East India Marine Society facts for kids
The East India Marine Society was a special club started in 1799 in Salem, Massachusetts, United States. It was made up of sea captains and traders from Salem who had sailed far across the oceans, past places like the Cape of Good Hope in Africa or Cape Horn in South America.
This society was more than just a club. It helped people in need and was a place for learning. It also had a library and a museum. The society was very important from the early 1800s to the 1830s, when Salem was a busy center for trade with countries all over the world. Later, in 1910, the society changed its name slightly to "Trustees of the Salem East India Marine Society."
The Museum of Wonders
A Museum's Journey Through Time
The people who started the East India Marine Society always wanted to have a museum. Their goal was to collect "natural and artificial curiosities," especially things found far away, beyond the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Horn. This meant they wanted to gather interesting objects from nature and things made by people from distant lands.
In just three years, their collection grew so big that it didn't fit in their first building! So, they moved to a larger place. In 1825, the society opened its very own building called the East India Marine Hall. This building was designed by an architect named Thomas Waldron Sumner.
The museum was known as the East India Marine Society museum until 1867. That year, a wealthy man named George Peabody bought it. He combined its collections with other items from another group called the Essex Institute. This new, bigger museum was first called the Peabody Academy of Science. Over time, it changed names again, becoming the Peabody Museum of Salem in 1915. Finally, in 1992, it joined completely with the Essex Institute to become the famous Peabody Essex Museum we know today.
The museum of the East India Marine Society was very important for a few reasons. First, the society's members had to donate interesting items from their travels. This helped Salem become a key place to learn about cultures from Europe and Asia. It also showed how successful America was in global trade. The museum proved that American cultural places were just as good as those in Europe. It also connected the world of trade with new ideas about science and society.
Amazing Collections from Around the World
The museum's collection began with gifts from Captain Jonathan Carnes. He donated all sorts of things, like an elephant's tooth and a pipe from Sumatra. Because members had to donate items from their journeys, the museum had many objects related to their trading adventures. This is why there were so many artifacts from the Pacific region.
The museum received so many objects in its first 20 years that it hired a special person, a curator, to help organize everything. This curator also created a list of all the museum's items. The first list, published in 1821, included 2,269 objects!
The museum had a huge variety of items. These included shells, old coins, and cultural objects like costumes, musical instruments, statues, and weapons. They also had handwritten journals from sea voyages between Salem and places like Batavia, Bombay, Calcutta, Canton, and Manila. Many people donated items, including members, local New Englanders, and even merchants from far-off places like Bombay.
Ten years after the first list, a second one was published, showing a total of 4,299 objects!
Nature's Wonders
The museum displayed many "natural curiosities," which are interesting things from nature. Some examples included:
- Ostrich eggs
- Stuffed penguins
- Elephant tails and tusks
- Lava from Java
- A hornet's nest from Surinam
- A two-headed dogfish (a type of small shark)
Cultural Treasures
The museum also had many "cultural curiosities," which are objects made by people from different cultures. These included:
- Pieces of granite from Pompey's pillar (an ancient Roman column)
- Ivory pagodas (small towers)
- A model of an 80-gun ship, made from soup bones by a prisoner
- Coins and money from other countries
- White marble pieces from the ruins of Carthage (an ancient city)
- A coffee cup and saucer that once belonged to Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte
- Paintings and clothing from China, Japan, and India
- "Three thousand yards of human hair, braided"
- Underwear from Lapland made from reindeer hair
Special Objects
Some objects in the collection were extra special because they were rare, came from unique places, or had important history. One such item was an idol of Kolia Moku, a medicine god from the Sandwich Islands. There are only two other idols like it left in the world!
Another famous object was the embalmed (preserved) head of a New Zealand chief. It was donated by William Dana and had to be shown behind a veil because it was so unusual.
An important early item was a sculpture donated in 1790 called Figure of a Chinese Man. Experts say it was one of the first sculptures from China to come to America.
What Was Missing
Even though the museum had many items from international trade, it had very few objects from Native American tribes. Since there wasn't a strong financial reason to collect Native American items, the museum's collection of them was small. Things like arrowheads found in New England were sometimes displayed next to ancient Roman artifacts.
How Things Were Shown
We don't have many records of how the museum looked, but we know a few things. When the society moved into the East India Marine Hall, tall display cases filled with artifacts lined the walls. Often, models of ships were placed on top of these cases. More cases were arranged in the middle of the room.
The museum also had life-size statues of merchants from China and India. These statues were placed around the hall. They were not just part of the collection; they also helped visitors understand the other objects better.
Around the 1830s, the museum started arranging items based on what they were used for, like weapons or musical instruments. The curator, Dr. Malthus Ward, did this to group objects that had similar purposes in their different countries.
Who Visited the Museum?
The museum didn't charge an entry fee, but visitors needed to be introduced by a society member. Many important people visited, including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Andrew Jackson, and Martin Van Buren.
It was one of Salem's most popular places to visit. People often said they felt amazed, like they were entering a different world. Martha Nichols, whose grandfather was a Salem sailor, wrote that its "magic door opened onto so many wonders." A visitor in 1860 wrote that "to walk around this room was to circumnavigate the globe" (meaning to travel all the way around the world).
These visits taught the younger people of Salem a lot about the global marketplace. This knowledge was very valuable in the early 1800s. Seeing these foreign items helped them understand other nations better, which was good for trade.
Experts say that the museum showed visitors that Salem's sailors had brought them a small piece of the entire world. The objects and their displays were not just to show how diverse other cultures were. They were also strongly linked to the people who donated them. Portraits of the donors were hung above the objects, and former sailors from the society even gave tours. This showed the personal connections to the items and highlighted the sailors' success in the international world.
Images for kids
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East India Marine Hall in 2013, now part of the Peabody Essex Museum
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Pacific Collection, East India Marine Hall in 1876
