National Park Service: Salem Maritime National Historic Site

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A black, white, and light blue header image with the words National Park Service Salem Maritime NHS

Last October, I visited Salem Maritime National Historic Site in Salem, MA. I had visited the city of Salem several times in the past and had taken a ranger-led tour of the area, but I had never completed a Junior Ranger badge for the site, so the revisit was a must. The National Historic Site designation within the National Park Service in the United States originated with Salem, as it was the first National Historic Site. Created on March 17, 1938, the park celebrated its 85th anniversary last Friday. Salem Maritime NHS can be divided into three parts: the Salem Armory Visitor Center, the tall ship Friendship of Salem at Derby Wharf, and historic buildings. Each of these parts is important for understanding the history of the city.

Salem Maritime National Historic Site sign; a concrete sign in an unusual shape with the words engraved on the side. The sign fits neatly underneath a large ship anchor. On the top point of the concrete sign is the National Park Service arrowhead logo. Front of Salem Armory Visitor Center; a tall, red brick building with large openings in the side. Engraved into the concrete holding up the red bricks above the opening are the words SALEM ARMORY in an all caps, serif font. Below the concrete is a sign reading VISITOR CENTER in a matching font, with the National Park Service arrowhead logo in the space between the two words. An American flag flies on a metal pole on the corner of the building.

Salem Armory Visitor Center

The armory once belonged to the Second Corps of Cadets, part of the Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, which was established in 1786. The building became the visitor center in 1994, twelve years after a fire burned all but the drill shed. Inside the building, visitors explore an exhibit about the Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, watch an orientation film on the history of Salem, and admire large model ships. This area also includes a gift shop the best restrooms in Salem.

Secord Corps Cadets sign at Salem Armory Visitor Center; side of the red brick building with the words SECOND CORPS CADETS protruding from the side of the building in an all caps, san serif font. Model of the original Salem Armory; a model of a long, red brick building protected by plexiglass, with signs describing the building
Model of a tall ship beside the wharf; a large model of a two mast tall ship anchored by a wooden platform. The First Muster sign; informational signage explaining the beginning of the Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, including images of fighting militia, the charter, a helmet, and a pike. Another model of a tall ship; this two mast ship stands next to the three-story tall glass window creating the side of the armory.

Derby Wharf & Friendship of Salem

Down by the harbor is Derby Wharf, named for the Derby family of maritime merchants. In 1762, father Richard Derby and son Elias Hasket Derby started to build the wharf, while they and their relatives continued to extend it until 1806. (My favorite fun fact about the Derby family is that some members had heterochromia, or eyes of two different colors. Elias had a brown right eye and a blue left eye, incidentally the opposite of another famous person with heterochromia, baseball pitcher Max Scherzer.) Back at Derby Wharf in Salem, the wharf is currently 2,045 feet long and has a little lighthouse on the end, unsurprisingly called Derby Wharf Light Station. A working lighthouse since 1871, it stands only twenty feet tall and is on the National Register of Historic Places.

Friendship of Salem; a three mast tall ship with a brown body and yellow trip. An American flag flies from the stern Derby Wharf Light; a twenty foot tall lighthouse built of whitewashed bricks and a black painted cupola. The lighthouse stands at the end of a gravelly wharf. Derby Wharf; a gravely strip of land in the middle of a harbor with grass growing on either side and a path down the middle. The city of Salem is visible in the background.

Moored beside the wharf is a beautiful replica tall ship with the punny name Friendship of Salem. The original ship sailed in 1797 and traveled around the world until 1813, during the War of 1812, when it was captured by a British ship. This replica is much younger, built in 1996 at Scarano Boat in Albany, NY. I have also seen a smaller but still impressively large model of the ship (and an original portrait of Elias Hasket Derby in all his two-colored eyes glory) at the Byrne Family Gallery of Maritime Art exhibit within the Peabody Essex Museum (PEM), also located in Salem. Near the wharf is Waite & Peirce Museum Store, named for the original owners of Friendship, business partners Aaron Waite and Jerathmiel Peirce (who wins the best name award for this week).

Historic Buildings of Salem

Several historic buildings in Salem are owned and maintained by NPS with signage to match. Constructed in 1819, Custom House is a two story federalist style building with neoclassical white columns holding up a balcony above the entrance. A golden bald eagle on top of the building, a replica of one carved by Salem local Joseph True at the price of $50 back in 1826 (just over $1,500 in 2023), gives it a super American touch. Just like the Custom House in Newburyport and others along the East Coast, the U. S. Customs Service collected tariff on imports using this building. One notable government worker was author Nathaniel Hawthorne, who wrote stories about life in colonial New England including The Scarlet Letter and The House of the Seven Gables.

The Custom House sign; a standard National Park Service informational sign describing the history of Custom House, including an original floorplan, a portrait of Nathaniel Hawthorne as a young man, and a vintage photograph of the Custom House The Custom House; a three story tall brick building with large concrete stairs leading up from street level. A whitewashed balconey supported by eight wooden columns stands over the matching door. A golden bald eagle holding a shield is perched on the roof in front of the cupola.

Near the Custom House are the Public Stores, constructed in 1819, where merchants kept their wares while they paid duties to the Customs Service. A smaller Scale House, built ten years later in 1829, also stands in the area, creating a separate space to weigh goods. Behind this area Narbonne House, predating the other structures by around 150 years. Built for butcher Thomas Ives in 1675, the property is considered a “witness house”, as it was standing during the Salem Witch Trials in 1690. The house gets its name from a later time, when it was the property of the Narbonne family. The longest residence of the house was held by Sarah Vincent Narbonne, who was born in the house in 1795 and died either in 1890 (according to her current headstone) or in 1895 (according to the National Park Service).

Public Stores; standard National Park Service informational sign describing the history of public stores, including a vintage photograph of the stores and a print of the stores. St. Joseph's Hall, a three-story red brick building.

A newer building on the block is St. Joseph’s Hall. Located next door to the West India Goods Store, the three-story red brick Hall was built in 1909 as the home of the St. Joseph Society, described as a fraternal society of Polish immigrants. Every level of the building had its own job. The bottom floor was a store, the second floor was a dance hall and wedding venue, and the top floor held apartments for recently immigrated families. By the 1980s, after several generations in America, people with Polish ancestors blended into the rest of the White population and moved to other parts of the state and country. NPS has owned the Hall since 1988 and keeps the space as offices.

Custom House Place sign; a standard National Park Service informational sign describing the history of the area near Custom House, including a map of the area and two vintage, black-and-white photographs Narbonne House; a tiny, colonial style clapboard house painted bluish-gray.

Hawkes House, a three-story wooden federalist style building with bright yellow paint and dark green shutters, was the grand estate of Elias Hasket and Elizabeth Derby. The house was designed in 1780 by local architect and carver Samuel McIntire, who also created Lyman Estate in Waltham, MA and his own golden eagle for Lynn Academy in Lynn, MA (now on view at the Lynn Museum). The Derby family never finished the house, instead moving to a different location, so shipbuilder Benjamin Franklin Hawkes, Sr. (runner-up for the best name of the week award) bought the property and completed the house in his own design.

The Hawkes House sign; a standard National Park Service informational sign describing the history of Hawkes House, including an original blueprint for the space and an oil painting of the harbor at the time the house was built. The Hawkes House; a two-and-a-half-story Federalist style clapboard building painted bright yellow with dark green shutters.

Conclusion

Salem Maritime NHS is a fee-free park, your tax dollars at work!  On-street and lot parking in Salem is spotty, so I suggest parking at the MBTA Garage in Salem, which costs a mere $5 a day on weekdays, and $2 a day on weekends. This park requires a lot of walking on standard sidewalks, brick walkways, and a gravel trail, so be sure to wear comfortable shoes. As you may already know, October is an incredibly busy time for Salem due to more recent connections between the Witch Trials and Halloween. I visited during the first weekend in October as someone with prior knowledge of how to navigate the area and enjoyed my visit. If you are leery of Halloween activity and have not previously visited Salem, I strongly encourage you to find another time to visit.


Abby Epplett’s Rating System

Experience: 8/10

Accessibility: 7/10



Location: 160 Derby St, Salem, MA 01970, USA