OLD SAYBROOK — A famous Connecticut lighthouse featured on some state license plates has been sold at auction for almost $300,000.
The Hartford Courant reports that the federal government’s General Services Administration, which oversees lighthouse sales for the Coast Guard, says Saybrook Breakwater Light drew a high bid of $290,000 in an online auction.
The identity of the high bidder has not been disclosed.
The sale cannot close until the bidder negotiates a lease with the state for submerged lands under the 127-year-old lighthouse.
The 48-foot lighthouse sold in 2013 for $340,000, but the bidder backed out of the deal because she couldn’t negotiate a lease for the submerged lands.
Since then, the state legislature enacted a law smoothing the way for negotiating such leases.
