Dick and Annette Hall of Niantic, Conn., take in a display at the Maine Maritime Museum.
(L. Tom Thel for the Boston Globe)
BATH, Maine - The Maine Maritime Museum is the state's premier showplace of boatbuilding, shipping, sailing, fishing, and cruising. But even those not fascinated by watercraft can find lots to see. With more than 20,000 artifacts, documents, and artworks in its collection, its reach is both abundant and quirky.
As one exhibit explains, this museum takes as its territory the lives of "sea captains, fisher folk, housekeepers, office workers, welders, businessmen, loafers, and babies" - almost anyone who lives or works on or near salt water.
The campus, as officials call the museum complex, is dominated by a sculpture designed to evoke the Wyoming, the largest wooden vessel ever made in the United States. Built in Bath in 1909, the huge, six-masted schooner could carry 6,000 tons of coal. Nearly 600 feet of empty space separate white steel replicas of its bow and stern, inviting the viewer's imagination to fill in the rest.
The sculpture sits in the area where the Wyoming was made: the nation's only surviving boat- yard for building wooden ships, the Percy & Small Shipyard, which is part of the museum. Maine rose to nautical prominence by building wooden boats known for their beauty and durability. This shipyard, largely unchanged since its last vessel was launched in 1920, tells the story.
At Percy & Small, visitors will find a shop where timbers were carved and shaped; another where they were molded together; a paint- and nail-making building; and even a caulking shed for tools and materials to keep vessels watertight. The elegant Italianate home of yard owner William T. Donnell, also on display, overlooks the operation.
When weather allows, live demonstrations in the yard explore how boats were made in past eras. During one visit, a volunteer showed techniques used by members of the Popham Colony to construct the sailing ship the Virginia. This colony was founded just south of Bath in 1607 by English settlers hoping to find precious metals and exotic spices in an area they called Virginia. (We call it Maine.) They abandoned their project in the fall of 1608, discouraged mainly by brutally cold weather, but they did manage to build the Virginia, which carried some of them back to England.
A permanent exhibit in the main building considers the state's international trade, the Mainers who traveled to foreign ports, how and why, what they sold, and what they brought back.
A separate building celebrates Homarus americanus, the American lobster, and the people who have tried to catch and sell it through the years. This includes the amusing story of the 23 lobster "factories," as they were known, whose owners in the 1880s saw a future in the sale of canned lobster. There's also a 1954 film written and narrated by author E.B. White about the life of a typical Maine lobsterman. "It's not a job for the lazy or the fearful," White observes.
Another large exhibit honors fisherfolk and the objects of their endeavors: cod, mackerel, herring, sardines, whale, clams, scallops, and more. A show next year (May 24-Oct. 13) will focus on folk art made by mariners.
The museum offers several reasonably priced river and coastal cruises, including some popular lighthouse tours, and a trolley tour of Bath Iron Works, which still makes ships and equipment for the US Navy. The museum also has an extensive research library.
One of the most entertaining exhibits is accessible mainly online. "Notes From the Orlop" refers to "a place of darkness, seepage, clutter, and mystery" in the lowest part of the ship. These notes, by registrar Chris Hall, discuss discoveries in the museum's basement and other storerooms, such as the unusual Wrist-Pak life jackets designed to keep one's hands, at least, above water, and assorted "far-flung curiosities that returned aboard many a vessel."
Judith Gaines, a freelance writer in Maine, can be reached at gaines.judith@gmail.com.
© Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.
