Lecture Series

One of the premiere lecture series in Hampton Roads, The Mariners’ Museum Lecture Series offers Museum members and Hampton Roads residents dynamic and memorable stories of mankind’s relationship with the sea. The Lecture Series has grown and now presents approximately 15 lectures each year designed to enlighten and engage curious minds with thought-provoking topics and meaningful dialogue.

GENERAL INFORMATION

Unless noted, Lecture Series events are held in the Main Lobby of the Mariners’ Museum at 100 Museum Drive, Newport News, VA. Lectures begin at 7:00 P.M. and doors open at 6:15 P.M.

Each lecture features a presentation by the author, a Q&A with the audience, book signing, and a light reception.

All lectures are free and open to the public. Mariners’ Museum Members may make a reservation by calling the Lectures Hotline at 757-591-7751 or emailing bhill@marinersmuseum.org. Reservations are not required, but encouraged. General Admission seating is available for non-Members.

Author’s books are sold in the Museum Shop and will be available the evening of the lecture. For more information, please call the Museum Shop at 757-591-7792.

View the Civil War lecture Series.

The Mariners' Museum Lecture Series is made possible, in part, by support from the Peninsula Community Foundation of Virginia.


 
The Mariners’ Museum Lecture Series 2012

Susan L. Gibbs SS United States Feb 9, 7:00 PM

George C. Daughan War of 1812 Feb. 27, 7:00 p.m.

Donovan Hohn Moby-Duck March 22, 7:00 p.m.

John Maxtone-Graham Titanic Tragedy April 2, 7:00 p.m.

Anthony Brandt Northwest Passage May 3, 7:00 p.m.

Lecture Series
SS United States: Made in America
Susan L. Gibbs
Thursday, February 9, 2012 7:00, P.M.

The SS United States captured world headlines in July 1952 with its record-breaking maiden voyage from New York to Southampton, England. One of the fastest ships in the world and one of the most luxurious passenger liners to cross the Atlantic, it quickly captured the hearts of those who sailed on it and those involved in its construction.

The ship, built in post-World War II Newport News, was designed as a luxury liner and top-secret Cold War weapon --- the SS United States could transport14,000 troops more than 10,000 miles without refueling. Prior to her retirement in 1969, the ship carried a million passengers across the Atlantic, including four U.S. presidents, moguls, movie stars, tourists, and immigrants. While naval architect William Francis Gibbs oversaw the design of some 6,000 vessels over the course of his career, the SS United States was his greatest accomplishment.

 Despite its fabled past, the historic liner’s fate remains uncertain. Purchased by the non-profit SS United States Conservancy in February 2011, plans are underway to re-develop the 990-foot-long liner as a stationary attraction, including a museum. Join us on Thursday,February 9th, as Susan L Gibbs, executive director of the SS United States Conservancy and granddaughter of William Francis Gibbs, will speak and premiere the Conservancy's new 45-minute film, SS United States: Made in America. Gibbs will offer a special "behind the scenes" perspective on her grandfather's 40-year quest to design the fastest ship in the world, her organization's improbable purchase and the Conservancy's efforts to save the SS United States for future generations.

In addition – for this evening only – The Mariners’ Museum Collections Department will be exhibiting original table, chairs, and place settings from the SS United States.
 

Lecture SeriesWar of 1812 – The Navy’s War
George C. Daughan
Monday, February 27, 2012, 7:00 P.M.

At the outbreak of the War of 1812, America’s prospects looked dismal. It was clear that an important battlefield would be the open ocean. Yet, America’s war fleet – only twenty ships strong – faced a practiced British navy of more than a thousand men-of-war. Through a combination of nautical deftness and sheer bravado, the American navy managed to take the fight to the British and turn the tide of the war: on the Great Lakes, in the Atlantic, and even in the eastern Pacific.

Join us Monday, February 27^th, as prizewinning historian George C. Daughan tells the thrilling story of how a handful of heroic captains and their stalwart crews overcame spectacular odds against the world’s greatest imperial power.

Daughan, who received his Ph.D. in American History and Government from Harvard University, will speak on his new book, 1812: The Navy’s War, a rousing follow-up to his earlier If By Sea: The Forging of the American Navy--from the Revolution to the War of 1812. In his new book, Daughan makes the compelling case that the Navy’s performance in the war forced Europe to take the U.S. more seriously, initiated a fundamental chan

ge in the British-American relationship, and subsequently allowed the country to maintain a robust Navy, even during peacetime.

Be prepared to arrive early as uniformed members of the Tidewater Maritime Living History Association will be displaying and interpreting food, navigation, and weapons from the naval War of 1812.
 

Lecture Series
Moby-Duck
Donovan Hohn
Thursday, March 22, 2012, 7:00 P.M.

On January, 10 1992, a freighter en route to Tacoma, Washington from Hong Kong encountered a storm in the North Pacific. As the massive ship lurched through three-story waves, its cargo, some of it lashed above deck in 20 foot-long shipping containers, toppled overboard. Among the freight: 28,800 plastic bath toys, including those lovable yellow rubber ducks.

The flotsam from the container ship changed the ducks (and the others) from bathtub toys to oceanographic tools and set writer Donovan Hohn on a quixotic odyssey to track their journey: Some ducks washed up in Alaska, some have been found in Hawaii, and some got trapped in Arctic ice.

Join us Thursday, March 22nd, as Hohn, formerly a senior editor at Harper’s, and now a features editor at GQ, speaks on his quest is to determine the fate of the ducks and his new book, Moby Duck: The True Story of 28,800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea and of the Beachcombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists, and Fools, Including the Author, Who Went in Search of Them. 

Hohn cleverly uses the deceptively whimsical premise of chasing little plastic ducks to provoke a thought-provoking conversation on larger issues. The result is not a sermon, however, but a lively travelogue that is, by turns, both light-hearted and serious.

“a delightfully narrated masterwork of adventure, science, [and] exploration”  Nathanial Philbrick

Lecture Series
Titanic Tragedy: A New Look at the Lost Liner
John Maxtone-Graham
Monday, April 2 2012 at 7:00 p.m.

The familiar story of the RMS Titanic – from her tragic 10-second encounter with an iceberg to her descent to the bottom of the ocean some three hours later, taking with her more than 1,500 lives – still looms large in the popular imagination. In recognition of the centenary of this tragic event (April 14, 1912), the “dean of ocean-liner historians,” John Maxton e-Graham, will speak on his new book, Titanic Tragedy: A New Look at the Lost Liner.

While much of the story has been told, Maxtone-Graham brings his incredible knowledge of the history and lore of ocean liners to shed light on the most salient and rarely investigated events aboard the Titanic that fateful night. Maxtone-Graham weaves together dramatic survivor accounts, the role of the newly invented wireless radio, the ship’s construction in Belfast, Ireland, and the dawn rendezvous with the rescue ship Carpathia in a gripping tale of that “night to remember.” 

Maxtone-Graham is the best-selling author of more than a dozen books about passenger vessels, including the classic The Only Way to Cross, Normandie, and France/Norway and edited Titanic Survivor: The Newly Discovered Memoirs of Violet Jessop Who Survived both the Titanic and Britannic Disasters. His entertaining and erudite talks are honed by spending six months of his life at sea, where he lectures aboard several cruise line vessels. 
 

Lecture Series
The Man Who Ate His Boots: The Tragic History of the Search for the Northwest Passage
Anthony Brandt
Thursday, May 3, 2012 at 7:00 p.m.

Scurvy…starvation…cannibalism -- men suffered and died in the Arctic in pursuit of the fabled Northwest Passage. The names along the Canadian Arctic Archipelago – Frobisher Bay, Davis Strait, Hudson Bay, Baffin Island – recall the enthralling and often deadly history of the adventurers who searched its waterways. Sought by explorers for centuries as a possible trade route to the riches of Asia, the passage could cut thousands of miles off sea routes to the Pacific from the Atlantic. 

While the search for the passage commenced following Columbus’ discovery of the New World, its discovery became an English obsession in the nineteenth century. With its ships idled following the Napoleonic Wars, and easier southern routes dominated by Spain and Portugal, the passage became the Holy Grail of British exploration. However, at the time, the Arctic was still completely unknown. Some insisted that salt water could not freeze or that the continual sun of the Arctic summer meant ice could not form.

On Thursday, May 3, Anthony Brandt recounts the rousing and often horrifying story of the search for the Northwest Passage taken from his latest book, The Man Who Ate His Boots: The Tragic History of the Search for the Northwest Passage. While Brandt chronicles the whole story of the search for the passage, he concentrates on the first half of the 19th century when multiple British expeditions failed, highlighted by the tragic Franklin expeditions. 

Anthony Brandt is the editor of the Adventure Classics series published by National Geographic Society Press, and the books editor at National Geographic Adventure magazine. His edited versions include The North Pole: A Narrative History and The Journals of Lewis and Clark.