Kate's Light: Kate Walker at Robbins Reef Lighthouse by Elizabeth Spires (review)

Spires, Elizabeth Kate's Light: Kate Walker at Robbins Reef Lighthouse; illus. by Emily Arnold McCully and with photographs. Ferguson/Holiday House, 2021 [40p] Trade ed. ISBN 9780823443482 $18.99 Reviewed from digital galleys R 5-8 yrs

Kate Kaird, a German widow who emigrated to America in 1882, settled comfortably into her new life after marrying lighthouse keeper John Walker. When John changed assignments to the Robbins Reef offshore lighthouse—a strenuous hourslong row from Staten Island—Kate was initially daunted by the isolation, but she turned their upper floors of stark living space into a home, eventually adapting to the rhythms and routines of keepers' duties and maintaining connections with her mainland friends with visits, weather permitting. Kate ultimately secured a paid position as her husband's assistant and, upon his death, was appointed temporary keeper. With no one else clamoring for the Robbins Reef post, Kate became the official lighthouse keeper, passing the position to her son after her retirement. In Spires' spirited telling, Kate Walker's professional achievement is less a tale of ambitiously upending gender expectations and more a demonstration of persistently demanding recognition of and remuneration for hard-earned skills. McCully's watercolor illustrations glide smoothly from homey interiors to roiling storms, capturing Kate hammering a massive warning bell in dense fog or chattering contentedly with friends in the sunshine. An author's note supplements the biographical details and, as a welcome bonus, includes a pair of photographs. Notes, additional sources, and period endpaper maps are also included.