As elsewhere, the holiday season somehow seems to have started early at Mystic Seaport. With the annual Lighted Holiday Boat Parade successfully completed, and with a month of Lantern Light Tours ahead, the Museum of America and the Sea is as active and festive as ever. Despite the unseasonably balmy temperatures around the region, trees [...]
Exciting times here at Mystic Seaport! All this week we have been celebrating the 70th anniversary of the arrival of the Charles W. Morgan to Mystic. We set things off with a bang last weekend with an awesome fireworks show on the river – the pyrotechnics were a great compliment to our new Sights & [...]
It was on July 21, 1841 at 10 a.m. that the Charles W. Morgan was launched from the Hillman Brothers Shipyard in New Bedford to join her many “sister” ships in the first great global industry.
Mark your calendars… where will you be for the first week of November? Mystic Seaport and Mystic, CT of course! In just one month’s time we’ll celebrate the 70th anniversary of the Charles W. Morgan coming up-river to Mystic Seaport with a full week of activities at the Museum and in Mystic to mark this [...]
We weathered the storm beautifully; but the ramifications are not insignificant! The piece I had written for this space had originally – before Irene‘s visit – been about prolonging what has been a fast and successful summer season. I intended to declare “two more months of summer” (having seen my shadow on the deck of [...]
“To inspire” is a key element of the Mystic Seaport Mission Statement. On the one hand, that element of our mission is easy to fulfill since for me there is inspiration all around us here on the grounds of Mystic Seaport. It’s palpable. On the other, we rarely know just how “inspired” a visitor has [...]
The reviews of the 2011 WoodenBoat Show are in, and it’s 10′s across the board! Attendance numbers were great (highest numbers of attendees since 1997 and the best Sunday ever) and exhibitors and visitors alike expounded about the diversity of the boats on land, boats in the water, demonstrations, and the increased number of exhibitors. [...]
Imagine 450 volunteers showing up at the front door of your home within a span of eight days ready to tackle whatever needs the greatest attention: painting, gardening, docks, cataloging, collection care, boat preparation, “attic” cleaning, filing, and the like. That’s what Mystic Seaport experienced in early May, thanks to our PILOTS and the Tourism [...]
Perhaps you were you on the banks of the Mystic River in Noank; or downtown Mystic at the drawbridge; or better yet in a small craft in the Mystic River witnessing the arrival of the Charles W. Morgan on November 8, 1941. I cannot claim to have been in any of those places, but if [...]
Something has been gnawing at me lately. I am burdened by the realization that, while we are the stewards of a nationally significant collection, Mystic Seaport is also largely responsible for keeping our nation’s great maritime traditions alive and vibrant, and seeing to it that they are passed forward to our rising generations.