What's New

See what happened at the Custom House in June 2011, May 2011, April 2011, March 2011, January-February 2011, November-December 2010, with our new 3-year program with the NL Public Schools Lighthouse Kids, in September-October 2010, in August 2010, summer festivities in June-July 2010, special Amistad events in April-May 2010, our trip to the UN with the Amistad exhibition in January-March 2010 in 2009, 2008,

& why not see how the Whale Tail fountain was made!

Read our Spring 2011 Winter 2011 and Fall 2010 newsletters.

The New London Maritime Society/Custom House Maritime Museum is made possible by generous grants from The Chester Kitchings Family Foundation, the Connecticut Humanities Council, Dominion Foundation, the Bodenwein Public Benevolent Foundation, the Frank Loomis Palmer Fund, the Community Foundation of Eastern CT, & and by the work of dedicated volunteers, members & friends.

6.11.11 It's Connecticut Open House Day!

Head Docent Bill LaRoue, with help from Greeter Ruth Nagle, held down the fort as the museum saw dozens of visitors who toured the Custom House, free of charge, on this special annual day to promote heritage tourism. At left: William LaRoue, Ronald Bernoudy, and Robert Pittaway put out the banner.

And on the other side of the river, our Custom House Lighthouse Kids Sea Shanty Chorus sang about whaling ships, oysters and recycling with Geoff Kauffan at Mystic Seaport's Sea Music Festival. One unexpected treat was that the SS Chanteens, from New Haven's Sound School, sang just before & after our group--and on one song: You Cant Eat the Oysters in New Haven Harbor, both groups joined together. It was the visit if the SS Chanteens to the Custom House last winter that prompted the idea of our having a Sea Shanty Chorus in New London. We'd like to thank Dominion Nuclear for their funding for this and our Lighthouse Kids program with the New London Public Schools. SS Chanteens are at the lower left.

6.10.11 Tonight the youth and leaders of Sea Scout Ship Dragon spent several houre cleaning & polishing New London Harbor Light in anticipation of our Sentinels on the Sound New Londo Lighthouse Heritage weekend, July 1-3.

Below is Alex Kelleher, leader of the Sea Socut cleaning crew. At lower left: the Sea Scouts in action. Thanks to George Sprecace, who oversaw the work, Marshall Parsons Skipper of Sea Scout Ship 584, Michael Lagasse Mate of Sea Scout Ship 584,Alex Kellehr's Mom, Alex Kellehr Crew Activity Chair,Dominique Chojnowski Crew, Connor Parsons Crew, Sean Parsons Crew, Patrick Parsons Crew. The great innovation this cleaning was the presence of two shop vacs!

6.10.11 The 1st Place winner ($1,000) in the 2011 Reid MacCluggage Scholarship stopped by the museum on Thursday. She is Miss Julia McKenna, a junior at Fitch High School, who won for her essay: A Battle Hero of a Different Kind at the U.S Naval Academy. Julia McKenna's piece was distinguished by excellent original research and her personal approach to the topic. In fact, Juila (below) is an avid sailor and will attend summer school in Annapolis at the Academy!

Congratulations, Julia!

2nd Place winner ($500 Savings Bond) is Miss Amy Whitehouse, of East Lyme High School, for her work An Ocean of Freedom: An Interview with Olaudah Equiano conducted by Benjamin Franklin. Amy created an intriguing, imaginary interview between two 18th-century figures.

This year, 12 area high-school juniors and seniors entered the competition.

Of course, the big news this week was the controversy over the Whale Tail Fountain. Read about it HERE. At left, above, the local ABC News crew stakes out Parade Plaza.

6.10.11 In our quest for Ellery Thompson paintings of all the area lighthouses (have you got one???), we came across Mark Densmore, who graciously loaned the museum this painting of what we believe is Montauk Point Light. Thank you, Mark.

Kimberly Petty has announced a lighthouse design competition for people from ages 5-15: deadline is next Saturday. The competition completion coincides with the Lighthouse Weekend. Click HERE to find out more.

6.10.11 Mary Anderson and Paul Bates visited the Custom House on Friday, too. They were representing the Noank Historical Society and here to share the wealth of collections storage furniture we were given last spring by the Yale University Art Gallery.

Also on Friday we visited our neighbor Kevin Farrar of Farrar Sails, which is located in the O'Neil's old Monte Cristo garage. He promises to send the exact details, of what he is building--it is a special One Design boat.

6.9.11 Two classes of English Learners from Benny Dover Middle School visited New London Harbor Lighthouse this morning. Their photos are above and above left. These students are old friends: they visited the Custom House this winter and, in March, invited me on their trip up the Thames River aboard Project O.

6.6.11 The final funding came through today on bringing Nimble Arts CIrcus back to Parade Plaza this summer. Dave the Date: Saturday, July 30. Sponsors are the Custom House, Thames America's Cup Committee and the New London Water Authority. It's all part of the summer programming brought to you by the City of New London!

6.6.11 Painting was completed on the Customs Office and stair landing today by Rob at CTM Home Services. It has been a long haul. Next Monday, Rogovin movers return to put everything back.

6.3.11 Deconstruction of the CIty Pier continues... We can only look forward...

Meanwhile, the first New London Local First Field of Greens Farmers; Market opened on Parade Plaza! In addition to strawberries, lettuce & vegetable plants, there is fresh herb-scented soap, extremely free-range eggs, and local honey.

Thank you, Art Costa, for bringing the market to Parade Plaza.

6.2.11 It seemed as if our banner was the very last one to go up, but now it is up at the intersection of Union Street and Gov. Winthrop. Thank you to Donald Charbonnier, of the

Professional Planning Group in Stonington, for surprising us with the extremely appropriate gift! We are very happy to be represented with the businesses that care about enlivening the downtown.

6.12.11 Our lighthouse-worker colleague, Todd Gipstein, just emailed this photo (at left). Turns out, while the Sea Scouts were getting ready to clean New London Harbor Light late Friday afternoon, the crew of the the USS Submarine Toledo were returning from a cleaning session out at Ledge Light!

According to Todd, "They scraped, painted, hauled stuff around, cleaned up, and did a fabulous job! Behind them, a sub (not theirs) heads to sea. They are one of many volunteer groups who have helped the Ledge Light Foundation the past few months to get Ledge Light in shape so we can open the Interpretive Center there this summer." Photo: Todd Gipstein

6.11.11 Very good to meet Franklin Rathbun, son of the infamous Captain Ben Rathbun, this morning. Franklin is loaning us paintings for the lighthouse weekend. He also gave us a copy of his father's book "Capsule Histories of...Lighthouses in The Eastern Part of Long Island Sound" & just in the nick of time!

A couple of changes to the lighthouse weekend line-up:

First, in July, the Custom House Maritime Museum will also host an exhibition of Pat Kelbaugh's Watercolors. This is, in part, because our friends at Caruso Music, where she was slated to have her exhibition, decided to close over weekends this summer.

Second, the Project Oceanology tours out to Ledge Light on July 2 and 3, only, now will leave from the Custom House Pier (& not from UCONN-Avery Point, in Groton). The two and one-half hour tours may be booked by calling: 860-445-9007.

6.13.11 Meanwhile, Rogovin Movers were back Monday to reassemble the US Customs Office-- which, now, freshly plastered and painted, it is looking marvelous! The new exhibit will be assembled over the next two weeks and should open for Lighthouse Weekend, July 1-3.

6.13.11 The latest from Patch: the first performance of the

New London Community Orchestra took place Sunday and New London's Harbor Towers (see left).

By the way, with no fanfare, last Monday, your New London Maritime Society and the New London Community Orchestra signed an agreement making us the orchestra's temporary fiscal sponsor. It's a way to help the group get on their feet, while fufilling their mission: raising funds to support musical instrument instruction in the City's public schools.

It's a goal we all should support!

NB: guests on Wednesday's Custom House television program this week are Dirk Langveld, New London editor of Patch, and Kimberly Petty, owner/designer of PINC! on State Street. The program follows-up to recent studies touting the importance of the City's emerging young creative class ior its future .

6.14.11 Yes, the Whale Tail Fountain is back ON! For the full story and more pictures, click >> HERE.

6.14.11 We are grateful to Mary Anderson, of the Noank Historical Society, who brought these lighthouse ornaments to our attention, and to Grader Jewlers, who is providing our museum shop with these eleven sparkly representations the lighthouses closest to New London.

The ornaments now are for sale in our shop at $35 apiece.

6.18.11 Thank you to Bryan Desautelle (above), organizer, donor of Prizes, and Cribbage comptroller for CribbageFest IV, which took place today at the museum. It was a great, day-long round-robin play-off beneath the Custom House tent. We're glad to be back, after a year's hiatus, and already are looking forward to 2012. In the photo upper near-left, from l to r are the two winners, Ed Bourque and John Whalen, team name 'Sound Lab' with a 12-2 record! Also in that photo is the 3rd place finishers, 'BT29', Richard Beplat, 3rd from the l, and Gail Turgeon, far right.The final list is as follows;

1st place, Sound Lab: Ed Bourque and John Whalen

2nd place, Grumpy Old Men: Doug Payne and Eric Sonn

3rd place, BT29: Richard Beplat and Gail Turgeon

4th place, Pequot Players: Susan Beebe & Janet Pawlikowski

5th place, Jim 'n Sandy: Jim and Sandy Tissiere

6th place, Double Trouble: Scott Grayson and Adam Shimmel

7th place, Golf Winds East: Nate Lidestri and Ed Santangini

6.16.11 Third Thrsday's speaker, author Richard Radune (left, above) with Alice Houston, who just found Amos Palmer's name listed in the index! Palmer built Alice's Stonington home.

6.30.11 The Mystic Whaler got a new, custom-made steering wheel today! At left is Captain John Eginton, First Mate Pat Beck and Crewmember Mike Piasecki, who Pat secretly commissioned to make the wheel! The Mystic Whaler made New London its home port in 2006!

left: Founder Carolyn Lewes with Mayor Marty Olsen and others prepares to open another season of New London Community Boating at Green's Harbor Beach--a GREAT program!