Statement of Significance (as of designation - December 20, 1989):
Built in 1950 and originally associated with the Overfalls lightship station off the Delaware coast, WAL-605 was subsequently sent to the Pacific to serve at the significant Blunts Reef station on the northern California coast. She ended her career as the Relief lightship, serving as a replacement vessel at all Pacific Coast stations. WAL-605 is representative of the end of more than a century and a half of American lightship operation.