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Once upon a time, when you were just a kid, Mom or Dad probably read you "The Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge.” And years later maybe you read this 1942 classic by Hildegarde H. Swift to your own children.   Little Red was saved twice by children, once from being auctioned off and once from neglect. The story begins with the introduction of a little lighthouse sitting on the rocky Manhattan shore of the Hudson River.  “It was round and fat and red. It was fat and red and jolly. And it was very, very proud.”  The...

'The Little Red Lighthouse' Monday, July 19, 2004 By THOMAS E. FRANKLIN THOMAS E. FRANKLIN / THE RECORD Under the big gray bridge sits a little red lighthouse. Hardly known and seldom seen, it sits quietly on the New York side of the Hudson, under the mighty roar of the George Washington Bridge. Immortalized in a popular children's book, it has stood as a quaint reminder of the past.The last surviving lighthouse in Manhattan, it stands just 40 feet high and a mere 28 feet above water. It was once an important beacon for ships from the north heading out...