Category: News

Mystic Seaport Museum honored Hall of Fame sailor Thomas A. Whidden with the 2020 America and the Sea Award. The prestigious award recognizes those individuals and organizations whose extraordinary achievements in the world of maritime exploration, competition, scholarship, and design best exemplify the American character. The award was presented at a virtual gala fundraiser on Friday, October 23.

Tom Whidden is the President and CEO of North Technology Group and a 2017 inductee into the National Sailing Hall of Fame. He was elected to the America’s Cup Hall of Fame in 2004.

Fellow Hall of Fame Sailor and the 8th America and the Sea Award recipient Gary Jobson presented the award to Whidden at a small gathering of Whidden’s family and friends at the Museum in Mystic, Connecticut, from where the event was livestreamed for an audience around the country and overseas. Jobson shared a brief history of the America’s Cup, followed by the award presentation, commenting that Whidden has contributed two important things to the sport of sailing, ”As an industry leader, he has made sailing more efficient, with better sails that last longer and go faster… and he’s been outstanding on the race course.”

Whidden, who grew up in Connecticut and learned to sail on Long Island Sound, has had an extraordinary career both on and off the water as an accomplished tactician for Dennis Conner in eight America’s Cup campaigns — winning three, and as a revolutionary sailmaker, bringing sail making from the manufacturing of paneled sails in a vast network of sail lofts to the current centrally managed, technologically driven, manufacturing system. Thanks to the remarkable vision of Whidden, North Sails has become a leader in the industry, with every America’s Cup winner and every Volvo Ocean Race winner choosing to race with North Sails since 1992 and 1993, respectively.

“Tom is a perfect fit for this award. Not only does he have a distinguished record as a competitive sailor, but he has also served as an important ambassador for the sport and the maritime community. For young sailors across the country and beyond, he has been a positive role model and mentor,” said Steve White, president of Mystic Seaport Museum.

In his wonderfully modest, graceful demeanor, Whidden remarked, “What a wonderful honor it is to be this year’s Mystic Seaport Museum America and the Sea Award recipient. I join an amazing group of previous recipients who have made incredible contributions in so many different aspects of maritime, sailing, and ocean life. I have spent my life racing sailboats and making products that make those boats perform their best. For me to be recognized alongside other abundantly accomplished previous honorees, for doing what I most love, by the most prominent maritime museum in the United States, is a dream come true.”

The virtual event was joined by friends and supporters from Nantucket to New York to Florida to Los Angeles, and Whidden was congratulated from around the world with remarks from Jimmy Buffett; New York Yacht Club’s American Magic skipper Terry Hutchinson in New Zealand; Sir Lindsay Owens-Jones, L’Oréal Honorary Chairman and owner of Magic Carpet 3; Peter Dubens, Managing Partner of Oakley Capital and Chairman of North Sails Technology; Christopher J. Culver, Vice Commodore, New York Yacht Club; and Jes Staley, CEO, Barclays.

The virtual event generated $520,284 through sponsorships, single tickets, live and silent auctions, and a virtual paddle-raise appeal. The Museum would like to express a sincere thank you to the gala committee, Board of Trustees, and the myriad supporters who gave in honor of Tom Whidden and to further the mission of Mystic Seaport Museum.

Past recipients of the America and the Sea Award include American businesswoman and philanthropist Wendy Schmidt; groundbreaking America’s Cup sailor Dawn Riley, philanthropist and environmentalist David Rockefeller, Jr.; boat designers Rod and Bob Johnstone and their company J/Boats; author and historian Nathaniel Philbrick; maritime industrialist Charles A. Robertson; Hall of Fame sailor and author Gary Jobson; WoodenBoat Publications founder Jon Wilson; former Secretary of the Navy John Lehman; oceanographer and explorer Sylvia Earle; America’s Cup sailor William Koch; President and CEO of Crowley Maritime Corporation, Thomas Crowley; historian David McCullough; and legendary yacht designer Olin J. Stephens, II.

In the photo: (from left) Museum president Steve White, America and the Sea Award honoree Tom Whidden, and Hall of Fame sailor Gary Jobson at the gala on October 23, 2020.

Mystic Seaport Museum will present its 2020 America and the Sea Award to Tom Whidden, one of the most applauded sailors of all time, member of both the America’s Cup Hall of Fame and the National Sailing Hall of Fame, and president and CEO of North Technology Group, parent company of North Sails. The prestigious award recognizes those individuals and organizations whose extraordinary achievements in the world of maritime exploration, competition, scholarship, and design best exemplify the American character.

In announcing the honor, Mystic Seaport Museum President Steve White said, “Tom is a perfect fit for this award. Not only does he have a distinguished record as a competitive sailor, but he has also served as an important ambassador for the sport and the maritime community. For young sailors across the country and beyond, he has been a positive role model and mentor.”

Whidden will be honored for his remarkable accomplishments in competitive sailing and his leadership in the design and manufacturing of technologically advanced sails at North Sails.

“I have spent my life racing sailboats and making products that make those boats perform their best. For me to be recognized by the most prominent maritime museum in the United States, for doing what I love most, is a dream come true,” said Whidden.

Whidden’s career soared in 1979 when he joined Dennis Conner for what would become a total of eight America’s Cup campaigns, racing as tactician in five series races and winning three times: 1980, 1987 (regaining the cup after Australia’s 1983 victory), and 1988. He has won the Newport-Bermuda Race five times, and had repeated wins on the European racing circuit.

Amid his racing success, Whidden joined North Sails in 1987, building it into the largest sailmaking company in the world, and later becoming CEO and co-owner of North Technology Group. He led North Sails and North Technology Group through decades of evolution from manufacturing paneled sails in a vast network of sail lofts to the current centrally managed, technologically driven, manufacturing system.

In 2004, Whidden was elected to the America’s Cup Hall of Fame “for his brilliance as a tactical advisor, his soundness as a crew organizer, and his mastery of winning in difficult boats under the most demanding conditions.” Most recently, he was inducted into the National Sailing Hall of Fame in 2017.

Mystic Seaport Museum will recognize Whidden’s exceptional career on and off the water by awarding him the America and the Sea Award on Friday, October 23, 2020. The award presentation, special toast to the honoree, auction, paddle raise, and special celebrity appearances will be livestreamed from the Museum beginning at 6:15 p.m. EST.

This affair is the premier fundraising event for Mystic Seaport Museum. Past recipients of the America and the Sea Award include: American businesswoman and philanthropist Wendy Schmidt; America’s Cup sailor and trailblazer Dawn Riley; philanthropist and environmentalist David Rockefeller Jr.; celebrated sailors and co-founders of J/Boats, Rod and Bob Johnstone; New York Times best-selling and National Book Award-winning author Nathaniel Philbrick; maritime industrialist Charles A. Robertson; yachtsman and author Gary Jobson; WoodenBoat Publications founder Jon Wilson; former Secretary of the Navy John Lehman; oceanographer and explorer Sylvia Earle; sailor, collector, philanthropist William I. Koch; industry leader in marine transportation and logistics services Thomas B. Crowley, Jr.; Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian David McCullough; and the most successful and admired yacht designer of the 20th century Olin J. Stephens, II.

For invitations, please email advancement@mysticseaport.org/.

The recently shared photograph of the hippocampus showing the new carousel piece that is currently exhibited in the Thompson Exhibition Building was accompanied by a 16^th century woodcut of a hippocampus. It appeared in Conrad Gessner’s 1560 Nomenclator Aquatilium Animantium (Nomenclature of Aquatic Animals), one of a number of zoological works written by the Swiss naturalist before his untimely death from the plague in 1565 at the age of 49.

Conrad Gessner was an extraordinary student, teacher, physician, bibliographer, philosopher and scientist who collected information from observation, from earlier sources and from colleagues around Europe. In addition to his many other talents, Gessner was a linguist fluent in Greek, Latin and Hebrew, teaching Greek at the University of Lausanne before getting his medical degree in Basel in his further search for scientific and natural truth. Conrad Gessner was a truly gifted scholar and compiler of information.

Because he copied illustrations from many sources, such as the earlier artist Albrecht Durer, many of his woodcut illustrations in his publications are very accurate, and yet others others are quite whimsical as they are images of fictional and fantastic beasts taken from less reliable sources. Below are just a couple of his woodcuts from his bestiary including a sperm whale gone rogue and one of a number of mermen that populated his oceans. The sea turtle is a bit more accurate to real life than the others (as far as we know!).

Gessner’s book is part of the Rare Book collection in the G.W. Blunt White Library at Mystic Seaport Museum.

Probably the most unusual gift we have received in some time comes from carousel figure collector Larry Freels, who had one of the biggest such collections in the country. Some time ago Mr. Freels began breaking up his collection and sending pieces to places like the MET, the MFA, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and other notable museums.

The piece he donated to Mystic Seaport Museum last year is one of the more unusual items that he collected and he felt that the marine nature of the piece made it especially pertinent to us. We agreed. Carved by noted carousel-figure carver Gustav Dentzel in Philadelphia in 1895, the hippocampus figure actually appears in a number of items in our collection including on a ship’s sternboard and on a silver trophy. A hippocampus is a mythological figure of a sea horse with two forefeet and a body ending in the tail of a dolphin or fish.

The photograph by staff photographer Joe Michael shows the carving as it currently appears in the Thompson Exhibition Building. The drawing comes from a 1560 book in our collection by Konrad Gesner who tried to illustrate all the “known” animals in the world at that time.

Our newest exhibition, A Way with Wood: Celebrating Craft, introduces visitors to the many ways people transform one of nature’s most malleable materials to objects of utility, art, and beauty. In association with this exhibit, the Museum has two related but distinct opportunities for people who work with wood: demonstrating in the exhibit (varying time slots available, August – December) and/or participating in Woodcraft Weekend, August 29-30, 2020.

Learn more

One of the Museum’s longest-serving employees has decided to retire after more than 40 years on the job. Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Susan Funk will retire effective July 1.

It is not an understatement to say that there is no aspect of the Museum that does not owe something to Susan’s influence.

Her association with the Museum began in 1977 when she was a member of the inaugural class of the Williams-Mystic program.

“My skills class was to be paired with shipwright Willets Ansel, who was building a dory for the L.A. Dunton. I learned all about clinker boatbuilding and how to clench nails,” she says. “It was a great experience at that point in life: he was so genuine and disciplined, but also open to change and growth.”

The hook had been set. Susan says she recently found an old letter to a cousin where she wrote that she was having so much fun that “Maybe I could work here?”

After a first job after college working in Geneva, Switzerland on the Law of the Sea Treaty – which taught her politics was not her passion – she did come to work here by taking a summer position where she worked on the demonstration squad, exhibit interpretation, and many other projects. That began a succession of 12 different job titles over the next four decades, culminating in her last as Executive Vice President & COO.

Personal highlights over the years include chaperoning  teen groups on board schooner Brilliant, and traveling with the Williams-Mystic program to the Pacific Northwest and going to sea with them.

“These were opportunities to see the combination of the academic and experiential in actions,” she says. “I can’t think of anything more powerful in education that influences lives and opens up dialogue and change.”

Funk’s leadership played a key role in bringing many of the Museum’s milestone events to reality: the building of the schooner Amistad and the accompanying website Exploring Amistad,  the 38th Voyage of the Charles W. Morgan, and the construction and successful launch of the Thompson Exhibition Building and the Collins Gallery.  The broad range of entertaining public programs and inspiring educational activities that she devised and contributed to is too long to list.

Her service extended beyond the Museum. Funk served on the board of the New England Museum Association and was the board chair for 6 years. She spent 7 years participating in an advocacy campaign for the American Alliance of Museums (AAM) to champion issues and programs to benefit museums, and she found time to be a reader and peer reviewer for AAM accreditation and National Endowment for the Humanities and the Institute of Museum and Library Services grant applications.

“What I will miss most about Susan – aside from her wisdom, sage advice, and calm presence – is her passion for maritime history and the Museum. She dedicated her professional life to ensuring that that visitor experience here is world class and much of what the Museum is today is due to her intelligence and hard work,” said Steve White, president of Mystic Seaport Museum.

“I have loved every minute of my time here and I will miss the daily exchanges with coworkers, scholars and visitors who are the heart of the institution,” said Funk. “Thank you all for your part in making Mystic Seaport Museum a most remarkable organization.”

“I look forward to enjoying the many dimensions of the Museum as a ‘civilian’ in the years ahead,” she added.

Funk plans to remain in Mystic with her husband, Jim, and pursue a variety of projects, most notably to spend time visiting her two grandchildren in Sweden.

Mystic Seaport Museum will open a new exhibition, A Way with Wood: Celebrating Craft, on July 3, 2020.The show will introduce visitors to the many ways people transform one of nature’s most malleable materials to objects of utility, art, and beauty. It will be on display in the Thompson Exhibition Building’s Collins Gallery.

At the core of the exhibition will be a boat-restoration and boat-building demonstration staffed by shipwrights from the Museum’s Henry B. duPont Preservation Shipyard. For this exhibition, the shipwrights will carry out different projects over the course of the show. The first will be a restoration of Afterglow, the tender to the Museum’s schooner Brilliant. Following will be the completion of a restoration of the Woods Hole spritsail cat Sandy Ford, and then the construction of a new dory for the L.A. Dunton. Little to no power tools will be used; the focus will be on work using hand tools.

Complementing the shipwrights’ work is a section where outside artisans will be invited in for periods to set up shop to practice and share their craft with the public. This changing stable of woodworkers might feature a variety of different disciplines: woodcarving, furniture making, sculpture, and model making are some of the possibilities.

Throughout the 5,000 square-foot gallery, there will be rotating displays of objects from the Museum’s collections, such as rare tools, unique carvings, small boats, photographs, and other artifacts that illustrate the wide range of ways wood has been shaped by the artisan’s hand.

The displays in A Way with Wood will change as new projects, artisans, and objects rotate in and out. The exhibition is intended to evolve over time and provide different views into the world of craftsmanship and wood.

“Warm, renewable, flexible, strong – the remarkable qualities of wood have appealed to countless generations, making it the traditional go-to material for crafting boats, buildings, furniture, and much more” says Director of Exhibits Elysa Engelman. “We’re excited to be using our largest and newest gallery to show-off our staff skills and our collections, by celebrating woodcraft and the craft of woodworking in a maritime setting.”

A Way with Wood replaces the previously announved SALT: Tracing Memories, an installation by Japanese artist Motoi Yamaoto, which was scheduled to open April 26. That exhibition was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. SALT is tentatively rescheduled for spring 2021.

As a casualty of the COVID-19 crisis and the weakening marine art market, Mystic Seaport Museum has made the difficult decision to close the Maritime Art Gallery.

The Gallery was founded by Rudolph Schaefer III in 1979 as a business venture to support Museum operations and to provide a venue to nurture the careers of emerging artists in the contemporary maritime art field. Many of the leading artists at work today got their start at the Gallery. It has also enabled a deep relationship between the Museum and the American Society of Marine Artists.

Unfortunately, the Gallery has faced declining sales in recent years as art-buying trends have shifted and the demand for maritime art declined. The economic upheaval caused by the COVID-19 pandemic forced the Museum to review all aspects of its business operations with a focus on sustainability. Therefore, after a great deal of deliberation, Mystic Seaport Museum has decided to close the Maritime Gallery on August 23. Effective immediately, the Gallery will be open on a limited basis and by appointment.  If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Monique Foster, Gallery Director, at 860-572-5388 or monique.foster@mysticseaport.org/.

Steve White
President and CEO
Mystic Seaport Museum