Built in 1841 at Hillman Bros. Shipyard in New Bedford, Massachusetts, the Charles W. Morgan is the last surviving American wooden whaleship and the oldest American merchant ship afloat. Launched when more than 600 American whaleships hunted whales to supply oil for lubrication and illumination, she was named for her original owner, whaling merchant Charles W. Morgan of New Bedford, Massachusetts. During an 80-year career, the vessel made 37 voyages, primarily in the Pacific Ocean, often spending three to five years finding the fifty or more whales needed to fill her hold with barrels of oil. To shorten voyages, she was berthed at San Francisco from 1887 to 1904. A crew of 30 to 36 men rowed the six-man whaleboats used to hunt and capture whales and rendered oil from blubber in a brick tryworks on deck. These crews were among the most diverse at sea, mixing Americans, Europeans, West Indians, Azoreans, Cape Verdeans, Polynesians, and Asians, and they received a small share of the profits for their years of tedium and toil. After her retirement in 1921, she was preserved as an exhibit near New Bedford before coming to Mystic Seaport in 1941. She was named a National Historic Landmark in 1967, and since 1973 has been exhibited afloat there, restored to look much as she did around 1905.
