V
irtual Vessels
Maryland Dove Goes Digital
by KATE LIVIE
ADY VICTORIOUS SHARK, Defiant Falcon, and Bold Odyssey. Three wooden vessels inspired by innovation in hull, sail, and ship design during the Great Age of Sail. Each boasts a hull designed to carry cargo, numerous sails intended for distance or speed, tunnage adequate for a crew, passengers, or both, and, importantly, an amazing name. And none of them has ever existed. Anywhere other than in the imagination of a Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum guest, that is. Though they bear no resemblance, this fleet of marvelous fantasy ships was directly informed by Maryland Dove and the unique approach taken by CBMM in order to tell the vesselʼs story. For Maryland Dove, CBMM has gone digital in a big way—developing tools that let the public step inside a virtual world where sailing on a 17th-century Dove and constructing your very own tall ship are all part of a visit. But these new digital experiences are also the result of out-of-the-box troubleshooting. Simply put, the groundbreaking construction of a vessel like Maryland Dove required interpretation to match. 16 FALL 2020
THE CHESAPEAKE LOG
From the beginning of the project, the interpretive team at CBMM had a major challenge. The construction of Maryland Dove was going to be slow, precise, and gradual, and it would be hard for a guest to visualize a finished ship from one that was little more than a keel and some frames. People would need context. A basic understanding of the construction process, how the first Dove had been built and why, and what the completed vessel might look like would all help bring the ship to life. CBMM’s partnership with Historic St. Mary’s City for the project also meant that conveying historical context was vitally important. Even for a world-class organization like CBMM, that’s a heavy lift for a traditional exhibition. It was time to think out of the box—virtually. To troubleshoot the challenges posed by the construction of Maryland Dove, CBMM staff have typically been looking 400 years into the past. But for the solution to this interpretation conundrum, the team instead looked decidedly to the future. CBMM teamed up with Philadelphia’s Night Kitchen Interactive, whose immersive digital experiences have allowed Mütter Museum visitors to peer inside the different parts of an eyeball model and audiences at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art to curate their own cabinet of curiosities. Together, CBMM and Night Kitchen created several different experiences, designed to tell the vivid, compelling, time-traveling story of Maryland Dove. “Dove is a platform for telling the messages of early
