What's Up at the

Custom House?

March 30, 2025

#StandUpForScience #Museums4Science

The Custom House is Open Thurs.- Fri. 1-5 PM,

Sat. 10 AM-5 PM, Sun. 1-5 PM.

Photo, above: Visitors to Kids Ahoy!

tonight -- Sunday, March 30, 6-9 pm

Open Mic at the Museum

Co-hosted by Kenny 'Doc' Frazier and Christina Corcoran, our monthly open mic welcomes music, poetry, prose, stand-up, or just state what is on your mind. Show up at 5:45 and get on the list! Open to all ages and abilities for fun & camaraderie. It's a friendly crowd!



Sponsored by Kozmik Music Services.  Admission is by donation. The evening is available on the Open Mic at the Museum Facebook page. The page also posts many of the individual performances from past sessions. Photos, above & below: Open Mic at the Museum.

This week at the Custom House

Lighthouses can be a dicey subject at the Custom House.

I spent much of the week with lighthouse lovers -- three days of zoom talks and discussions with over 90 US lighthouse stewards, owners, partners, and technicians -- an event organized by the United States Lighthouse Society in partnership with the GSA and NPS. It was all to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act of 2000.

When times are uncertain, people ask why did NLMS accept the responsibility for three lights?

We do it because these landmarks are an integral part of New London's maritime identity, and once they are gone -- that's it.

And don't you want to visit?! We're starting to plan our trips to visit inside Harbor, Race Rock, and Ledge Lights for this summer.

The actual NHLPA 25th anniversary is on October 24, 2025. We'll be honoring that milestone at our 43rd Annual Meeting.

--Susan

Tuesday, April 15, 1:30 pm

JIBBOOM CLUB #1

Join Jibboom in April when Gordon Videll, Chief Executive Officer of Sea Services North America, talks about Sea Services' unique co-operative model to use local fishing vessels to provide scout and safety (guard) vessel services for offshore wind developers.

Near the docks of New London, Connecticut, a fishermen’s co-op is making history.

Established by fishermen for fishermen, Sea Services North America serves as the bridge between offshore wind developers and commercial fishermen. Their mission is to improve safety on the open water and create opportunities for local watermen to earn extra income by providing guard, scouting, and environmental compliance services to the growing clean energy industry. --from https://ss-na.com/

Jibboom Club is not a club, but a friendly gathering, with a speaker and refreshments, that is free and open to all! Please come and bring a friend. Generously sponsored by the Maco Family Fund!

On view through April, 2025

Day Trip to Little Gull Island: Photographs by Lisa Kereszi

In August of 2023, I embarked on a special trip out to Little Gull Island with the New London Maritime Society. The museum made a limited number of spaces available to visit this tiny speck of an

island, capped with a Stony Creek granite lighthouse built in 1869.

The isle is paired in Long Island Sound with Great Gull (owned and managed by the Museum of Natural History in New York) and sits between New York’s Fisher’s Island and Plum Island (a currently

preserved, former research station operated by the U.S. Agriculture Department.) Just twelve miles from here, the museum put in a bid to buy it in 2012, and the most recent, now previous, owner who had the highest bid had intended to preserve it. Before the island changed hands, for 5 or so hours a small group of us (including the grandson of one of the last lighthouse keepers, evidenced by the

tattoo of the sentinel on his arm) explored the nooks and crannies, among the rocks, native plants, nests, Cormorants, and a few seals that had chosen to watch us from the shallows. To step out of the hot sun, we even had a chance to climb to the very top.

Many of the other human explorers were looking for birds – and they found them. The island was literally covered with Cormorant nests and bird droppings, which left a strong, ammonia smell hanging in the air. Some of these black birds, as well as seagulls, had expired, and their carcasses were in various states of decay. But there were baby birds, too, and eggs best left alone. Among the rocks, pebbles, and plant life could be found vertebrae and other bones, most likely from seals, as well as trash that had made its way from beaches and boaters – oddly enough, much of it in shades of blue. It was truly a privilege to step onto this otherworldly mount in the middle of the Sound. It was like being on another planet – whose alien inhabitants were all birds. --LK

Saturdays, Sundays, & by appointment year-round

a popular destination for more than a century.

Visit Inside NL Harbor Pequot Light

Visit Long Island Sound's oldest and tallest lighthouse.

We offer Harbor Light tours every Saturday & Sunday at noon. Climb 116 steps up into the lighthouse lantern. The views are spectacular!​

Tours for up-to five people take approximately 40 minutes. Sign up today. To book a custom tour, send us an email.

Day & night the NL HarborCam is your eye on the harbor. We've had 7.1M views. Photo, above: The NL HarborCam view across the Thames to Fort Griswold.

Please share Bluesky our new social media platform so that we can find our people! @customhouse.bsky.social

Photos, below, clockwise from left: a busy Saturday -- Elizabeth's back, snow boarders, USCG cadets, and retirees from MA.

Photo, bottom: EB at night, in the rain, on the NL HarborCam!