![Entrance to the Vancouver Maritime Musem](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/16/Entrance_to_the_Vancouver_Maritime_Musem.jpg)
The Vancouver Maritime Museum is a
maritime museum
A maritime museum (sometimes nautical museum) is a museum specializing in the display of objects relating to ships and travel on large bodies of water. A subcategory of maritime museums are naval museums, which focus on navies and the militar ...
devoted to presenting the
maritime history
Maritime history is the study of human interaction with and activity at sea. It covers a broad thematic element of history that often uses a global approach, although national and regional histories remain predominant. As an academic subject, it ...
of
Vancouver
Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...
,
British Columbia
British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...
, Canada, and the
Canadian Arctic
Northern Canada, colloquially the North or the Territories, is the vast northernmost region of Canada variously defined by geography and politics. Politically, the term refers to the three territories of Canada: Yukon, Northwest Territories and N ...
. Opened in 1959
as a Vancouver centennial project, it is located within
Vanier Park
Vanier Park is a municipal park located in the Kitsilano neighbourhood of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, created in 1967. It is home to the Museum of Vancouver, the Vancouver Maritime Museum, the City of Vancouver Archives, and the H.R. Mac ...
just west of
False Creek
False Creek (french: Faux ruisseau) is a short narrow inlet in the heart of Vancouver, separating the Downtown and West End neighbourhoods from the rest of the city. It is one of the four main bodies of water bordering Vancouver, along with ...
on the Vancouver waterfront.
The museum is affiliated with
CMA,
CHIN
The chin is the forward pointed part of the anterior mandible (List_of_human_anatomical_regions#Regions, mental region) below the lower lip. A fully developed human skull has a chin of between 0.7 cm and 1.1 cm.
Evolution
The presence of a we ...
, and
Virtual Museum of Canada
The Digital Museums Canada (DMC; , ''MNC'') is a funding program in Canada "dedicated to online projects by the museum and heritage community," helping organizations to build digital capacity.
Administered by the Canadian Museum of History (CMH) ...
.
[
]
Collection
Captain Henry A. Larsen on the foredeck of the R.C.M.P. St. Roch.jpg, Captain Henry A. Larsen on the foredeck of the R.C.M.P. St. Roch
HMS Discovery (1789) Model in the Vancouver Maritime Museum.jpg, HMS Discovery (1789) Model in the Vancouver Maritime Museum
The main exhibit is the ''St. Roch
Roch (lived c. 1348 – 15/16 August 1376/79 (traditionally c. 1295 – 16 August 1327, also called Rock in English, is a Catholic saint, a confessor whose death is commemorated on 16 August and 9 September in Italy; he is especially invoked a ...
'',[ a historic ]arctic
The Arctic ( or ) is a polar regions of Earth, polar region located at the northernmost part of Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean, adjacent seas, and parts of Canada (Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut), Danish Realm (Greenla ...
exploration vessel used by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP; french: Gendarmerie royale du Canada; french: GRC, label=none), commonly known in English as the Mounties (and colloquially in French as ) is the federal police, federal and national police service of ...
. The museum also has extensive galleries of model ship
Ship models or model ships are scale models of ships. They can range in size from 1/6000 scale wargaming miniatures to large vessels capable of holding people.
Ship modeling is a craft as old as shipbuilding itself, stretching back to ancient ...
s,[ including one with historic model ships built entirely from cardboard or paper as well as a particularly fine bone model of the French warship ''Vengeur du Peuple'' which was built around 1800 by French prisoners of war, a Children's Maritime Discovery Centre, a recreation of the forecastle of Vancouver's ship ''Discovery'', an extensive collection of maritime art, and a large library and archives.
Outdoor displays include the NASA undersea research vessel ''Ben Franklin'' and the boiler of the ''Beaver'', the first steamship in the ]Pacific Northwest
The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though ...
; it also has a small heritage harbour. There is a workshop where visitors can watch craftsmen build models. Of particular significance is the extensive Chung collection of material relating to Canadian Pacific steamships and original hand drawn charts from Captain Cook
James Cook (7 November 1728 Old Style date: 27 October – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the British Royal Navy, famous for his three voyages between 1768 and 1779 in the Pacific Ocean an ...
's exploration of the Pacific. This collection is separate from the Wally Chung material housed at the Rare Books and Archives Collection at the University of British Columbia.
See also
* Maritime Museum of British Columbia
The Maritime Museum of British Columbia (MMBC) is a museum in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, that engages people with the maritime culture and history of the Pacific Northwest through rotating exhibits, educational and community-based program ...
* Museum ship
A museum ship, also called a memorial ship, is a ship that has been preserved and converted into a museum open to the public for educational or memorial purposes. Some are also used for training and recruitment purposes, mostly for the small numb ...
* List of museum ships
This list of museum ships is a comprehensive, sortable, annotated list of notable museum ships around the world. Replica ships are listed separately in the article on ship replicas. Ships that are not museum ships, but are still actively used fo ...
* Ship replica
A ship replica is a reconstruction of a no longer existing ship. Replicas can range from authentically reconstructed, fully seaworthy ships, to ships of modern construction that give an impression of a historic vessel. Some replicas may not even ...
* Ships preserved in museums
There are numerous notable ships preserved in museums around the world. These are distinct from museum ships, which are ships where visitors can go aboard to see the ship.
List
This list is in date order, starting with the oldest ships.
* Khufu ...
References
External links
*
History museums in British Columbia
Maritime museums in British Columbia
Museums in Vancouver
Kitsilano
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