MYSTIC SEAPORT

'Mystic Seaport' is a maritime museum situated along the banks of the Mystic River in Mystic, Connecticut, USA. It is notable both for its collection of sailing ships and boats, and for the re-creation of an entire 19th century seaport, consisting of over 60 original buildings, most of them rare commercial structures, moved to the 37 acre (150,000 m²) site and meticulously restored.

Contents

Overview

Livery

Buildings

Music

See also

Reference

External links

Overview

The museum was established in 1929 as the "Marine Historical Association". Its first fame came with the acquisition of the ''Charles W. Morgan'' in 1941, the only surviving wooden sailing whaler. The seaport now sees about 400,000 visitors each year. In addition, it supports research via an extensive library, runs a summer, graduate-level academic program that was established in 1955 by maritime historian Professor Robert G. Albion of Harvard University, the Frank C. Munson Institute of American Maritime Studies, and, in conjunction with Williams College, hosts Williams-Mystic, an undergraduate program in maritime studies.
Mystic Seaport is a popular destination for boaters, who pay to dock overnight just a short walk away from ships such as the Morgan and the Dunton.

Livery

Several of the vessels are the unique survivors of their type in the world. The collection includes:

★ ''Annie'' (sandbagger sloop)

★ ''Australia'' (coasting schooner)

★ ''Breck Marshall'' (catboat)

★ ''Brilliant'' (auxiliary schooner)

★ ''Charles W. Morgan'' (whaler)

★ ''L. A. Dunton'' (fishing schooner)

★ ''Emma C. Berry'' (Noank smack)

★ ''Estella A.'' (friendship sloop)

★ ''Florence'' (dragger)

★ ''Joseph Conrad'' (training ship)

★ ''Nellie'' (oyster sloop)

★ ''Regina M.'' (carry away sloop)

★ ''Roann'' (eastern-rig sloop)

★ ''Sabino'' (island steamer)

Buildings

One of the main buildings of the museum is the Preservation Shipyard, where traditional tools and techniques are used to preserve the Museum's collection of historic vessals, inclusing the ''Charles W. Morgan'' and a recreation of the ''Amistad'', which set sail on June 21, 2007 from New Haven, Connecticut on a 14,000 mile transatlantic voyage to Great Britain, Lisbon, West Africa and the Caribbean to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the end of slavery in both the United States and Great Britain.
The 19th century seafaring village contains nearly all the types of general and specialized trades associated with building and operating a sailing fleet. They include a chandlery, sail loft, ropewalk, cooperage, shipping agent office, printing office, bank and others, including The Spouter Tavern which is open seasonally and serves visitors "travelers' fare." Each building is used both to show the activity for which it was used, and multiple display examples of the objects sold or constructed; for instance the nautical instruments shop displays sextants, nautical timepieces and the like and demonstrations at the cooperage show how barrels are assembled.
Additional buildings house more exhibits. One intriguing exhibit is a 1/128th scale model of the entire Mystic River area ca. 1870, complete down to the outhouse behind every residence; a modelling ''tour de force'' over 50 ft (15 m) long. Another contains a collection of carved figureheads. Also among the museum's buildings is a planetarium that helps to show and teach visitors how the stars were used by seamen for navigation.

Music

Mystic Seaport's music program is unusual in that it prominently features sea shanties in their original contexts, as work songs. Regular sessions find shantey singers keeping museum visitors in line as they haul sails or turn a capstan. The Mystic Seaport Sea Music Festival, held annually in June since 1979, is among the oldest and largest such in the United States.

See also

Whaleboat - examples shown are at Mystic Seaport
The official Mystic Seaport Podcast ia available on 'MuseumPods' [1] the Museum Podcast Directory.
Steven Spielberg's ''Amistad'', which used Mystic Seaport as a set representing 1830s New Haven.

Reference

★ Maynard Bray, Benjamin Fuller, and Peter Vermilya ''Mystic Seaport Watercraft'' (2002) ISBN 0-913372-94-3

External links

★ Mystic Seaport homepage

★ Mystic Seaport Podcast