USS Constitution and the Charlestown Navy Yard

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

One cannot discuss the custodianship of the USS Constitution by National Park Service and the United States Navy without first understanding the history of the United States and the history of the Charlestown Navy Yard and its role as the homeport to the USS Constitution and the early history of the United States Navy.  Built in Boston to accommodate 44 cannons and weighing in at 1,576 tons, the USS Constitution, along with the USS President, the USS United States, the USS Chesapeake, the USS Congress, and the USS Constellation, was one of six frigates to be constructed, following authorization by Congress in 1794, in an effort to establish a formal navy for a United States still in its infancy.[1] 

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Designated as the homeport to the USS Constitution on July 23, 1954, the Charlestown Navy Yard, in addition to serving for two centuries as a center of Boston industry, also occupies an important chapter of Boston history as a base for naval activity for the Untied States Navy.[2]  Established in 1800, the Charlestown Navy Yard consists of a ropewalk, machine shops, foundry, barracks, as well as one of the nation’s first granite dry docks built by Loammi Baldwin.  Dry Dock One, built in 1833 would be utilized by a number of ships, including the USS Constitution, in order to complete necessary ship repairs in a more safe and efficient manner.  In addition to interpreting the historical significance of the USS Constitution, the National Park Service strives to interpret the Charlestown Nay Yard as an environment, which shows a clear evolution in the maritime practices of Boston and the United States Navy. [3] Dry Dock One serves as a prime example of this evolution, as prior to the creation of Baldwin’s dry docks, the most common way of repairing a ship involved the practice of careening, or the pulling of the ship to one side so as the expose one half of a ship’s hull at any given time so that it might be repaired.  The National Park Service has stressed the significance of the Charlestown Navy Yard’s dry docks, not only as important relics of the past, but also as an advancement to the task of repairing ships in comparison to the practice of careening, which in addition to being extremely time consuming, also placed a ship at risk of being accidently scuttled, or sunk.[4]

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Furthermore, the USS Constitution Museum, opened April 8, 1976 is a unique center for historic interpretation as it not only interpreters the Navy Yard in which it is located but also the oldest commissioned ship in the Untied States Navy, the USS Constitution, through the interdepartmental cooperation of the National Park Service and Naval History and Heritage Command.  The interpretation of the USS Constitution is greatly influenced by the mission of the Park Service to place the ship itself within the proper historic context by creating interactive and technologically oriented exhibits which shed light on the social, economic, and political makeup of the United States, and the exteriors pressures this young republic faced which led to the build up of a formidable naval force.  While a number of these exhibits focus on the USS Constitution’s long military service in the Quasi War with France, the Barbary War in North Africa, and the War of 1812, the museum itself plays host to a number of public oriented activities involving the currently underway restoration of the USS Constitution.  As of late the USS Constitution is in dry dock where the copper fittings, which protect the hull of the ship from wood boring mollusks, are being replaced with fresh rolls of copper similar to the original rolls provided from the copper foundry of Paul Revere during the ship’s construction and launching from 1794 to 1798.  An act of historic preservation, which under the auspices of the United States Navy, has involved the participation of the general public who have been given the opportunity to sign their names to the copper sheeting which is then to be fitted to the hull of the ship.[5]

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

            Overall, the USS Constitution and the Charlestown Nay Yard are two vital components to the historical interpretation to not only the maritime history of Boston, but also to the early American naval history, histories that have successfully been made available to the public through museum interpretation and the encouragement of participation from the general public.

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[1] Thomas Charles Gillmer, Old ironsides: The Rise, Decline, and Resurrection of the USS Constitution. (Camden: International Marine, 1993), 6.

[2] National Park Service: U.S. Department of the Interior, “Charlestown Navy Yard,” (National Park Tour. Charlestown, MA, November 13, 2015).

[3] National Park Service: U.S. Department of the Interior, “Charlestown Navy Yard,” (National Park Brochure. Charlestown, MA, 2015).

[4] National Park Service’s USS Constitution Museum, USS Constitution- The Nation’s Ship. (National Park Tour. Charlestown, MA, 2015).

[5] Naval History and Heritage Command, Copper Sheathing for USS Constitution. (National Park Tour. Charlestown, MA, 2015).  

Tea Party Museum

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

John Brewer, Professor of Humanities and Social Sciences at the California Institute of Technology, stated in his publication Reenactment and Neo-Realism that, “reenactment, it seems to me, is not going to get much beyond a site of modern fantasy and nostalgia (pleasant as this may be), unless it can begin to address the issues of the relationship between historical and poetic truth.”[1]  The romanticizing, of the past is not only a hindrance to the field of Living History and its application as a tool of historic education, it also promotes escapism from reality and a nostalgic interpretation of historic events.  For-profit historic tourism has often served as a bastion from which historically themed vacations and entertainment is marketed to the general public, such historical fetishism exists at The Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum, located in the heart of Boston.

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum, is a historic attraction located on the Congress Street Bridge in the heart of Boston, which promotes a first-person interactive experience revolving around The Boston Tea Party, a historical event of vital importance with regard to the escalation of political and social conflict in eighteenth century Boston which would culminate in the outbreak of the American Revolution.  The Boston Tea Party of December `6, 1773 is one of many examples of political protest which exacerbated British/Colonial relations with the Mother Country. The Boston Tea Party resulted in the destruction of three-hundred and forty-two chests of East India Trading Company Tea in response to the May 1773 Tea Act, which made such cargo liable to a government tax on all tea purchased and distributed in Great Britain’s North American colonies.[2]  In an event which will lead to the dismissal of Massachusetts’s last civilian Royal Governor, Thomas Hutchinson, the establishment of full military rule under British General Thomas Gage, and the closure of Boston Harbor, The Boston Tea Party has often been viewed as a catalyst which would lead to war and eventual independence from Great Britain.  However, this event has also been popularized and commodified by private businesses involved in Boston’s tourist trade, including Historic Tours of America Inc., a for-profit tourist organization, which operators of The Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum.[3]

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

 Lasting one hour and fifteen minutes, the tour offered at The Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum, beginnings by employing first-person living history interpretation and audience participation in a colonial meetinghouse setting where guests are involved in events leading to the Boston Tea Party.[4]  Rather than approaching the use of living history with caution in an effort to avoid cloaking this historic event in romanticism, The Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum revels in the promotion of what Brewer refers to as “poetic truth,” or the use of historical information and events for entertainment purposes.[5] Following the introduction in the meetinghouse, guests are then escorted to one of two replica eighteenth-century ships, intended to serve as a recreation of the storming of Griffin’s Wharf and the boarding of the Dartmouth, Eleanor and Beaver, the three ships containing East India Trading Company Tea, where guests are then encouraged to imitate the destruction of the ships’ cargo of tea by throwing Styrofoam tea chests over the sides of the ships.[6]

Photo Courtesy of Lorenzo Deagle

Furthermore, the second half of the tour is dominated by traditional museum exhibits including a display containing the John Robinson Half Chest, an empty tea chest recovered from the Boston Harbor following The Boston Tea Party, and technology-based exhibits including a hologram debate between a Loyalist named Catherine and a Patriot named Sarah.[7]  The tour then ends with a slightly abrupt conclusion involving the viewing a multi-sensory patriotic film entitled “Let It Begin Here,” which depicts the events leading to the Battle of Lexington.[8] 

Overall, while the tour itself was stimulating the dramatic nature of the tour and the theatrical attributes of the entire experience detracted from the accuracy and objectivity of the historical events depicted.  Much as Brewer has scrutinized historic reenactment as a form of fetishism where, “what is important is not the truth of the enactment but its psychological effect.”[9]  The Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum, while governed by profit making through historic entertainment, has resulted in the dissemination to the public at large of dramatized and oversimplified historical information.

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[1] John Brewer, “Reenactment and Neo-Realism,” in Historical Reenactment, ed. Iain McCalman and Paul A. Pickering (London, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), 88.  

[2] Robert J. Allison, The Boston Tea Party (NE Remembers). (Boston: Commonwealth Editions, 2007), 1, 42.

[3] Ibid., ix-x.

[4] Historic Tours of America. “Museum Experience,” Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum, http://www.bostonteapartyship.com (accessed November 6, 2015).

[5] Brewer, “Reenactment and Neo-Realism,” 88.

[6] Historic Tours of America. “Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum,” (Guided Tour of the Tourist Attraction, 306 Congress St., Boston, MA, November 6, 2015).

[7] Ibid.

[8] Historic Tours of America. “Museum Experience,” Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum, http://www.bostonteapartyship.com (accessed November 6, 2015).

[9] Brewer, “Reenactment and Neo-Realism,” 81.