Month: March 2018

Laura Hopkins grew up sailing on the Great Lakes, racing 420s and Sunfishes. In the summertime, her family would head from their home in Buffalo to her grandmother’s house in Woods Hole, and there Laura would sail her dad’s Herreshoff 12 ½.

She learned at an early age that “Boating out on the water, whether by sail or motor, with the wind, the spray of the sea, and the distant horizon, is magical.”

Hopkins started as senior vice president for Advancement in early January, as the Museum prepared to launch its Era of Exhibitions. She brings with her that same sense of wonder and appreciation of what Mystic Seaport is and does that she has for being on the water, be it salty or fresh.

“I revel in the history of this organization, the wealth of knowledge here, the grittiness of the shipyard,” she said in a recent interview in her sunny office on the second floor of 75 Greenmanville Ave., where she hasn’t yet finished hanging the (largely nautical) art on the walls. “We have resources, institutional knowledge, an incredible staff, and a sense of teamwork and collaboration.”

Hopkins’ other passion besides sailing is painting. She primarily paints abstracts with oils, and also draws and sketches. She has a studio in the Velvet Mill in Stonington Borough.

A career in museums

Her love of art led her to study art history at Vassar, and when she graduated she moved to San Francisco and landed a job at the M.H. de Young Museum running group tours for the blockbuster show, Treasures of the Vatican.

“I had to squeeze a thousand people an hour into the museum before it opened, and make them feel special,” she said. “That was my first job.”

She took that job as she was deciding whether to go on to graduate school and become an art historian/curator.  “But I got distracted,” Hopkins notes. “I moved into managing a small nonprofit, and I was hooked. I enjoyed working with a board, interacting with philanthropists and the process of going from vision to execution.”

She moved to Seattle after San Francisco and spent 17 years at Seattle Art Museum in a variety of positions, advancing from grants manager to associate development director. She specialized in raising the contributed revenue necessary to support exhibitions and education programs, using her grant writing expertise to work more effectively with foundations and government agencies. During her tenure there the museum tripled in size and successfully completed a $200 million capital campaign.

She also directed advancement departments at two smaller nonprofits, building major giving programs, running annual fund campaigns and adding to membership ranks. Working as a consultant to non-profits for several years has raised her awareness of the critical importance of having an engaged Board of Trustees. “Mystic Seaport has one of the best boards around,” she said.

A life and career change

While all this was going on, Hopkins got married, raised two children, and went through a divorce. She decided to return to Buffalo for her 35^th high school reunion, not having been back since she graduated. At the party, she bumped into a classmate named John Farmelo. They dated long distance, and then she moved back East and they married. After a couple of years in Buffalo, John left the investment field and decided to work in the yacht brokerage business. Laura was consulting with museums at the time, and together they moved to Mystic with their two dogs.

“We moved to Mystic in April of 2017, and became members of Mystic Seaport the first week we lived here,” Hopkins said. “We appreciate the culture here – it’s a boating community but it’s not a beachy vacation place. It’s authentic to its history.”

“I was contacted by a recruiter last September,” Laura recalled. “When I mentioned to her that I had moved to Mystic, she said, ‘Are you kidding me? I have this amazing job at Mystic Seaport that just opened up’.”

Arriving just as the Era of Exhibitions is launching gives Hopkins a sense of certainty that Mystic Seaport is on the cusp of its next transformation. “The organization is in such a great place and I believe I will make an impact. I am excited about the future of Mystic Seaport. It has so many strengths, and so much potential. I come home from work every day excited and charged up. It seems as if it was meant to be.”

Artist John Grade will return to Mystic Seaport March 20-21 to add pieces to his kinetic sculpture Murmur: Arctic Realities, currently on exhibit in the Collins Gallery at the Museum.

Grade will add panels to two of the steel spines that support the piece. Murmur: Arctic Realities is an intricately carved sculpture (15’ x 38’ x 42’) that represents a pingo, a hill of ice that grows over centuries in the Arctic’s highest latitudes, then collapses, pockmarking the tundra. This sculpture simulates a pingo in Alaska’s Noatak National Preserve that Grade saw when he was exploring the tundra two years ago.

Just as a pingo grows over time in the natural world, so Grade envisioned his piece would evolve as it toured museums and galleries before its final stop at Anchorage Museum. And even there, Murmur will again change as it will hang upside down from a ceiling in a gallery, offering visitors an entirely different experience.

“Evolution and change are what interest me most with my projects rather than arriving at a static state of completion or finish,” Grade said. “Rather than aiming to preserve a sculpture in an ideal state, I am also more interested in witnessing and understanding how it might change through interaction with time and the elements. As a project is exhibited in multiple venues, it is important to me that it relate to each space in a different and site specific way each time, ideally changing its configuration or orientation in some significant way as well.”

The evolution of the piece was part of what attracted Mystic Seaport to the idea of staging the exhibition in the Thompson Building, said Nicholas Bell, senior vice president for curatorial affairs at the Museum.

“When John set out to create his own Arctic landform, he knew it would evolve over time as it moved from museum to museum,” Bell said. “Visitors to Mystic Seaport have already enjoyed the installation’s international debut. Now they will be able to see the monumental sculpture change before their eyes when he returns this month to apply new wood panels to the form’s kinetic steel spines.”

The piece is carved from salvaged Alaskan yellow cedar. Grade will be adding panels to two of the eight spines that hold the piece. The top of the spines open and close, powered by hydraulic and pneumatic cylinders, to also mimic a pingo’s growth and collapse.

Murmur: Arctic Realities is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Thursday-Sunday, through March 23. From March 24 to  April 22, Murmur is open 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., seven days a week.

Mystic Seaport, in partnership with the New Bedford Whaling Museum, has developed  the world’s most comprehensive whaling history database and it is now available for all to use at WhalingHistory.org. Researchers, genealogists, students, teachers, and history buffs alike will find it to be the most robust and useful repository of whaling history documentation and scholarship.

The data presented combines many sources including logbooks, journals, ship registers, newspapers, business papers, and custom house records. Users will be able to find and trace whaling voyages and ships to specific logbooks, as well as the list of crew members aboard most of the voyages. The foundational fabric of Whaling History features three databases that have been stitched together – the American Offshore Whaling Voyage (AOWV) database, the American Offshore Whaling Log database, and an extensive whaling crew list database. All data is open to the public and is downloadable for any researcher to use with other tools and systems.

“We are so pleased to have been part of this project and so proud of the end result,” said Paul J. O’Pecko, Vice President of Research Collections at Mystic Seaport. “This information, gathered over decades, is invaluable to scholars, students, genealogists and others. And the fact that it is all available on one site with data that can be downloaded and manipulated is unprecedented in the world of maritime history.”

The American Offshore Whaling Voyage (AOWV) database, which was spearheaded by Judith Lund, scholar and former curator at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, includes information about all known American offshore (or “pelagic”) whaling voyages from the 1700s to the 1920s. It does not include the modern factory ship voyages of the mid-20th century. Information is most complete for the 19th century. The voyages included in the database sailed from, or were under the registry of, what is now the United States.

Extensive records of American whaling in the form of daily entries in whaling voyage logbooks contain a great deal of information about where and when the whalemen found whales. The second part of the database’s foundation is the American Offshore Whaling Log database, which includes information from 1,381 logbooks from American offshore whaling voyages between 1784 and 1920. These data were extracted from the original whaling logbooks during three separate scientific research projects, one conducted by Lieutenant Commander Matthew Fontaine Maury in the 1850s, the second conducted by Charles Haskins Townsend in the 1930s, and the third conducted by a team from the Census of Marine Life project lead by Tim Denis Smith between 2000 and 2010. The data file includes 466,134 data records assembled in a common format suitable for spatial and temporal analysis of American whaling throughout the 19th century.

The third database from which Whaling History is built is extensive whaling voyage crew lists from more than 5,300 voyages. Crew lists for whaling voyages recorded at the customs houses in Fall River and Salem, Massachusetts, and in New London, Connecticut, have been compiled as part of various projects and from various sources over the years. Crew lists for New Bedford voyages have been compiled using records kept by the chaplains of the New Bedford Port Society from 1840 to the end of whaling in New Bedford. These crew lists are now in a single searchable, sortable database.

In the next phase of the Whaling History Database, museums’ and other institutions’ collection items will be able to be linked to the database, giving researchers the ability to see a robust and dynamic picture of whaling history and artifacts.

“The future phases that will put linked objects, maps and images at the researchers’ fingertips, will give them the chance to find a particular voyage or person and read  journals or view images and sailing routes directly linked to that particular person or event,” O’Pecko said. “The information gathered here will be an obvious boon to research in social and business history, but also for those studying in such fields as climatology and anthropology.”

Dawn Riley, the first woman to compete in both the America’s Cup and in the Whitbread Round the World Race, will receive the 2018 America and the Sea Award from Mystic Seaport.

“Dawn Riley’s impact on international sailing speaks for itself, and this award gives Mystic Seaport the opportunity to call greater attention to the extraordinary accomplishments of this courageous woman,” said Mystic Seaport President Steve White. The prestigious award recognizes those individuals and organizations whose extraordinary achievements in the world of maritime exploration, competition, scholarship, and design best exemplify the American character.

Riley stands alone as the first woman to compete in both the America’s Cup and in the Whitbread Round the World Race, two of the pinnacles in the sport of sailing that prior to her had been all but closed to women sailors. Riley also went on to become the first American, male or female, to sail in three America’s Cups and two Whitbread Round the World Races.

Riley trains premier-level American sailors for future Olympic, America’s Cup, and other world-class level sailing competitions, and leads a movement to reinvigorate the sport in this country. One nexus of this movement is Oakcliff Sailing Center in Oyster Bay, N.Y., where Dawn serves as Executive Director. A high-performance training center for sailors who have progressed beyond traditional coaching methods, Oakcliff’s vision is to “Build American Leaders through Sailing.” Riley’s leadership and the quality of the programs she oversees were recognized recently by New York Yacht Club’s Belle Mente Quantum Racing, which is currently preparing a challenge for the 36th America’s Cup. This syndicate is partnering with Oakcliff to recruit and train members for their America’s Cup Team.

Riley pursued an impressive racing career on the water punctuated by unprecedented accomplishments such as her role as the watch captain/engineer on Maiden, the first all-women’s team in the 1989-90 Whitbread Round the World Race; pit person for America³, winner of the 1992 America’s Cup and first woman to have an active role on an America’s Cup team; skipper of Heineken, the only all-women’s entry in the 1993-94 Whitbread Race; team captain of America³, the women’s team in the 1995 America’s Cup; 1999 US Sailing’s Rolex Yachtswoman of the Year; America True CEO and Captain in the 2000 America’s Cup; and winning skipper at the 2002 IC45 World Championships.

A black tie gala will be held in Riley and Oakcliff Sailing’s honor in New York City Wednesday, October 3, 2018. This affair is the premier fund-raising event for Mystic Seaport. Past recipients of the America and the Sea Award include philanthropist and environmentalist David Rockefeller, Jr.; oceanographer and explorer Sylvia Earle; historian David McCullough; legendary yacht designer Olin Stephens; President and CEO of Crowley Maritime Corporation, Thomas Crowley;  philanthropist William Koch; former Secretary of the Navy John Lehman; WoodenBoat Publications founder Jon Wilson; yachtsman and author Gary Jobson; maritime industrialist Charles A. Robertson; author Nathaniel Philbrick; and Rod and Bob Johnstone and their company J/Boats.

The world-famous Budweiser Clydesdales will be at Mystic Seaport March 22-25, in a special stable on the Museum’s Village Green, in advance of their appearance in the Mystic Irish Parade.

The horses will be available for public viewing during regular Museum hours March 22-25.

To prepare for their return to the Museum (they stayed here when they marched in the parade in 2008), we brushed up on our Clydesdale trivia. Here are 10 things you need to know about Clydesdales:

How long have Clydesdales been bred?
In the early 19th century, farmers living along the banks of the River Clyde in Lanarkshire, Scotland imported a few Great Flemish Horses and mated them with local mares. This was the birth of the Clydesdale.

Can any Clydesdale be a Budweiser Clydesdale?
No. In order to join the World Famous Budweiser hitch, a Clydesdale must:

• stand at least 18 hands high (6 feet tall)
• be a gelding and at least 4 years old
• have a bay coat, four white stockings, a blaze of white on the face, a black mane and a black tail
• weigh between 1,800 and 2,300 pounds

How much does a Clydesdale eat and drink?
Each hitch horse consumes as much as 20 to 25 quarts of whole grains, minerals, and vitamins, 50 to 60 pounds of hay and 30 gallons of water per day.

How big is a Clydesdale horseshoe?
Clydesdale horseshoes measure more than 20 inches from end to end and weigh about five pounds – more than twice as long and five times as heavy as the shoe worn by a light horse.

Do the Clydesdales have names?
Yes, the Budweiser Clydesdales are given short names like Duke, Mark, Captain and Bud so that it’s easier for drivers to give commands to the horses during a performance.

Where is the official home of the Budweiser Clydesdales?
The official home of the Budweiser Clydesdales is an ornate brick and stained-glass stable built in 1885 on the historic 100-acre Anheuser-Busch Brewery complex in St. Louis.

Where are all the hitches located?
The traveling hitches of the Budweiser Clydesdales are based in St. Louis, Missouri; Fort Collins, Colorado; and Merrimack, New Hampshire.

How do the Clydesdales travel?
Ten horses, the famous red, white, and gold beer wagon and other essential pieces of equipment are transported in three 50-foot tractor-trailers. Air cushioned suspension and thick rubber flooring in the trailers ease the rigors of travelling. And the team stops each night at local stables so the gentle giants can rest.

Do the Clydesdales have a special harness?
Yes. Each harness is handcrafted with solid brass, patent leather, and stitched with pure linen thread. The harness is made to fit any Clydesdale; however, collars come in various sizes and must be individually fitted to the Clydesdales like a finely tailored suit. Each harness and collar weigh approximately 130 pounds.

What does it take to drive a hitch of Clydesdales?
Driving the combined 12 tons of wagon and horses requires expert skill and physical strength. The 40 pounds of lines held by the driver plus the tension of the horses pulling creates a weight of over 75 pounds. That’s why the hitch drivers endure a lengthy training process before they assume the prestigious role of “Budweiser Clydesdale Hitch Driver.”

Source: Anheuser-Busch