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Mission Statement

To collect, preserve and be a depository of artifacts and all types of information pertaining to the Steamboat Era of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries. The Steamboat Era Museum exists for the enjoyment, education, understanding and interpretation of the lifestyles, travel and economics of the area during that time.

History

The influence of steamboats was as important to the Northern Neck and towns along the entire Chesapeake Bay as rail was to any other small town across the country. The steamboats provided an economic lifeline. The cities of Norfolk and, more predominately, Baltimore acted as gateways to the world beyond. The cities provided the markets, the towns provided the goods and the steamboats provided a means to both.

The Steamboat Era Museum was established to preserve their legacy. From its grassroots inception in 1999 to its opening day in 2004, the museum has evolved to become a unique treasure for our local community and our visitors. Though numerous maritime museums exist nationwide, few reflect the steamboat era and none of them is dedicated to the steamboats of the Chesapeake Bay.

The Steamboat Era Museum tells the story that has not been told: the times of the steamboats, and how they altered the lives of everyone along the Chesapeake Bay.

The museum offers a unique look into the human side of the story, the Captains the travelers, the lifestyle. Brought to life with models, artifacts, photos, films and oral histories one steps back into time; a romantic time full of adventure, splendor and prosperity. In addition, the museum produces a number of popular annual programs and concerts related to the steamboat era.

The story below was included in the Spring 2008 issue of Chesapeake Currents and is shared here with permission.

Steamboat Era Museum: Capturing Life Before Automobiles

Today, tourists and weekenders seeking a break from the daily grind, drive down interstate highways 95 and 64 to reach the Northern Neck from Richmond, Washington, D.C., and Baltimore. And when they arrive, the Rappahannock River is a place for summertime play aboard jet skis, sailboats, and fishing boats.

Life wasn't always as we know it today, a history that Irvington's Steamboat Era Museum seeks to preserve.

In the days before the steamboat, "Richmond might as well have been across the country" because road travel was so inconvenient, according to Terri Thaxton, executive director of the Steamboat Era Museum.

With the introducation of the steamboat on the Rappahannock River in 1828 by the Weems family, other markets became more accessible. Steamboats traveled the Chesapeake Bay and its tirbutaries, enabling tourists and locals to travel from Baltimore, Norfolk and D.C., overnight. Fresight was shipped, too.

"The Chesapeake Bay was the highway," Thaxton said. "Baltimore was an international port. All of a sudden, [Northern Neck residents] are now being exposed to international items at general stores on virtually every steamboat wharf. It means nothing to you or me to see an orange or a banana, but these were exotic fruits that had never been seen here."

The Steamboat Era Mususem shares details like these, but its larger mission is to help people—residents, students, and tourists alike—understand the overall impact that the steamboat had on communities located along the Chesapeake Bay and its rivers. For its efforts, the museum, which opened five years ago, has received designation from the National Park Service as a Chesapeake Bay Gateway.

"We take into account the human aspect, not just 'this is how the engine worked,'" Thaxton said.

(FYI: the Rappahannock steamboats were powered by a variety of engines as designers made improvements, the cross-head engine among them.)

The Steamboat Era Museum opened its spring season with new offerings. One exhibit shows the growth of Canneries, a post-Civil War initiative that brought prosperity to the area because canned goods, such as tomatoes, could be shipped easily upriver to larger markets.

Another exhibit features the influx of tourists who traveled on steamboats to the Northern Neck for camps (described by Thaxton as religiously based social gatherings).

"Thousands of people would descend on a place like Wharton Grove," Thaxton said. "They would stay in tents, which were really simple cottages. A lot of people met in these camps and later married and had families."

Tours of the museum, including a new model of the James Adams Floating Theater (a barge complete with auditorium seating and a stage), give a good idea of the period. The museum has gone one step further, by offering first-hand accounts from those who grew up around steamboats."

"Every summer the floating theater would come," recalled Ruby Lee Norris of Topping in an oral history she recorded. "Those people who played the players were just as big as stars we have on television. I mean people just went gaga when they saw them on the streets anywhere in Irvington or Kilmarnock."

The Rappahannock passenger steamboat era ended in September 1937 when the Anne Arundel made her last trip to Baltimore. A 1933 hurricane destroyed many steamboat wharves, and because of the popularity of the automobile, many were not replaced. Additionally, the 1927 Downing Bridge at Tappahannock had made road travel more manageable.

For those who would like to travel back in time to an era when waterways were main highways, the Steamboat Era Museum has stories to tell...even if you come by car.

Chesapeake Currents is a quarterly community publication from

Plan your visit to allow time for the many other museums and historic sites here in the lower Northern Neck of Virginia.

Our museum volunteers will be happy to help you plan an itinerary that matches your interests.