Niagara Falls has long, colorful history

NIAGARA FALLS, Ontario -- You can't take a boat ride into the roar and spray of Niagara Falls in the winter, but this time of year offers a different spectacle: Nighttime illumination of the falls in a changing array of colors -- red, white, blue, purple, orange, amber and green.

In spring and summer, the colored lights shine for just three hours, but with less daylight in winter, curtains of color wash over the falls each night for up to seven hours.

Crowds gather along the sidewalk and railing on Niagara Parkway to see the show as mist rises from the falls and basin in front of them; others watch from the windows of hotels and restaurants on the Canadian side.

The display starts with patriotic themes -- red, white and blue for the American Falls, red and white for the horseshoe-shaped Canadian Falls -- and frequently includes colors to honor a cause.

When Niagara Falls hosted the first wedding following New York's legalization of same-sex marriage in July, Mayor Paul Dyster arranged for a rainbow of colors, the symbol of gay pride.

On Nov. 16, the falls were lit by white light for 15-minute stretches for lung cancer awareness, a request made by Christine Dwyer, who founded a group called Make Some Noise for Lung Cancer Awareness after losing her best friend to the disease.

"I think it validates us a bit," Dwyer said. She said supporters sent her emails after the lighting saying, "I heard about this, I'm in tears, I'm so grateful."

The light beams emanate from a bank of 18 spotlights, each 30 inches in diameter, sitting atop a raised stone bunker across the road. For more than 50 years, Peter Gordon, 80, has been manning the light show, splitting the week with "the rookie," Dick Mann, 78, who has been at it just under 30 years.

"I never get tired of it," Gordon said one night in November, the start of his busy season, when fewer daylight hours mean longer nights to light. The best views come on crisp winter nights, he said, when the mist is transformed to sparkling ice crystals that catch the soft colors.

For the past year, Gordon and Mann have used a relatively new technology to control the lights -- computerized touch screens.

But the history of Niagara's illumination goes back more than 150 years. The falls were lit for the first time at 10 p.m. on Sept. 14, 1860, when 200 lights like those used to signal for help at sea were put in place for a visit from the Prince of Wales. Electricity was first used in 1879. An Illumination Tower, still used today, was built in 1899.