Dressed in a high-collared wool uniform with a corporal’s rank insignia sewn on his right sleeve, Benjamin Harrison Splowne had reason to beam.

Photographer Albert Durant approached the opportunity to be on board the SS United States during its trial run to focus on fellow people of color whose service made the passengers’ journey pleasurable.

Discovering the history of Camp Hill, a staging camp in Newport News for black troops.

Matthew Henson was a black explorer who sailed many expeditions, including one to the North Pole!

Dr. West has had an incredibly accomplished career in mathematics over her 42 years of service! After starting her career with the Navy, Dr. West focused her work on astronomical studies in an effort to understand how Pluto and Neptune moved in relation to each other in the 1960s.

Discover some objects made by – or purchased by – sailors as they were on long voyages away from their sweethearts!

The Museum’s archives are full of wonderful and seldom seen objects that span over 500 years of maritime history.

The United States Army Nurse Corps (ANC) was formally established by the US Congress in 1901. Women served as nurses in previous wars, but it wasn’t until 1901 that they were officially on Army Payroll.

On this coin that is well over 2300 years old, we see a floating galley on the reverse and a curious figure on the obverse. Some records of similar coins from the Phoenician city of Arados label their male figure as Poseidon, or sometimes Zeus, but these are Greek deities.

The Virginia Peninsula was already engaged in wartime work when President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare war against Germany on April 6, 1917. Local military bases, shipyards, air fields, ports, and people turned their faces toward the nation’s crusade to make the world safe for democracy.