Visitors to The Mariner’s Museum in Newport News, Va., will be delighted by two exhibits opening this winter. “America’s Cup: There Is No Second Place,” which opens January 25, celebrates the race’s 150-year history. The exhibit includes a variety of historical America’s Cup relics and images, most notably a collection of black-and-white photos from 1893-1937 by notable maritime photographer Edwin Levick and paintings of America’s Cup vessels by Antonio Jacobsen and James Butterworth.
“Defending the Seas,” which opened in September, is a look at the U.S. Navy over the last 200 years. The exhibit includes the newly raised turret and propeller of the ironclad Monitor, which sank off Cape Hatteras in 1862, and a “ready room” of an American aircraft carrier. Each of the exhibit’s five sections focuses on one period in the Navy’s history and explains the importance of sea power in the building of this country.
Visitors literally walk the decks of historic vessels, which are laid out chronologically. For example, moving from the early 19th century into the 1860s, the visitor walks from the decks of a wooden fighting ship to the steel of an ironclad.
Contact the Mariner’s Museum at 800-581-7245 or www.mariner.org.
