Method
Sources & Methodology
How articles are researched, how images are licensed, and how to read our citations.
How an article is built
Each entry begins from a specific question a reader might actually have. The editorial desk then assembles candidate sources, opens them, and writes the article against the record. Every factual claim is checked against the opened sources before publication, and each article ends with a Sources box identifying the exact pages consulted, the publisher, and the date we accessed them. We read pages — not search-result snippets — and we link to specific documents: an official history page, a station page, a report, a dataset. We never cite an institution's homepage as evidence for a specific fact.
What our source types mean
- Official agencies — National Park Service, US Coast Guard Historian's Office, Trinity House, Northern Lighthouse Board, Canadian Coast Guard, UNESCO World Heritage Centre. Primary administrative record.
- Museums and archives — Royal Museums Greenwich, Minnesota Historical Society, national record offices. Curated historical documentation.
- Engineering and standards bodies — Institution of Civil Engineers, IALA. Technical context and definitions.
- Official data — Light Lists and Notices to Mariners (navcen.uscg.gov), NOAA climate archives. Operational facts.
- Professional media — specialist press with named authors, used for contemporary preservation news and always named in the citation.
Images and licensing
Article illustrations are real photographs, not AI-generated images. They are sourced from Wikimedia Commons and equivalent free-license or public-domain collections, downloaded and stored on our own servers, and used under the terms of their licenses (public-domain dedication, CC0, or Creative Commons attribution licenses). Each image caption credits the photographer and license. Our internal provenance record keeps, per image: the creator, the source page, the license and its URL, and any modifications — normally none. If you are a rights holder and believe an image is miscredited, write to [email protected] and we will resolve it promptly.
How to read a citation
A citation in the Sources box follows the pattern: Publisher — page title. Supports: the specific claims it underpins. plus the URL and access date. Access dates matter for a reason: agency pages are reorganized and URLs rot, so our citation tells you when the page said what we quoted.
Conflicting sources
Historical sources sometimes disagree — first-light dates and tower heights are repeat offenders. Where authorities conflict, the article reports the discrepancy or uses the better-evidenced figure while noting the uncertainty. We do not average conflicting figures or invent a compromise.
Full standards: Editorial Standards. To challenge a fact: Corrections Policy.