Huntington Library
Huntington Library: Land of Golden Dreams: Li's Journey: China to California
Li is a 14-year-old boy from Guangdong, China, who travels to California during the Gold Rush. Read about his journey on a sailing ship from Southern China to San Francisco. Along the way experience, the sights and sounds of sea travel...
Curated OER
Merriam Webster: Visual Dictionary Online: Caravel
Illustration of a caravel, a sailing ship.
Science Buddies
Science Buddies: Science Careers: Marine Architect
The marine architect is the one who designs many kinds of vessels which sail the seven seas. This Science Buddies site lays out the requirements needed to become a marine architect, as well as the education and job description. Included...
Other
Uss Constitution Museum: Constitution Collage
Tell the class that they will be making collages of USS Constitution. Reproduce the sails and hull pages to hand out along with scissors, rulers, paste and pieces of paper 11" x 17" on which students may assemble their collages.
Mariners' Museum and Park
Mariners' Museum: Resources: Age of Exploration
Scroll to the bottom of this page to access activity resources and lesson plans that encourage students to explore an understand the practicalities and difficulties involved in sailing to new places during the Age of Exploration.
Read Works
Read Works: Magellan Was First
[Free Registration/Login Required] An informational text about Ferdinand Magellan, the first explorer to sail around the world. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Digital History
Digital History: Roots of American Economic Growth: Speeding Communications
Find out the many reasons why communication speed increased in the early 19th century. It wasn't just because of the telegraph.
Texas A&M University
Ocean World: Satellite Oceanography
What does a satellite in space have to do with the oceans? Discover the answer to this question as well as uncover some interesting facts about satellites at this site.
Other
St. Vincent College: Hms Victory
Examination of the HMS Victory, an eighteenth-century sailing ship.
University of Houston
University of Houston: Engines of Our Ingenuity: No. 1338: The Last Masts
Read about the history of the steamboat and the difficult transition that led to the eventual relinquishing of a ship's sails. This article is a transcript of a radio broadcast.
Smithsonian Institution
National Museum of American History: On the Water: Maritime Nation: Shipwrecks
Illustrated accounts of the destruction and loss of two ships sailing to America across the Atlantic illuminate the dangers of nineteenth-century travel and the modes of rescue available at the time. With a range of archival material,...
Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation
History Is Fun: Jamestown Day
2013 marks the 406th anniversary of the founding of the Jamestown colonial settlement. Learn about how Jamestown Day is now celebrated in Virginia, including the sailing of a recreated ship, archaelogical digs and a variety of cultural...
Mariners' Museum and Park
Mariners' Museum: Exploration Through the Ages
A history of the world from the perspective of those who sailed the seas in great waves of exploration, from ancient times through the nineteenth century. Learn about the explorers, their ships, the tools they navigated by, and their...
Curated OER
St. Vincent College: Hms Victory
Examination of the HMS Victory, an eighteenth-century sailing ship.
Curated OER
National Library of Medicine: Darwin's Hms Beagle
The HMS Beagle is the ship Charles Darwin sailed an his journey to study life science.
Other
Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum
This great site offers information about the Chesapeake Bay, its history, people and it's stories. "Tour" the museum to find interesting information.
University of Illinois
University of Illinois: Early American Trade With China: John Swift's Letter Home [Pdf]
The American ship Empress of China left New York on February 22, 1784 and arrived in Canton, China six months later on August 18. John White Swift, the ship's purser, wrote the following letter to his father in Philadelphia in July,...
University of Illinois
University of Illinois: Early American Trade With China: Log of the Empress of China [Pdf]
The following are excerpts from logs of the Empress of China, the first American ship to sail toChina after American independence. The ship left New York on February 22, 1784 and reached Canton on August 28. All excerpts are taken from...
Other
Florida.com: Division of Historical Resources: Archaeology: Galleon Trail
In 1733 a fleet of many ships set sail from Havana for Spain. After a bout of wind changes and bad weather most of the ships were swamped or sunk covering a span of approximately 80 miles in the Florida Keys. The shipwrecks created many...
University of Groningen
American History: Outlines: Victory and Independence
In July 1780 France's Louis XVI had sent to America an expeditionary force of 6,000 men under the Comte Jean de Rochambeau. In addition, the French fleet harassed British shipping and prevented reinforcement and resupply of British...
AdLit
Ad lit.org: Reading Discussion Guide: Corby Flood
Corby Flood and her family are about to set sail on a rather ramshackle cruise ship, the S.S. Euphonia. Onboard, among the odd passengers and eccentric crew, there is a strange group of men in bowler hats who call themselves the...
Khan Academy
Khan Academy: Anglo Saxon England
In the fifth century C.E., people from tribes called Angles, Saxons and Jutes left their homelands in northern Europe to look for a new home. They knew that the Romans had recently left the green land of Britain unguarded, so they sailed...