Mystic Seaport Museum: Boats, Signs, & Shows

I recently had an adventure in the Mystic / Lyme region of Connecticut and spent about a day and a half at Mystic Seaport Museum. This is the fifth post in a six-part miniseries about my visit. My last four posts covered Part 1 and Part 2 of “Seaport Village” along with the “Preservation Shipyard” and “Galleries”. This post includes “Boats, Signs, & Shows” such as the Charles W. Morgan, the Joseph Conrad and Little Vigilant, many other antique boats, the opportunity to operate small boats, signage, and shows about maritime life in 19^th century New England. The final upcoming post will feature “Bonus Houses”.

Charles W. Morgan

Advertised as “The Last Wooden Whaleship in the World!”, this boat has sailed since July 21, 1841, meaning the vessel turned 183 years old during my visit, as I saw the boat on its birthday. (Where was the cake and ice cream?) This boat carried sailors into whale territory for over eighty years, ending its career in 1921. The boat had its own preservation organization for twenty years until it was sent to Mystic Seaport Museum in 1941. During that period of its career, it survived the Hurricane of 1938, unlike a myriad of other structures previously appearing on this blog, including:

• Trees at Cathedral of the Pines in Rindge, NH
• Saltwater swimming pool at Rocky Point in Warwick, RI
• Whale Rock Lighthouse near Beavertail Lighthouse in Jamestown, RI
• Part of New Bedford, prompting the Army Corps of Engineers to build New Bedford Hurricane Protection Barrier.
• 1750s Barn in Rehoboth, MA; later reproduced by the Rehoboth Antiquarian Society

This very special ship was named a National Historic Landmark in 1966. Today, signage located beside the ship explained how it sailed and who sailed it. Additionally, I attended the show “Working Aloft on a Square Rigger” at 10:15 a.m. where employees raised the sails for the day, climbing high on the rigging to do so. The show included an interactive piece where visitors joined the crew in singing while hoisting the sail. I had recently raised a sail during the standard Gundalow Company boat tour in Portsmouth, NH, so I passed on the interactive portion. The Morgan is literally the flagship of Mystic Seaport Museum, so if you have a limited time to visit, go on this boat first.

Joseph Conrad & Little Vigilant

On another dock was the ship Joseph Conrad and smaller boat Little Vigilant. These boats are considered training vessels and used for camps, so the below deck area was off-limits during my visit. Joseph Conrad dates from 1882 and moved to Mystic in 1947. The Danish boat was originally named Georg Stage, which it kept even after a sinking incident in 1905, but was renamed after new ownership in 1934. The original Georg Stage was the son of maritime benefactors Frederik and Thea Stage, whose son George died of tuberculosis at age twenty-two, and a second version of this ship still floats in Scandinavian waters. The original Joseph Conrad was a Polish-English sailor and author whose best known book is Heart of Darkness, a work sympathetic to the plight of the subsaharan African environment but not so much the people who lived there. Little Vigilant is a much younger ship, built in 1950 after Joseph Conrad had retired, and can be rented for pleasure cruises.

Barns of Boats

The Tom Clagett Boat Shed and nearby catboat exhibit were crowded with bonus boats as Mystic Seaport Museum restores a space to be used for their massive boat collection. Charles Thomas Clagett was a well-known yacht sailor who worked with his wife, fellow yachter and horseback rider Nancy Leiter Clagett, to advance the sport. Their family continues to run a program to teach sailing to people with disabilities, Clagett Sailing. I found this story a bit more interesting than the actual boats on display. Meanwhile, I had difficulty concentrating in the catboat exhibit, as museum staff had installed a QuadBlaster QB-4 ultrasonic bird repeller in the barn. While the website claims this device is “silent-to-humans”, one human definitely heard high pitched buzzing and lower pitched clicking, perfect for scaring birds and annoying me. None of the other people in the barn could hear the device or were aware of its presence without me pointing it out.

Other Boats

Many smaller water vessels were scattered around Mystic Seaport Museum, as the organization truly has too many boats. The yellow research submarine Asherah was built in 1964 as the first of its kind and named for a Phoenician goddess. I saw the steamboat Sabino chugging along the water, although I did not take a ride. The boat was originally called Tourist and operated as a passenger boat, changing hands several times before arriving at Mystic Seaport Museum in 1974. The boat now runs on electric power but can emit steam for special occasions and was named a National Historic Landmark in 1992.

Gerda III was one of several boats that assisted Jews from Denmark in escaping to Sweden in October 1943 after the Nazi German invasion. The boat was donated to the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York City, NY by the Folketinget or Danish Parliament and on permanent loan to Mystic Seaport Museum. On a lighter note, other boats on display were the unlimited hydroplane racing craft Miss Budweiser, which could reach top speeds of 200 mph (322 kph), Deepsea Challenger submarine used by director-explorer James Cameron to reach the bottom of Challenger Deep, the deepest known point on the seabed of the Earth; and a cute red tugboat behind the sign for the south entrance to the museum.

Row, Paddle, or Sail Your Boat (Gently Down the Stream)

One of the cleverest features of Mystic Seaport Museum are the family-sized boats available for a quick thirty-minute trip. After donning a lifejacket and signing a consent form, visitors are assisted by knowledgeable staff members who explain the basics of operating the vessel along with how to call for help. Fortunately, I never needed to use the latter method. I took my parents in a rowboat on the first day and must have rowed too violently, as I still have marks on my hands two weeks later. On the second day, my parents peddled a paddleboat, and I took pictures while on the water. I did not take out a sailboat for the sake of my own safety and sanity.

Signs

Continuing its recent Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiative and rebranding efforts, Mystic Seaport Museum installed signage called “The Sea Connects Us” highlighting the accomplishments of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) who lived in maritime New England. Highlights from the signage included inventor Lewis Temple, an who made improvements to the whaling harpoon and has a statue in New Bedford, MA; Arctic explorer Matthew Henson whose skill at language learning helped his crew learn about Inuit culture; and La Amistad survivors Sengbe Pieh and Sarah Margru, who were kidnapped in Sierra Leone and won a court battle in New Haven, CT that allowed them to return home.

Most of the other signage around the museum were decorative or gave technical information. A large sign in the park lot showed a map of the museum identical to a map in the Summer 2024 Guide given upon entry. Additional versions of this map were found inside the museum along with a daily schedule of shows. One overlooked sign was a bronze plaque on the side of the Wendell Building that honored the founders of the Marine Historical Association of Mystic in 1929: Charles Kirtland Stillman, Carl C. Cutler, and Edward E. Bradley. The fact that these men created an organization dedicated to the preservation of antiquated by historically important marine technology mere weeks after the start of the Great Depression shows their strength of vision and conviction that their plan would succeed.

A Note on Shows

Besides the sail raising on the Charles W. Morgan, I attended two additional shows. At 10:45 p.m., I saw “From Whale Ho! To Fin Out: Whaleboat Demo” at Middle Wharf right beside the Morgan. During this fun and fast-paced demonstration, museum staff explained and then acted the roles in a whaleboat when attempting to harpoon a whale. At 1:30 p.m., I attended “Music of the Sea and Shore” in the Chapel. Not only was the staff member leading the show an excellent singer and concertina player, but several audience members had prior knowledge of sea shanties and similar historical songs. As an added bonus, this seems to be the only opportunity to sit in the pews at the Chapel. The number of shows, tours, and bonus add-ons was so numerous that I could have spent the full day and a half attending only those. Looks like I will have to return to Mystic Seaport, perhaps next museum season!

The rating for this museum will appear at the end of the sixth post in the miniseries.