Curator, Penobscot Marine Museum

Ben started racing in one-designs, including his Jet 14, and continued during college. He took up whitewater paddling in graduate school, building and racing slalom and wild-water kayaks, then started learning about traditional boats while serving as the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum’s first curator, in the process picking up a Culler skiff and an International Canoe. He continued his interest in small boats while managing the curatorial department at Mystic Seaport where he was responsible for the traditional boat programs led by John Gardner and Barry Thomas. While at Mystic, he obtained a Delaware Ducker, a type of boat he had learned about from Josef Leiner while he was in the Chesapeake. He gradually expanded his fleet to include sea kayaks, a marathon canoe, and a catboat. After leaving the Seaport and moving to Maine, Ben worked for the Apprenticeshop in Rockland, and sat for and received his Coast Guard license which enabled him to take passengers for hire aboard Friendship Sloops and to teach seamanship courses at the WoodenBoat School. Later, he became a Registered Maine Guide and began teaching sea kayaking. To his ever-expanding fleet Ben has added a faering, a beach cruiser designed by Tony Dias, several Greenland qajaqs, and a Swampscott dory. He has become part owner of the Tancook Whaler Vernon Langille, built years ago by the Apprenticeshop, and he and his partner are completing her rehabilitation. Ben has written for WoodenBoat, and other traditional boating publications, and currently is the curator at the Penobscot Marine Museum in Searsport, Maine.