Matthew Reardon is a native of northeastern Connecticut. He earned his BA in history and MA in secondary education from Sacred Heart University. His research interests mainly focus on Connecticut during the American Revolution and the Civil War. He has published several articles for the Journal of the American Revolution and served as executive director of the New England Civil War Museum & Research Center for more than 15 years. Earlier this year, he was commissioned a captain in the Connecticut State Guard and serves as a command historian for the Connecticut Military Department. He also currently works as a middle school teacher in Vernon, Connecticut.

You can find Matt's book in the museum's gift shop.

Please 'like' our new facebook page -- a single place to keep up with What's Up! & special NLMS offers.

We're temporarily locked out of our previous facebook pages, due to a technical error.

Saturdays, Sundays, & by appointment year-round

a popular destination for more than a century.

Visit Inside NL Harbor Pequot Light

The weather is perfect for visiting Long Island Sound's oldest and tallest lighthouse.

Photo: Bob Tellier.

Climb 116 steps up into the lighthouse lantern. We offer tours every Saturday & Sunday at noon. The views are spectacular!​ Tours for up-to five people take approximately 40 minutes. To book a tour at other times, send us an email.

Thanks to our friends at Veolia-NL Water Authority and at the Chelsea Groton Foundation, New London residents may visit inside New London Harbor Lighthouse with a $5 ticket through December, 2024! Don't miss this opportunity. Sign up today!

A few personal questions came up at last month's talk on estuaries, presented by Patrick Lynch. The answers are yes, Patrick has fully recovered from Lyme disease with no ill after effects, and yes, I am finally out of the boot-- my broken foot healed!

Jibboom founder Russ DeMarco and wife Pauline were there!

Last week U.S. Senator Chris Murphy held a roundtable discussion on Connecticut’s growing Blue Economy centered around the Long Island Sound. It was an opportunity for the Senator to hear directly from stakeholders in the field. Participants included climate scientists, aquaculture experts, marine repairmen, boat manufacturers, seafood restaurant owners, aquatic farmers, representatives from the tourism industry, and local representatives.

Senator Murphy said that these days, with so much federal funding going towards coastal resilience, one of his main efforts will be to expand public access to the shoreline. We couldn't agree more.

What can you do with an NLMS membership?

Become an NLMS member & receive a discount in the Gift Shop & to special events.

Sign up today (download pdf) or Sign up online.

Sunday, September 29, 6-9 PM

Open Mic at the Museum

Open Mic meets on the last Sunday of the month at the beautiful Custom House Maritime Museum. 

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

Sponsored by Kozmik Music Services.  Admission by donation.

All programs are livestreamed on the Open Mic at the Museum facebook page and available there to watch.

The Open Mic page also posts many of the individual performances from past sessions.

Donations like yours help keep the lights on!

The 2024 Charter Oak Federal Credit Union matching gift program has begun.

If you are a Charter Oak member, your gift (to $500) will be doubled if you donate now!

Download the pdf and please make NLMS your favored charity.

You might assume that there’s little new to discover after all this time, but the opposite is true. In the past 15 years, primary materials related to the story have been uncovered in Cuba, Sierra Leone, and the U.S.

The truism 'History is written by the victors' applies to the Amistad. Until recently, it was the American defense lawyers and Abolitionists who were seen as the heroes in that saga; in part that was because they left written records. But as new facts have come to light, historians have revised the story and today credit the steadfast Africans as the real heroes, and the lawyers and Abolitionists as significant but supporting players.

An aside: the phrase, history is written by the victors, is often attributed to Winston Churchill, but it has a much older origin as Matthew Phelan notes in his research on the origins of the phrase:  

In 1891, Missouri Sen. George Graham Vest, a former congressman for the Confederacy who was still at that late date an advocate for the rights of states to secede, used the phrase in a speech... “In all revolutions the vanquished are the ones who are guilty of treason, even by the historians,” Vest said, “for history is written by the victors and framed according to the prejudices and bias existing on their side.” In other words, the world has rewritten history to credit the saying to one of the 20th century’s greatest victors , but it’s always been very popular with history’s biggest losers.

I've seen it happen with my own work. Years ago I wrote a design history of Dumbarton Oaks, a renowned Washington, DC, garden. Previous and subsequent histories attributed the genius of the place to the landscape designer, Beatrix Farrand (who was a garden genius). But in my research it became clear that the exacting client, Mildred Bliss, oversaw and contributed to every detail of the design -- she and the designer were true and equal partners. Earlier landscape historians often were landscape architects, themselves -- and that could have been prejudice enough to tip credit in favor of a fellow designer and away from the client. Some also had occasion to meet the imperious Mildred Bliss late in life, and she was a person who would not have engendered sympathetic feelings. For a brief period after my book was published, the patron Mildred Bliss was given her due. But now, twenty years on, the tides have turned. Beatrix is favored. Prejudices persist, and once again, Mildred Bliss is largely forgotten.

There are, in fact, two revisionist Benedict Arnold talks taking place this week: our session Thursday with Matthew Reardon about the true motives behind Arnold's attack, and another -- on the same night at the same time but in Groton -- by John Seward, illustrating how the story surrounding Ledyard's death became an urban legend.

I guess it's fun to burn an effigy -- that's Saturday night. But let's approach Thursday's lectures with an open mind.

--Susan