New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park

New Bedford Whaling
National Historical Park

New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park Visitor Center
Location New Bedford, Massachusetts, United States
Coordinates 41°38′08″N 70°55′24″W / 41.63556°N 70.92333°W / 41.63556; -70.92333Coordinates: 41°38′08″N 70°55′24″W / 41.63556°N 70.92333°W / 41.63556; -70.92333
Area 34 acres (14 ha)
Built 1790–1855
Architect Robert Mills, Richard Upjohn, Russell Warren, others
Architectural style Federal, Greek Revival, Italianate
Visitation 273,862 (2011)
Website New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park
NRHP Reference # 03000283
Added to NRHP 1996

New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park (NBWNHP) is a United States National Historical Park in New Bedford, Massachusetts, and is maintained by the National Park Service (NPS). The park commemorates the heritage of the world's preeminent whaling port during the nineteenth century.

Established in 1996, the park encompasses 34 acres (fourteen hectares) dispersed over thirteen city blocks. It includes a visitor center, the New Bedford National Historic Landmark District, the New Bedford Whaling Museum, the Seamen's Bethel, the schooner Ernestina, and the Rotch-Jones-Duff House and Garden Museum.

As a National Park, the NBWNHP is rather unusual in that the only properties owned by the NPS are the Visitor Center and the Corson Maritime Learning Center. Rather, the park is a historic district administered under a partnership between the NPS, the City of New Bedford and private building owners to preserve the historic landscapes, structures, and collections and promote research and educational programming associated with the history of whaling. The enabling legislation also established a formal affiliation with the Inupiat Heritage Center in Barrow, Alaska, to commemorate the more than 2,000 whaling voyages from New Bedford to the Western Arctic. The city promotes visitation to the park through advertising that calls it "New England's real seaport", as opposed to Connecticut's Mystic Seaport Museum which is a collection of historic buildings and vessels moved from various other locations throughout the region.

Although the famed Whaleman Memorial (commonly called the "Whaleman's Statue") is not within the park's boundaries, it is located only two blocks beyond its western boundary at the corner of William and Pleasant Streets in front of the New Bedford Public Library.

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park.
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 11/25/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.