Tattershall Castle Lightning Rods

I found another lightning rod that I'll show you today. Well, I didn't exactly find it. It was sent to me all the way from England by my friend, and fellow adventurer, John from English Wilderness. He knew I've been looking for this type of thing, so he decided to do me a favor. Take a look at his site. I know you'll like it.

These aren't just one lightning rod. They're a series of lightning rods that protect the top of Tattershall Castle. The castle is a tourist destination in Lincolnshire. There is even a website with official information. Here's a link to it: Tattershall Castle

There are three doors at the bottom. When you enter the one on the left, you'll see a spiral staircase that leads to the top of the castle. I like spiral staircases. The second goes down to the basement and the storerooms. And the third, which is close to the middle of the castle, enters right into the great hall.

On the top left tower you can see a pole sticking up. It's actually a flagpole, not one of the lightning rods. There are lightning rods on each of the towers and on the three chimneys in the middle. These towers look smaller compared to everything else, but they look huge when you see them closer.

This is a closeup of the three chimneys at the middle of the castle. I told you they looked bigger when you see them closer. You can get a good look at the network of lightning rods from here. Here's a little better description of the castle from John, since he's the one who was actually there.

"The castle is about 40m high. There are 5 floors, plus the roof and a walkway around the battlements. Tattershall Castle was built in the 1440s by Lord Cromwell. Most of the windows have pictures in stained glass.

There's a lightning conductor on each of the chimneys and each of the towers. I followed the conductor as far as possible. They connected together and eventually disappeared through a wall.

There's some really old graffiti in the castle... Most of the dates are from the 1800s, but I spotted a few from the 1700s and a couple from the 1600s. 1642 was the oldest. I looked up the chimneys, but didn't find anything interesting."

Cheers,

John

That was some interesting stuff! It's fascinating to me to know that someone from as far back as 1642 would write graffiti on the walls. I don't think we'll find very much English graffiti here in America from that far back. Maybe a little from the 1700s and 1800s.

Here's a closer shot of one of the chimneys. You can get an excellent look at what the lightning rods look like in this one. These lightning rods aren't fancy, and they aren't meant to be. These have a very important purpose here.

These lightning rods are on this castle to protect it from lightning. They don't need to look good for that. They are serving this important function so that the castle won't be damaged. This castle looks to be the highest structure in the area, so it's probably struck by lightning frequently.

This last photo is of one of the stained glass windows John told us all about. If you click on the photo to get a better look, you can maybe make out the words that are written on it. It's okay even if you can't. The glass is beautiful nonetheless.

Well, that was a little bit of a different kind of adventure for today. This should show you that you can have great adventures wherever you are, whoever you are. All you have to do is go out and claim the world as your own. So many of you already do this. Others of you only need to step outside. Things like this are waiting for you there.

Tomorrow I'm hoping to have another special adventure, so Friday Fiction will be canceled for this week. For those of you who have enjoyed it, don't worry. What I hope to have tomorrow will be just as good. I'm telling you, I laughed out loud when I found out about it. Talk to you then.


Related Posts

• My First Lightning Rod
• Weather Vane Watch 2-4-09
  
• Weather Vane Watch
• What A Weather Vane Does
• My New Play Area