A U.S. Coast Guard vessel departed from Station Islamorada on the afternoon of June 20. There were no emergencies or rescues; rather, a special burial was about to take place at sea near Alligator Reef Lighthouse for Jeffrey Steven Kime.
A U.S. Coast Guard member from 1959 to 1965, the Ohio-born Kime spent four of those months manning the towering, majestic lighthouse roughly 4 nautical miles off Islamorada with two other keepers.
Kime passed away Feb. 25, 2024 following a battle with Parkinson’s. He was 82 years of age.
Per his wish, some of his ashes were spread not far from the lighthouse that held a special place in his journey. The sea burial was led by Coast Guard Chaplain Josh Johnson. In attendance were Kime’s daughter, Kelley; son, Casey, and daughter-in-law, Monica; and fellow Coast Guard Station Islamorada members.
“We had a year of mourning,” Kelley said as the Coast Guard vessel carrying Kime’s ashes headed out to sea on a sunny and clear afternoon. “This was more celebrating and putting my dad where he wanted to be.”
Alligator Reef Lighthouse was Kime’s first place away from home. He was 19 at the time.
He’d spend three weeks manning the lighthouse before taking a dinghy back to shore for a week off.
A day for Kime and the other lighthouse keepers began at 8 a.m. with breakfast. Then it would be on to cleaning the decks and working in the engine room.
They would quit at noon because of the intense heat. During their leisure time, they would hang out on the decks, swim, fish or even go scuba diving.
Kelley said the stories going back to her father’s days at the lighthouse didn’t come out until later on in life. He reminisced over the days fishing from the lighthouse with the other men on duty. A small hammerhead shark, which Kelley believed they called “Junior,” would appear every time he’d throw his line into the water.
During scuba diving, Kime would recover several cannonballs and square nails around the lighthouse. Kime believed the nails were from the USS Alligator, one of five schooners built for the suppression of slavery and piracy during the presidency of James Madison. He began treating the cannonballs in hopes he could keep them.
Then there was Hurricane Donna in September 1960. The category 4 storm made landfall at Duck Key; the effects began to be felt at the reef lights including Sombrero Key and Alligator Reef on the night of Sept. 9. The storm’s force was felt by the Coast Guard keepers, including Kime, who was stationed at Alligator Light that night.
Kelley recalls her father saying the winds were so strong that the steel shutter doors were separated from the outside. There were also some 8 inches of rain in the barrack area where Kime and two other men were waiting out Donna.
“I’ll never forget being inside the little cabin here and listening to parts of the lighthouse ripping away,” Kime said in a Nov. 24, 1960 Miami News article.
At certain times, Kime and the others could stand in the light chamber or on the outer rails and see St. Elmo’s Fire, a natural electric phenomenon where a bluish or violet glow is seen on the tips of pointed objects like ship masts during thunderstorms.
Eventually, Kime finished his duty at the lighthouse and left the Keys for Mackinac Island. He later moved to Dallas, married his wife, Barbara, and had a family of four children. He became a master plumber, working in the industry from 1967 to 2006.
Kelley said her father had a plot at a cemetery in Dallas, but he asked her three days before he passed if he could be cremated so his ashes could be spread at Alligator Reef Lighthouse.
“With him having Parkinson’s, we urged him to keep doing his exercises. We told him if you get the strength, we’ll take you to see the lighthouse. He called it his lighthouse,” Kelley said.
Sadly, a final trip never came to be before Kime passed.
Knowing how near-and-dear the lighthouse was to her father, Kelley proceeded to call a friend in Clint Brookover, who grew up in the Keys and went to Coral Shores High School, to help find some contacts to get a boat.
Ultimately, she got in touch with the U.S. Coast Guard, which gladly offered its services to provide a burial at sea with honors. Chaplain Johnson provided a lighthouse keeper’s prayer. It was followed up with a remembrance, a flag presentation and Kime’s ashes spread in the crystal blue waters near Alligator Lighthouse. The ceremony concluded with the playing of taps.
“I thought it was phenomenal. I was overcome just seeing the lighthouse,” Kelley said. “It just did something to me and my brother. We saw it coming in on the highway, but when you’re out there close to it in the water, it’s a whole different thing.”
As Kime’s obituary reads, he leaves behind a beautiful legacy of love — especially for the lighthouse that stole his heart as a young man.
