New Bedford Whaling Museum

Purpose: Building Public Access This grant will provide critical support for the New Bedford Whaling museum's "Interpretive Technology Initiative," an important component of the museum's new planned core exhibition. The ITI will result in an interpretive information database (linked to the museum's collections database) and multiple audience-specific interfaces that allow guided and self-directed exploration of the database. The ITI pilot project will be the development of a virtual tour of the Lagoda-an 89-foot-model of a whaleship that is the central icon of the museum and the physical centerpiece of the core exhibition. Enhanced by primary source material, such as logbooks and crew accounts from the collection, the Lagoda makes an ideal starting point for the museum's effort to integrate technology fully into the Visitor's learning experience. After testing, the project will expand to include other related artifacts and interpretive materials.