Museums used to be such a boring thing, but in the last decades a whole new concept for presenting old items and stories have made them so interesting and attractive not only to researchers and academy members, but to the general public as well. Probably the champion of great museum sites is MoMA.
org, but hey: they are also probably the champions of museums altogether. MysticSeaport.org surely has a lot to learn from the juggernaut, but it’s still is a good example of a nice page depicting the museum’s collections, exhibitions and open archives for researchers, a limited selection of which is available though this site, and includes digitalized and transcript versions of ship registries, manuscripts, engravings and pictures of objects portraying the coastal life in New England in the 19th century. If you are just curious about that period of American history, and not so concerned about the hard facts, take a look at the maritime art gallery, where you will be able to find reproductions of some of the museum’s collections, and you can order prints as well. If you are going to Connecticut this summer and plan to visit the museum, make sure you stop by at MysticSeaport.org to learn about operating hours, special events which will take place at the museum, buy your tickets online, or even find out about nice hotels close by to stay in. 
