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Nestled at the top of Wisconsin since a cluster of islands on Lake Superior that have been home to Native Americans, pioneer farmers, commercial fishermen, and more.

Today, it's a land that is mostly reclaimed by the wilderness.

It's also home to what some call the finest collection of lighthouses

in the country. Guiding the wafer ships on Lake Superior, nine light stations stand upon the Apostle Islands.

Though operated automatically today, there was a time when Lighthouse Keepers lived on the

islands and tended the lights.

It was a lonely occupation, and while some keepers were bachelors many brought families to the islands

A light keeper's wife was faced with the difficulty of caring for a family and conditions that are unimaginable today.

I'm Jason Epperson and on this episode of America's National Parks,

the Apostle Islands National Seashore.

Anna-Marie Carlson was one such woman.

Born in Sweden, Anna-Marie came to the US as a teenager.

At the age of 21, she married Robert Carlson, the newly appointed assistant keeper at the Outer Island light.

Many years later, she told a newspaper reporter of how it felt to adapt to her new way of life.

Here's Abigail Trebue. And so I had three persons to talk to. My husband, who was the assistant keeper, the head keeper,

an old man with but one eye, and a fisherman who came that summer and lived in a shack down by the shore.

Oh, the loneliness of those days on Outer Island.

There was nothing to see but water, with a dim outline of other islands of the

Apostles group behind the haze and an occasional steamer way out on the lake.

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