The Antique Boat Museum was excited to reintroduce our lecture series in 2021! Spanning all four seasons and a range of topics, we hope to be able to bring local history and boating life to you throughout the year whether you are with us in the 1000 Islands or far away and missing the River.
Note: All lectures, unless indicated otherwise, will be held in a hybrid in-person/virtual format. If you are unable to join us in-person, we invite you to join us via Youtube live stream. The live stream link for each lecture can be found below.
Shipwrecks of Lake Ontario – A Journey of Discovery
Jim Kennard, Shipwreck Explorer
July 28 | 5:30pm
Youtube Live Stream: This lecture will not be live streamed
Join the most successful shipwreck hunter in Lake Ontario on a personal and historic exploration of some of the most important shipwrecks discovered in Lake Ontario by his team and shipwreck peers. Jim Kennard will take the audience on a nearly 50 year journey of Lake Ontario shipwreck discovery from the pages of his new book. Several of these significant discoveries include the two oldest shipwrecks discovered in the Great Lakes, the 1780 British warship HMS Ontario and the sloop Washington lost in 1803 and more with underwater images and video of these lost ships.
Ways of Learning: An Apprentice Boatbuilder in Japan
Dennis Brooks
August 5 | 5:30pm
Youtube Live Stream: link coming soon.
When people think about Japan, they usually have in their minds images of manga and anime, busy urban centers, and an economy based on innovations in electronics. Most people do not know that there is also a second Japan, wherein lies a rich history of traditional arts and crafts, many of which are fast disappearing. Douglas Brooks has apprenticed with boatbuilders from throughout Japan since 1996, building over a dozen types of traditional wooden boats. Brooks’ teachers were all in their seventies and eighties when he worked with them, and he is the sole apprentice for seven of his nine teachers. In this slide talk he will share his experiences with traditional crafts drawn from twenty-six trips to Japan since 1990, visiting all forty-seven prefectures. Brooks’ research in Japan focuses on the techniques and design secrets of the craft. These techniques have been passed from master to apprentice with almost no written record. His book, Japanese Wooden Boatbuilding is the first comprehensive survey of the craft, spanning his first five apprenticeships and including a chapter on Japan’s last traditional shipwright.
Brooks will also talk about the nature of craft education in Japan; an ethic that is largely at odds with our notions of teaching in the West. The apprentice system produced craftspeople with incomparable skills, yet it required an intense devotion and seriousness from participants. Brooks has experienced first-hand what it is like to learn when the apprentice is forbidden from speaking. At the core of this process is the belief that one learns by observation and perseverance. Japan’s last generation of traditional boatbuilders has almost disappeared.
Past Lectures:
2023 Lectures
February 3, 2023: Key to Liberty, the Underwater Archaeology of the Revolutionary War on Lake Champlain with Chris Sabick, Director of Archaeology & Research at Lake Champlain Maritime Museum (watch the recording of this lecture here)
April 21, 2023: The World Comes to the Waterfront: Historic Architecture and Ideas on New York’s Northeastern Shores with Professor Dennis Earle, Assistant Teaching Professor – Environmental and Interior Design & Shaffer Art History Professor at Syracuse University (watch the recording of this lecture here)
2022 Lectures
December 2, 2022: Geology and People of the St. Lawrence with Dr. Laurie Rush, Cultural Resources Manager and Army Archaeologist – Ft. Drum (watch the recording of this lecture here)
October 28, 2022: Understanding the ecological role of wetlands in a changing river: Protecting and monitoring wetland fish habitat in the Thousands Islands with Thornton Ritz, SUNY ESF PhD Student (watch the recording of this lecture here)
August 12, 2022: The Katie Eccles and the Final Years of Sail on Lake Ontario with Ben Ioset, Texas A&M Anthropologist
June 18, 2022: Inextricably Connected: John Henry Rushton and Slipstream Watercraft with Slipstream Founders Stan & Cathy Zdunek
2021 Lectures
September 1, 2021: The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame & The Wind in the Islands by Scott Ouderkirk
July 15, 2021: Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown
January 28, 2021: Shipwrecks of the 1000 Islands with Dennis & Kathi McCarthy
The Homer L. Dodge Lecture Series is funded by the Homer L. Dodge Endowment which funds programming that promotes, celebrates, and teaches topics focused on the history and ecology of the St. Lawrence River.