The schooner Ernestina-Morrissey, ex Ernestina, ex Effie M. Morrissey, will soon begin a new chapter in her long and storied career as a sail training vessel for the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. The schooner was built in 1894 at the James … Continue reading
Category Archives: History
One 109 years ago today, the RMS Titanic slipped below the icy waters of the North Atlantic after striking an iceberg. Close to 1,500 passengers and crew were lost, making the sinking the deadliest peacetime sinking of a passenger liner … Continue reading
The Vice President and the Secretary of the Navy now each have new “heritage desks,” built by Navy Seabees, using wood, fasteners, and fittings from historic US Navy ships. The desk for Vice President Kamala Harris is made from wood, … Continue reading
In November 2019, RV Petrel located the scattered wreckage of a World War II warship at a depth of 21,180 ft in the Philippine Sea. The wreck, thought to be the deepest wreck of a warship ever discovered, was suspected to … Continue reading
On April Fool’s Day, a repost about not an April Fool’s Day prank but a hoax and a swindle. In October of 1897, at the height of the Alaskan Gold Rush, two men, Prescott Ford Jernegan, a Baptist minister, and … Continue reading
On the last day of Women’s History Month, it is worthwhile remembering Eleanor Creesy, the navigator of the clipper ship Flying Cloud, who with her husband, Captain Josiah Creesy, set world sailing records for the fastest passage between New York … Continue reading
On the next to last day of Women’s History Month, it is a good time to honor Winnie Breegle who served in World War II as a WAVE (Woman Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service) cryptographer and a Navajo code talker, … Continue reading
While preparing to dredge the shipping channel in the Savannah River, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers may have found artifacts from HMS Rose, a 20-gun Royal Navy frigate, dating from the American Revolutionary War. Archaeologists with the Corps of … Continue reading
One day after the observance of International Women’s Day, there is still time to remember and honor Admiral Grace Hopper. Grace Hopper was a pioneering computer scientist and a United States Navy Rear Admiral. Hopper received a master’s degree and … Continue reading
Last Friday, the Spanish Navy training ship Juan Sebastian De Elcano arrived in Guam on its journey to retrace the first circumnavigation of the globe 500 years ago. As reported by Stars and Stripes, the four-masted ship — named for … Continue reading
Hugh Mulzak served as the first Black Liberty ship captain in World War II. When offered the command, he refused to sail with a segregated crew. Born in 1886 on Union Island in Saint Vincent Grenadines, he went to sea … Continue reading
From maps to apps to chartplotters, we all rely on GPS these days, sometimes whether we realize it or not. Ethan Siegel recently wrote in Forbes: Unbeknownst to most people, however, the science underlying this technology was primarily developed by … Continue reading
Thomas Slade, a pioneering naval architect and shipwright, died in 1771, 250 years ago today. While he is most famous for the design and construction of Admiral Horatio Nelson’s Victory, his larger contribution to the Royal Navy and even in … Continue reading
On February 21, 1862, Nathaniel Gordon, captain of the slave ship, Erie, was executed by hanging in New York City. Under the Piracy Law of 1820, slave trading was considered to be an act of piracy punishable by death. He was … Continue reading
My wife and I recently received the second of two shots of Covid-19 vaccine at a drive-through vaccination state set up at the USS Juneau Center, on the site of the old Federal Shipbuilding & Drydock Company in Kearny, NJ. … Continue reading
In the United States, today is “Presidents’ Day,” a national holiday on the third Monday of February, falling between Lincoln’s (February 12th) and Washington’s (February 22) birthdays. Here is an updated repost of the tale of a patent granted to … Continue reading
Happy Valentine’s Day! In honor of both the day and Black History Month, an updated repost about Frederick Douglass. But what does Valentine’s Day have to do with Frederick Douglass? As a slave, Douglass never knew the date of his … Continue reading
During Black History Month, it is worthwhile to remember early African-American shipmasters. Who was the first? That is hard to say. Paul Cuffee is a good candidate. An updated repost. Paul Cuffee was born on Cuttyhunk Island, MA on January … Continue reading
Over nearly three centuries of whaling, some 175,000 men went to sea in 2,700 ships. Of the 2,500 masters who captained these ships, at least 52 were men of color. In honor of Black History Month, here is an updated … Continue reading
In honor of Black History Month, an updated repost about the barrier-shattering naval engineer Raye Montague, who died at the age of 83 in 2018. At the age of 7, she was inspired to become an engineer after she toured … Continue reading