Cassie’s London Trip - 2009: National Maritime Museum in Greenwich

On Monday July 20th, we went to the National Maritime Museum (NMM) in Greenwich, England. The museum offers joint library and archival services, modern and rare books, journals, periodicals, maps, charts dating back to the 14th century. The library was founded in 1937 and claims to be the largest Maritime Library in the world. Collection users include academic scholars, legal historians, and people interested in family history. Their collection ranges from various topics including emigration, astronomy, piracy, navigation, voyages & explorations, navel architecture, and merchant & royal navy resources.

Their holdings include 100,000 modern books, 8,000 rare books, and 20,000 pamphlets & periodicals, of which 200 are current. the NMM also holds over 66,000 manuscript records as well as a manuscript database. They welcome between 3,000-4,000 visitors a year and answer approximately 15,000-18,000 questions through their e-library. On average they pull about 5,000 archival items a year as well. A topic of great interest to me is their material relating to pirates. The museum features material covering the many pirates who were active in the 'Golden Age' of piracy from 1650–1720.

The National Maritime Museum's collection webpage is http://www.nmm.ac.uk/explore/collections/