the lifeboat as skillfully as her father. Ida loved
hearing his stories of adventures at sea. Her
favorite was about a lighthouse keeper’s daugh-
ter named Grace Darling who, in 1838, helped
rescue eight people who had been shipwrecked
during a storm off the coast of England.
Grace’s father had hesitated to attempt a rescue
while the storm raged, doubting that he would
be able to control a small lifeboat on the wild
sea. But Grace, overwhelmed by the pitiful
plight of the survivors clinging desperately to
the rocks, begged him to try—convinced that,
if the two of them rowed together, they could
save lives. Grace’s resolve to risk her life for
others made her a symbol of female compas-
sion and courage around the world.
The Lewis family had lived on Lime Rock
for only four months when Captain Lewis
suffered a stroke. No longer able to work, he
depended on his wife and daughter to tend
the light and offer aid to those shipwrecked in
the harbor.
Wearing a linen apron to protect the lens
from scratches, Ida climbed the steps to the
light, fourteen feet above the water. She filled
the lamp with oil, trimmed its wick, and pol-
ished the glass so that the beam could be seen
for miles. It was Ida’s job to light the lamp
each evening, check it at midnight, and extin-
guish it at sunrise.
In 1858, when she was only sixteen, Ida
saved her first lives. Four boys dared each
other to climb the mast of their small sail-
boat as they crossed the bay. When one of
them took the dare, his weight atop the mast
overturned the boat. The boat flipped upside
down, and the boys could not right it. Ida
rowed out and saved all four.
Other rescues followed, but the soldiers
brought Ida recognition for her heroics.
Harper’s Weekly, a magazine with over
100,000 subscribers, put a full-page draw-
ing of Ida on the cover of its July 31, 1869,
issue. Inside, a story entitled “Ida Lewis, the
Newport Heroine” was accompanied by illus-
trations of Lime Rock and the interior of the
Lewis home.
Ida’s newfound fame brought throngs
of visitors to Lime Rock. As Ida put it,
“Boatloads of men and women... all talked
to me at once and treated me as if I were a
kind of real queen.”
Many of the richest families in the coun-
try owned summer estates in Newport. The
Astors, Vanderbilts, and Belmonts brought
their guests to meet Ida. Civil War General
William Tecumseh Sherman came to pay his
respects. Also visiting were Susan B. Anthony
and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, leaders of the
National Women’s Suffrage Association, a
group determined to earn women the right to
vote. They left with autographed photos of Ida.
When the President of the United States,
Ulysses S. Grant, asked to meet her, Ida wor-
ried that he might ruin his shoes on Lime
Rock, so she rowed to the mainland. Grant
was quoted as saying, “To see Ida Lewis,
I’d get wet up to my armpits.
The townspeople of
Newport were so proud of Id
that they declared July 4, 18
Ida Lewis Day. They present,
.”
da
69,
tdted
A STROKE IS A SUDDEN, DISABLING
ATTACK CAUSED BY BLOOD-FLOW
PROBLEMS TO THE BRAIN.SHE WAS IN
HARPER’S
WEEKLY,
AND NOW
CRICKET!
COOL.SHE
DESERVES
IT!23