Welcome to the
American Maritime History Project

The American Maritime History Project is dedicated to recording America’s great seafaring history. The Project will publish work that sets forth the impact and role of water transport in the broad sweep of American history. This history needs illumination and has not been fully told, and the public is generally unaware of it.

In Peace: America’s maritime history is long, colorful and interwoven with many fascinating strands. The narrative includes many individuals, enterprises and vessels, passenger and cargo, sail and steam, blue water vessels, brown water vessels, large and small, as well as shipbuilding and mariners themselves. Our nation’s maritime world encompasses  much that lies within the land’s edge as well  as the oceans; the great rivers, the Great Lakes, the vast canals that link our coastal settlements to cities and inland industry, and, of course, seaports on the country’s edge that stand as gateways to our continent, East, Gulf and West coasts, Alaska and Hawaii.

America is a trading nation and has been since its earliest days. Its oceans and waterways have provided security, commerce, wealth and communication throughout our history.

In War: American merchant ships have been directly involved in maritime conflicts since the colonists first arrived; with pirates, privateers, the English, French and Spanish navies, before the Revolution and on to the World War II German and Japanese navies, and the current Middle East and Gulf War zones. This is little understood by the public. Until Desert Storm (Kuwait), troops and their equipment were necessarily carried by water transport.  Today, troops go by air, but 95% of the “logistics” (equipment, fuel, ammunition, food, supplies) goes by water.

 As important as waterborne transportation has been to this nation, it remains an under-heralded aspect of our history. This Project, through its research and publications, will address this critical shortcoming.