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 number of museum ships that are still operational and thus capable of regular movement.
The San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park is located in San Francisco, California, United States. The park includes a fleet of historic vessels, a visitor center, a maritime museum, and a library/research facility. Formerly referred to as the San Francisco Maritime Museum, the collections were acquired by the National Park Service in 1978. The San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park was authorized in 1988; the maritime museum is among the park's many cultural resources. The park also incorporates the Aquatic Park Historic District, bounded by Van Ness Avenue, Polk Street, and Hyde Street.
MV The Second Snark is a small passenger ferry, built in 1938 by William Denny of Dumbarton, later operated by Clyde Marine Services on the Firth of Clyde, Scotland.
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 be seaworthy, but built for other educational or entertainment purposes.
MS Bore is a combination museum and hotel ship docked permanently in Turku, Finland. She was originally built in 1960 by Oskarshamn shipyard, Oskarshamn, Sweden as the car/passenger ferry SS Bore for Steamship Company Bore, Finland, then the last commercial steam ship built in Scandinavia and the first ferry on the route between Finland and Sweden where cars could drive aboard. She was later known as SS Borea, before being rebuilt as a cruise ship in 1988. 1988 to 2010 she was owned by the Finnish shipping company Kristina Cruises and known as MS Kristina Regina until she was retired because she did not comply with new safety regulations.
National Historic Ships UK is a government-funded independent organisation that advises UK governments and others on matters relating to historic ships. It is sponsored by the Headley Trust, the National Lottery Heritage Fund and the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport.
The Queensland Maritime Museum is located on the southern bank of the Brisbane River just south of the South Bank Parklands and Queensland Cultural Centre precinct of Brisbane, and close to the Goodwill Bridge.
Western Union is a historic schooner located in Key West, Florida, United States. She is berthed at the Key West Bight at 202 William Street. Western Union is the last surviving authentic working tall ship built in Florida. On May 16, 1984, Western Union was added to the US National Register of Historic Places. She is also the official flagship of the State of Florida and the flagship of the city of Key West.
Pentland Ferries is a privately owned, family company which has operated a ferry service between Gills Bay in Caithness, Scotland and St Margaret's Hope on South Ronaldsay in Orkney since May 2001. The company is one of only two major vehicle ferry operators plying within Scotland which are not subsidised by the Scottish Government or local authorities.
The technique of composite ship construction emerged in the mid-19th century as the final stage in the evolution of fast commercial sailing ships.
TSS Manxman was a passenger ferry launched from the Cammell Laird shipyard, Birkenhead, on 8 February 1955. She was the final vessel in a class of six similar ships, the Six Sisters, ordered by the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company, and was the second of the Company's ships to carry this name. She was withdrawn from service in 1982. Following a failed preservation attempt, and featuring in a music video in the process, the ship was broken up at Sunderland in 2012.
ARA Alférez Sobral (A-9) is an 800-ton ocean-going tug that was in service with the Argentine Navy from 1972 until 2019, where she was classified as an aviso. She had previously served in the US Navy as the fleet tug USS Salish (ATA-187). In Argentine service an aviso is a small naval vessel used for a number of auxiliary tasks, including tugging, laying buoys, and replenishing other ships, lighthouses and naval bases.
The colonial service Defender-class torpedo boats were designed by Thornycroft & Company for the defence of New Zealand, built at Chiswick in 1883 and shipped to New Zealand. They were quickly obsolete and were left to deteriorate in situ. The remains of Defender are preserved at the Lyttelton Torpedo Boat Museum.
Mayflower is a steam tug built in Bristol in 1861 and now preserved by Bristol Museums Galleries & Archives. She is based in Bristol Harbour at M Shed. She is the oldest Bristol-built ship afloat, and is believed to be the oldest surviving tug in the world.
Irene is a 100-foot West Country Ketch built in Bridgwater in 1907, the last ship built in the docks and the only Ketch built in the West Country still sailing. It was built by FJ Carver and Son and launched in May 1907. The Blake Museum in Bridgwater opened an exhibit about the ship in 2010.
The National Museum of the Great Lakes is a museum in the Toledo Maritime Center, a heritage location on the banks of the Maumee River on the east side of Toledo, Ohio. Operated by the Great Lakes Historical Society, it celebrates the natural and built heritage of the North American Great Lakes from a U.S. perspective. The museum is most noted as the docking location of a museum Lake freighter, the SS Col. James M. Schoonmaker.
Zebu, formerly Ziba, was a historic tall ship. Built in Sweden in 1938, she was used as a trading vessel until the late 1960s, before circumnavigating the globe in the 1980s. She has been based in Liverpool since the 1980s. She sank in 2015, and was subsequently restored. She partially sank again in 2021 after running aground on Holyhead breakwater after slipping her anchor, and had masts and sails removed to reduce weight so the hull could be moved. On 21 May 2021 after suffering further damage due to a storm, she was declared a wreck.
Mullogh was a ketch rigged steam ship, built in 1855 in Belfast. It sailed to Australia, then to New Zealand. The wreck of Mullogh is now beached on Quail Island.
Lyttelton, built in 1907 as Canterbury is a historic steam tug in Lyttelton, New Zealand. She was ordered by the Lyttelton Harbour Board in 1906 as a replacement for the earlier iron paddle tug Lyttelton, built in 1878.
TEV Rangatira was a passenger ferry that sailed the Wellington to Lyttelton route between 1931 and 1963. She was the first turbo-electric vessel (TEV) to arrive in Australia or New Zealand waters. During the Christmas season she would also run trips between Wellington and Picton.
