NEWBURYPORT – The Custom House Maritime Museum may hit a record this year with as many as 16,000 visitors walking through its doors, which is double the museum’s 2023 attendance.
Much of that success has to do with a series of transformations and additions designed to make the staid old institution more relevant to the modern world and to attract more youth, who find the Stem-focus interactive stations and exhibits in the refurbished Discovery Center, plus new outdoor activities on Saturdays to be great fun.
“I know they are having fun,” said James Russell, the executive director, and himself a recent addition to the museum’s collections of clipper ships and oil paintings. “I hear them running and laughing and crying when they have to leave.”
The inside joke, he wrote in the museum’s newsletter, is that one of its capital projects may be to install soundproofing, most likely for the Discovery Center in the basement.
About a third of the attendees are young, up from about 5 percent in past years, Russell said.
Russell, who joined the Newburyport Maritime Society less than two years ago, set about to transform the staid old institution that has been celebrating the city’s maritime history and culture for 50 years.
Built in 1835, the Custom House promoted overseas trade and collected taxes on imported goods that off-loaded on the Newburyport waterfront. It is not surprising that visitors can find information about Alexander Hamilton and tariffs, as well as how the young country opened trade with China.
The building lost its focus until 1968 when the Newburyport Maritime Society was founded and began to restore and manage the Custom House, which opened in 1975, making it one of the east Coast’s youngest maritime museums.
When Russell, who had headed the Nantucket Historical Assn. and the New Bedford Whaling Assn., arrived in Newburyport, he found a building that had structural challenges and was very short on storage space for equipment and historical exhibits. With the help of Dan Healey III, who donated $100,000 to help fund, in part, the expanded Discovery Center, the Custom House found climate-controlled storage space in Amesbury and opened up space in the basement for the center.
In every corner of the basement there is an ever-expanding array of educational games, toys, demonstrations, photos, videos designed for youth to learn and play with the science involved in wind, waves, oceans and rivers.
River Valley Charter School student Peter Jackman created teeth that he inserted in whale’s jaw bone. There is a magic dolphin to ride and an iron brig, created by a volunteer.
About three months after his arrival, Russell met with Jim Keenan, director of the Boys and Girls Club of the Lower Merrimack Valley, about forging a partnership with the Custom House. With just a handshake, the two agreed that the Boys and Girls Club would bring a busload of students daily to have their world broadened while having fun at the Custom House.
A few weeks ago, the Custom House opened the back lawn overlooking the Merrimack River to families to enjoy for free. From 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., rainy or not, youth can jump in a bouncy castle, sail in a pirate ship, do nautical crafts, explore the sensory water tank, steer a boat into port with a wheel from a real pirate ship, guide ships home from a working lighthouse and dress up as a sailor.
Sponsored by The Institution for Savings and Newburyport Cultural Council, the first Saturday drew 300 people. The following Saturday, 700 showed up.
“That was beyond my wildest dreams,” Russell said.
For next year, the Custom House plans to build a handicapped lift at the back door to make the museum and particularly the Discovery Center wheelchair accessible.
Russell attributes the success the Custom House is enjoying to the 120 volunteers and paid interns who provide most of the staff for the museum. Some of those volunteers bring tremendous expertise as curators, such as the invaluable Kevin MacDonald, who donated his talents before passing away earlier this year.
In honor of MacDonald a donor offered a matching challenge of $50,000 to launch a fund that provide college scholarships and the chance to intern at the Custom House. It has already matched the first $25,000 for the fund and has until December 31 to meet this challenge, which will then total no less than $100,000 with expectations for the fund to hit $250,000 by 2028.
Russell said the board, headed by former City Councilmember Robert Cronin, has been very supportive of the changes the museum is making and has stepped up financially to put the museum on a strong financial footing.
He singled out Jen Germain, Susan Finneran and Susan Bernhard for their work in producing a successful 50th anniversary gala last year.
For more information, visit customhousemaritimemuseum.org. ♦
