Walking along the docks at Mystic Seaport, it doesn’t take long to realize how many different sizes and kinds of vessels have found a home there, ranging from rowboats to sea-going traders and fishers and nearly everything in between.
That’s at least in part because Mystic sees itself representing not a single period or place, but rather a life and culture along the sea that centered in the area, but changed year by year.
And, as more than a museum, nearly all its boats and ships are in working order, and occasionally put to sea for demonstrations and visits to other sites. And while they do their very best to explain everything, there’s still more to be learned later.
Take the pair above, moored together, each representing a different stage in the development of New England fishing. Roann, top, was built in 1944 and worked for 60 years along the coast. It’s the motorized fishing boat that ended the career of sailing schooners like its berth-mate, the L. B. Dunton. The change to a motor made possible dragging nets instead of line fishing. Some day, they may be joined by one of the steel-hulled trawlers that replaced Roann.
Roann is an ‘eastern-rig’ dragger; her pilot house is at the stern and fishing operations were at the front and sides. Florence, below, is from about the same era, but is a ‘western-reg’ dragger with the pilot house at the front; that made it easier and safer to work nets over the back. Eventually it became the most common configuration.
Nellie, above, comes from a different tradition; she’s an 1891 Long Island oyster dredger. To protect individual dredgers from industrial operations, laws limited the trade to sailing ships, which kept Nellie working into the 1960s.
Not all of Mystic’s ships have led such hard-working lives. Little Vigilant was built in Germany as a yacht for a New York yachtsman, seaworthy but designed to navigate Europe’s canals. In 1959 she was the dive boat for a National Geographic underwater expedition in the Aegean Sea, and the film “3000 Years Under the Sea” was filmed on board.
Then, from 1961 to 2005 Little Vigilant was in storage in England. Bought and restored by a New England yachtsman, she sailed for a few years in New England, Bermuda and the Caribbean before being donated to Mystic. Got some money and five friends? She does family cruises and other trips.
The Sabino, above, is a Maine river steamer, built in 1908, and still running on her original engine. Her first ten years were on the Damariscotta River, including sinking in a 1918 accident. From 1927 to 1960, with her hull widened, she was a Casco Bay ferry out of Portland; after that she put in an additional dozen years working out of Newburyport, Massachusetts. Sabino is a National Historic Landmark. She was restored again in 2017 at Mystic’s own Preservation Shipyard.
One of the few Mystic ships fully retired from sailing, the Joseph Conrad, above, is used as a training ship for Mystic’s Mariner Program and educational programs. But her history is more colorful than that. Built as a Danish Navy training ship in 1882, one of the smallest full-rigged ships. Despite being sunk in 1905, she kept the job until 1934.
Slated for scrapping, she was bought by British yachtsman Alan Villiers, who renamed her and with a ragtag crew took her on a 58,000-mile trip around the world that lasted more than two years. He then sold her to George Huntington Hartford who raced her as a private yacht. With World War II on the horizon, she became a training ship again. In 1947 she arrived at Mystic.
This ship is, paradoxically, one of the most historic elements of Mystic Seaport, and yet has almost no history at all; it was never a working ship, though it is fully seaworthy. Built in 2000, in Mystic’s own shipyard, it is a meticulous copy of the sailing schooner Amistad, whose original was seized in 1839 by slaves being transported to the Americas, and whose case inspired the 1997 movie.
The reconstructed Amistad is operated by a non-profit called Discovering Amistad that operates educational programs and training designed to use the Amistad story as part of modern struggle against racism.
Gerda III has the look of an ordinary work boat, and that was the plan for her when she was built in Denmark in 1926 to carry supplies to lighthouses and do maintenance on buoys. But during World War II, her teenage captain used her to smuggle over 300 Jews to safety in Sweden. She was given by the Danish Parliament to the Museum of Jewish Heritage in New York; Mystic takes care of it for them.
A rescue vessel of a different kind: equipment on display at Mystic’s replica of a Lifesaving Service station.
One of Mystic’s best-known ships is the Charles W. Morgan, one of the last American whaleships. Inside, it’s full of exhibits explaining the trade and the life of the whalers.
There are a variety of small boats, both for sailing and rowing, around the museum, and Mystic encourages visitors to get out on the water. Some are available for individual use, while others need staff assistance or operation.
Most of the small boats have been built on site, and their building and repair can sometimes be seen in exhibit areas.
And here’s one of the most unusual ships on hand, but it’s only a visitor. It’s the Draken Harald Hårfagre, a Viking longship built in Norway between 2010 and 2014, using traditional boatbuilding knowledge married with archaeology. It’s the largest Viking vessel built in modern times, and sails with a crew of 30 (there’s also an option for 50 rowers).
It was sailed to North America in 2016, following Leif Ericsson’s route, and went as far as the Great Lakes before spending time at Mystic. In 2018, she sailed to 14 East Coast cities, and was scheduled to attempt a world cruise next. Instead, because of the pandemic she’s spending her time getting a thorough overhaul at Mystic’s shipyard.
