The Delaware Breakwater is a set of breakwaters

Breakwater (structure)

Breakwaters are structures constructed on coasts as part of coastal defence or to protect an anchorage from the effects of weather and longshore drift.-Purposes of breakwaters:...

 east of Lewes, Delaware

Lewes, Delaware

Lewes is an incorporated city in Sussex County, Delaware, USA, on the Delmarva Peninsula. According to the 2010 census, the population is 2,747, a decrease of 6.3% from 2000....

 on Cape Henlopen

Cape Henlopen

Cape Henlopen is the southern cape of the Delaware Bay along the Atlantic coast of the United States. It lies in the state of Delaware, near the town of Lewes, Delaware...

 that form Lewes Harbor. They were listed on the National Register of Historic Places

National Register of Historic Places

The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...

 on December 12, 1976.

The original 1700 feet (518.2 m) and 2800 feet (853.4 m) breakwaters were built in 1828. The breakwaters are now included in the National Harbor of Refuge and Delaware Breakwater Harbor Historic District

National Harbor of Refuge and Delaware Breakwater Harbor Historic District

The National Harbor of Refuge and Delaware Breakwater Historic District encompasses a series of seacoast breakwaters behind Cape Henlopen, Delaware that were built in a program to establish a shipping haven on a coastline that lacked safe harbors. The Harbor of Refuge is at the mouth of the...

.

The breakwaters were the first structure of their kind to be built in the Western Hemisphere

Western Hemisphere

The Western Hemisphere or western hemisphere is mainly used as a geographical term for the half of the Earth that lies west of the Prime Meridian and east of the Antimeridian , the other half being called the Eastern Hemisphere.In this sense, the western hemisphere consists of the western portions...

.