Collection Highlights
Smit Loire
Scale Models WestonLoan No.: L2010.9.1
Date: circa 2000
Materials: Plastic and wood
Provenance: This builder’s model of an ASD Tug 3111 tugboat was built in 2000 at the Damen Shipyards in the Netherlands. The model was delivered to the Houston Maritime Museum from the SMIT offices in the Netherlands. The Loire assists in towing and mooring with a total pulling power of 115 tons. This tug is registered in Nassau, Bahamas and has worked in the Northern Atlantic, including the Port of Rotterdam.
On long-term loan from SMIT Marine Projects- Americas, 2010
HMS Bounty
Ronald RobertiAccession No.: 2007.1.38
Date: 1998
Materials: Basswood, walnut, cherry, boxwood, and metal parts
Provenance: This 1:60 scale, Class B plank-on-bulkhead model of the HMS Bounty was built by Master Modeler Ronald Roberti and later purchased by Houston Maritime Museum founder, James L. Manzolillo. The HMS Bounty, originally christened the Bethia, was commissioned in 1787 by Great Britain to find and transport breadfruit to the British West Indies. After a long stop on the Tahitian Islands, Fletcher Christian led a portion of the crew to mutiny, and set Captain William Bligh and his supporters underway a jolly boat in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. The mutineers, before being brought to justice for their crimes, were able to establish a colony on the remote Pitcairn Islands, where their descendants live today.
Bequest of James L. Manzolillo, 2007.
British Dispatch Cutter
Burton Reckles
Accession No.: 2010.18.1
Date:circa 2010
Materials: Pre-ban ivory and mixed media
Provenance: This 1:192 scale, scratch-built miniature represents a British naval vessel in the style commonly used by French POWs during the Napoleonic Wars. Built by Houston-based master miniaturist Burton Reckles, the model is depicted underway thus replicating how a sailing vessel looks both above and under water. The vessel itself is almost entirely crafted from hand-cut pre-ban elephant tusk ivory.
Gift of Burton Reckles, 2010.
Houston Pilot Boat No. 1 (1924)
Lorena Alvarez
Accession No.: 2010.18.1
Date:circa
Materials: Wood
Provenance: This scratch-built model was created by Master Modeler Lorena Alvarez for the Houston Pilot’s Association to commemorate the first designated Pilot Boat for the Port of Houston. Harbor Pilots are essential to any maritime port, as they are required to board vessels both entering and leaving the port. Pilots are considered to be the experts on the local natural and man-made features that affect passage through the waterway. As one of the busiest ports in the world, the Port of Houston depends on the Houston Pilots’ Association to continue to guide vessels with their local passages.
On long-term loan from the Houston Pilot’s Association, 2010.
Liberty Ship
Accession No.: 2007.FIC.1
Date: Unknown
Materials: Plastic, thread, and metal
Provenance: This is a 1:192 scale model of a Liberty Ship, standardized and easy to build vessels ordered by the United States Maritime Commission and the War Shipping Administration during World War II. These vessels constructed at multiple shipyards across the country, including Todd Houston Shipyard in Houston. Liberty ships crossed embattled seas with un-armed and non-military crews, to provide Allied troops stationed on all fronts with invaluable supplies and equipment.
Bequest of James L. Manzolillo, 2007.
National Geographic Society Map Cabinet
Accession No.: 2010.6.1
Date: circa 1944
Materials: Wood, paper, brass
Provenance: This map cabinet, containing 19 roll-out maps, was gifted to Capt. (and later Rear Admiral) James B. Sykes, USN in 1944. Admiral Sykes was the captain of the USS Bennington (CV-20) from August 6, 1944 until June 30, 1945, where this map cabinet hung in his office. The Essex-class aircraft carrier was a member of the United States Navy’s Pacific Fleet. It earned three (3) Battle Stars during its service for its role in American actions against Imperial Japanese vessels during World War II. The ship was struck from the register in 1970 and eventually scrapped in the early 1990s. Admiral Sykes, a 1919 graduate of the United States Naval Academy, also served as Chief of the US Navy’s Bureau of Plans and was the commanding officer of the Navy Ordnance Test Station at Inyokern, CA before retiring in 1953 and spending his later years in the Texas Gulf Coast region. The cabinet was accessioned into the collection of the Brazoria County Historical Museum in 1996.
Gift of the Brazoria County Historical Museum, 2006.
Offshore Mischief
BAE Models Team PTE LTD, Singapore
Accession No.: 2010.13.1
Date:circa 2010
Materials: Plastic and metal
Provenance: This is a 1:100 scale builder’s model of the LeTourneau Super 116E jack-up oil rig, Offshore Mischief, built by Lamprell Energy, LTD in 2010 and owned by Scorpion Offshore, who donated the model to the Houston Maritime Museum in 2010. This ABS Maltese Cross A1 Self-Elevated Mobil Offshore Drilling Unit can host a crew of 105 and can drill in depths of up to 350 feet. This rig differs from the semi-submersible units in that the legs, over 477 feet, attach to the sea floor.
Gift of Scorpion Offshore, 2010
USS Confederacy (1778)
Accession No.: 2007.1.26
Date: 2002
Materials: Basswood, red gum, mansonia, walnut, ebony, boxwood, pear, holly, pave marfin, and poplar
Provenance: This 1:64 scale, Class-A (scratch built), plank-on-frame admiralty model of the USS Confederacy was built by Master Modeler Ronald Roberti and purchased by Houston Maritime Museum founder, James L. Manzolillo. Admiralty models were the builder’s models of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and every piece used to construct this model is exactly as it appeared on the original vessel. The USS Confederacy was one of the first frigates used for the newly independent United States of America. After a transporting naval stores and government officials, both foreign and domestic, she was captured and renamed the HMS Confederate by Great Britain before being lost to history in 1781.
Bequest of James L. Manzolillo, 2007.
Vernier Sextant No. 124
William Desilva, Liverpool
Accession No.: 2001.1.1
Date:1899
Materials: Metal and glass
Provenance: This sextant is a part of a large collection of nautical navigation instruments at the Houston Maritime Museum, which received the sextant from Lt. Comdr. Robert W. Lane in 2001. Sextants have been used since the early eighteenth century to calculate the angle between two points, often the horizon and an astrological point (celestial navigation) and determine location before digital aides.
Gift of Lieutenant Commander Robert W. Lane, 2001
