View source for Maritime Museum of the Atlantic

{{Infobox museum
|name=            '''Maritime Museum of the Atlantic'''
|image=      MMAabove.JPG
|caption=    Maritime Museum of the Atlantic 
|established=     1948
|location     = 1675 Lower Water Street<br />[[Halifax, Nova Scotia]], Canada
|type         = [[Maritime Museum]]
|visitors     = 
|director     = Calum Ewing
|president    = 
|curator      = Roger Marsters
|website=    [http://maritimemuseum.novascotia.ca/ maritimemuseum.novascotia.ca]
}}
 
The '''Maritime Museum of the Atlantic''' is a [[maritime museum]] located in [[downtown Halifax]], [[Nova Scotia]], Canada.

The museum is a member institution of the [[Nova Scotia Museum]] and is the oldest and largest maritime museum in Canada with a collection of over 30,000 artifacts including 70 small craft and a [[steamship]]: the [[CSS Acadia|CSS ''Acadia'']], a 180-foot steam-powered hydrographic survey ship launched in 1913.

==History==

The museum was founded in 1948. It was first known as the Maritime Museum of Canada and located at [[CFB Halifax|HMC Dockyard]], the naval base on Halifax Harbour.  Several naval officers served as volunteer chairs of the museum until 1959 when [[Niels Jannasch]] was hired as the museum's founding director, serving until 1985. The museum moved through several locations over the next three decades before its current building was constructed in 1981 as part of a waterfront redevelopment program.  The museum received the CSS ''Acadia'' in 1982.  Today the museum is part of the Nova Scotia Museum system.

==Location==
The museum was one of the first attractions to open on the redeveloped [[Halifax Boardwalk|Halifax Waterfront]]. Its location provides the museum with several piers and boatsheds, as well as a strategic view of the [[Halifax Harbour]], which looks seaward towards the [[Harbourmaster]] office and [[Georges Island (Nova Scotia)|Georges Island]] and across to [[Dartmouth, Nova Scotia|Dartmouth]]. Among its facilities is the restored 1880s Robertson Store [[ship chandler]] building, as well as modern exhibit galleries in the Devonian Wing (the modern museum building). [[HMCS Sackville (K181)|HMCS ''Sackville'']], a [[World War II]] Flower-class [[corvette]] is docked adjacent to the museum in the summer months but is not owned or administered by the museum.
Also, the flags across the front of the building read, "Welcome aboard L44 38N G63 34W"--giving it's '''L'''atitude and lon'''G'''itude in degrees and minutes.

==Collection==
[[File:Bluenose one-design sloop -1, Maritime Museum of the Atlantic, Nova Scotia, Canada.jpg|thumb|[[Bluenose one-design sloop]] #1, Maritime Museum of the Atlantic, Nova Scotia, Canada]]
In addition to the over 30,000 artifacts, the museum also has a collection of 30,000 photographs as well as a large collection of charts and rare books. A reference library, open to the public, is named after the museum's founding director, The [[Niels Jannasch]] Library. The museum has Canada's largest collection of ship portraits including the oldest ship portrait in Canada as well as a large collection of [[ship model]]s including the original production models of the television show [[Theodore Tugboat]]. Ongoing restoration of ''Whim'', a 1937 C-class sloop can be found in one of the boatsheds on the wharf behind the museum.  In addition to this current restoration project, the boatsheds house some of the museum's small craft collection. During the summer months three boats in the working small craft collection can be found moored next to the CSS ''Acadia''. In July 2017 the museum also completed restoration of the small schooner ''Hebridee II''.

==Exhibits==
Public galleries include the Days of Sail, the Age of Steam, Small Craft, the Canadian Navy, the [[Halifax Explosion]], and Shipwrecks. A special permanent exhibit explores the sinking of the [[RMS Titanic|RMS ''Titanic'']] with an emphasis on Nova Scotia's connection to recovering the bodies of ''Titanic'' victims. The museum has the world's foremost collection of wooden artifacts from ''Titanic'', including one of the few surviving [[deck chair]]s. The ''Titanic'' exhibit also includes a child's pair of shoes, which helped identify ''Titanic''{{'}}s "unknown child" as [[Sidney Leslie Goodwin]].<ref>[http://news.discovery.com/history/titanic-unknown-child-identified-110426.html "Titanic's Unknown Child Identified"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120929225334/http://news.discovery.com/history/titanic-unknown-child-identified-110426.html |date=2012-09-29 }}, Discovery Channel News, April 26, 2011</ref>
[[File:Maritime_Museum_of_the_Atlantic_9-04-04.JPG|thumb|right|The waterfront side to the museum]]

The adjacent exhibit "Shipwreck Treasures of Nova Scotia" explores the many other shipwrecks off the coast of Nova Scotia including archaeological discoveries on naval shipwrecks in [[Louisbourg]] Harbour and an unknown 1750s schooner at [[Lower Prospect, Nova Scotia]]. The results of treasure hunting are also featured in a section on Cape Breton treasure wrecks which has displays of weapons, instruments, gold and silver from wrecks such as the 1711 [[HMS Feversham|HMS ''Feversham'']], the 1725 wreck of [[French ship Chameau|''Chameau'']] and the 1761 wreck of the ship [[Auguste (1758 ship)|''Auguste'']].<ref>Roger Marsters, ''Shipwreck Treasures of Nova Scotia: Disaster and Discovery on Canada's East Coast'', Formac Publishing Halifax (2002), pp. 26–27, 40, 44</ref>
 
The Age of Steam gallery includes a special display on [[Samuel Cunard]], the Nova Scotian who founded [[Cunard]]. The restored 1880s Robertson building includes the fully restored Robertson [[ship chandler]]ly which features hands on foghorns, ropes and ship fittings.

The Navy gallery includes the "Convoy Exhibit" about the [[Battle of the Atlantic]] which includes the [[Canadian Merchant Navy]] Book of Remembrance.  Monuments to the Canadian and Norwegian Merchant Navy are located just outside the museum along with a unique children's playground in the shape of a submarine.

[[File:NorwegianNavyMemorial.jpg|thumb|150px|Norwegian Memorial beside the museum]]
The museum also has a changing exhibits gallery.  A 2009 exhibit ''Ship of Fate: The Tragic Voyage of the St. Louis'' was the first Canadian exhibit to explore the 1939 voyage of the Jewish refugee ship {{MS|St. Louis||6}}.<ref>[http://www.gov.ns.ca/news/details.asp?id=20091105005 "Maritime Museum Exhibit on Tragic Voyage of MS St. Louis", November 5, 2010, Nova Scotia Government Press Release]</ref>  The museum became the first museum in North America to present an exhibit about the lives of gay seafarers in 2011 when it presented ''Hello Sailor: Gay Life on the Ocean Waves'', adapted from an exhibit developed at the [[Merseyside Maritime Museum]] in [[Liverpool]], [[England]].<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20110705001800/http://www.halifaxnewsnet.ca/Entertainment/2011-05-18/article-2516312/Museum-marks-a-first-with-Hello-Sailor%21-exhibit-/1 "Museum Marks a First with Hello Sailor Exhibit", ''Halifax News Net'' May 18, 2011]</ref>  The 2012 exhibit explores the experiences of the [[Cable layer|cable ships]] based in Halifax who recovered most of the victims of the [[RMS Titanic|RMS ''Titanic'']] sinking.

<gallery>
Image:T TugboatSet2 2006.jpg|The original models and set from ''[[Theodore Tugboat]]'' 
File:Robertson's Hardware & Warehouse store front.jpg|Artifacts in the restored ship chandlery
File:MaritimeMuseum_exhibit-437.jpg|Sailboat exhibit
File:ShipModel-443.jpg|One of several ship models on display
</gallery>

==Vessels==
<gallery>
File:433 - Halifax NS.JPG|The sloop ''Windekilda'', named after founding director [[Niels Jannasch|Niels Windekilda Jannasch.]] 
Image:CSS Acadia 4.jpg| [[CSS Acadia|CSS ''Acadia'']], the museum's largest artifact.
</gallery>

* [[CSS Acadia|CSS ''Acadia'']], served as research from 1913 to 1968 and as a WWI and WWII patrol ship
* 70 small craft displayed in a Small Craft Gallery and boat sheds
* Working collection vessels which sail from the museum wharves include the [[ketch]] ''Elson Perry'', the [[sloop]] ''Windekilda''; and S-Class sloop ''Valkyrie''
* [[Schooner]] ''Hebridee II''

The corvette [[HMCS Sackville (K181)|HMCS ''Sackville'' (K181)]] is not part of the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic but is located adjacent to the museum in the summer and works with the museum to interpret the [[Royal Canadian Navy]].

==Event location==
[[File:Symphony Nova Scotia performs at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic.jpg|thumb|[[Symphony Nova Scotia]] performs at the museum's Small Craft Gallery]]

The museum's location on the Halifax waterfront has made the museum the site of several significant public events. In addition to being a stop on most Canadian federal election campaigns, the museum hosted meetings from the [[21st G7 summit|1995 G7 Summit]], as well a September 11 commemorative event in 2006 attended by [[Minister of Foreign Affairs (Canada)|Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs]], [[Peter MacKay]] and [[United States Secretary of State]], [[Condoleezza Rice]].  The museum hosts an annual commemoration of the [[Battle of the Atlantic]] on the first Sunday of every May and [[Canadian Merchant Navy]] day every September 3.

==See also==
{{Portal|Canada|Nova Scotia|Museums|History}}
* [[History of the Royal Canadian Navy]]
* [[List of museum ships]]
* [[Marine Museum of the Great Lakes]]
* [[Military history of Canada]]
* [[Military history of Nova Scotia]]
* [[Museum ship]]
* [[Naval Museum of Halifax]]
* [[Organization of Military Museums of Canada]]
* [[Ship replica]]
* [[Ships preserved in museums]]
* ''[[Theodore Too]]'' – full-size tugboat based on a model present in the museum
* [[Toronto Maritime Museum]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
{{Commons}}
* [http://maritimemuseum.novascotia.ca/ Maritime Museum of the Atlantic homepage]
* [http://www.novascotiawebcams.com/halifax/maritime-museum.html Webcam view of the museum and CSS ''Acadia'']

{{Shiplife}}
{{Shipbuilding in Atlantic Canada |state=expanded}}
{{coord|44|38|51.7|N|63|34|15.8|W|display=title}}

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[[Category:History museums in Nova Scotia]]
[[Category:Maritime history of Canada]]
[[Category:Maritime museums in Nova Scotia]]
[[Category:Museums in Halifax, Nova Scotia]]
[[Category:Nova Scotia Museum]]