she may wear a fancy dress. She has dark blue eyes and her skin is vibrant and medium-tone.

Camille drives a 2005 Chevrolet Silverado 2500HD crew cab 4x4 pickup truck. When she traded her first car — a Civic — for the truck, it had been hit by a hailstorm but still ran and drove perfectly. Camille’s grandfather and father helped her replace the hood and repaint the entire truck yellow to match her lighthouse. But she wanted to have the damaged roof removed to create an optimal beach experience, so she had a body shop cut it off and replace it with a roll cage with a roll-up tarp. Camille’s truck has the Texas license plate “LKPR03”, meaning “lightkeeper 2003”. Camille parks the truck in the carport near the lighthouse. The town of Cabeza is just up the dirt road from the lighthouse. The town is an hour away from Houston, where Camille might go to shop or have fun on off-duty days.

Cabeza is located opposite the Brazos River from the larger town of Freeport and the even larger town of Lake Jackson is to the north. Texas State Highway 288 connects this area with Houston. Cabeza has a population of about 4,280. The local geography prevents the town from expanding beyond its current borders. The Brazos River and Gulf of Mexico form natural boundaries to the east and south. To the west is a state nature preserve.

Before effectively buying the lighthouse in Cabeza, Camille lived with her parents in their house on 1472 Waxwing Drive. Her grandfather and uncle Zeke have also proven to be invaluable mentor figures to her.

OC created by me.