All Aboard the Charles W. Morgan

Narrator: Welcome to Mystic Seaport Museum in Mystic, Connecticut! Today, a group of students is stepping back in time. They are boarding the Charles W. Morgan, the world’s last surviving wooden whaling ship.

Mr. Davis: Watch your step, class! As we walk across this gangplank, we are stepping onto a vessel built way back in 1841.

Maya: Wow, Mr. Davis! The wood under our feet feels so solid. It is hard to believe this ship is over one hundred and eighty years old.

Leo: Look at all these ropes and giant wooden poles! How did the sailors know what to do with all of them?

Mr. Davis: Those wooden poles are called masts, Leo. And the ropes are part of the rigging, which held up the giant canvas sails. It took an incredibly skilled crew to navigate this ship across the stormy oceans.

Narrator: The students walk toward the middle of the deck, where they see a large brick structure with two giant iron pots.

Maya: What is this brick stove doing in the middle of the deck? It looks like a giant outdoor kitchen.

Mr. Davis: That is called the tryworks. Back in the nineteenth century, whaling crews used the tryworks to melt whale blubber into oil. That oil was highly valuable because people used it to light their lamps before electricity existed.

Leo: (Looking amazed) So, they literally built a fire on a wooden ship? That sounds incredibly dangerous!

Mr. Davis: It was very dangerous, Leo. Fire was one of a sailor's greatest fears. But the crew placed a shallow pool of water beneath the brick stove to keep the wooden deck from catching fire.

Narrator: Maya walks over to the side of the ship and looks down at the dark, cold water of the Mystic River.

Maya: I read that the Charles W. Morgan was called a "lucky ship." Why is that?

Mr. Davis: Excellent question, Maya. She survived eighty years of active service, thirty-seven voyages, and countless fierce ocean storms. She even survived being frozen in Arctic ice!

Leo: I can't imagine living on this ship for years at a time. It must have been so crowded.

Mr. Davis: It certainly was. More than thirty men lived on this ship during a voyage. They slept in tiny, cramped bunks below the deck and ate simple, salted food.

Maya: Standing here makes me appreciate how hard their lives must have been. I am glad this ship was saved so we can learn from it today.

Narrator: Thanks to historians and shipbuilders at the Mystic Seaport Museum, the Charles W. Morgan remains afloat. It stands as a majestic monument to America’s maritime history, waiting for the next generation of explorers to climb aboard.