Site Visit: The St. Augustine Pirate and Treasure Museum

The St. Augustine Pirate and Treasure Museum

The topic of pirates tend to be a side branch in history. Historians and history buffs tend to prioritize political, military, religious, or social aspects of life, and crime tends to take a weird fifth place. Pirates have been around for hundreds of years, not so long after maritime trade and before navies to police them. However, when most people in the western world think of pirates, they tend to think of what is referred to as the "golden age of piracy" lasting from the 1500s to early 19th century, centering on the Caribbean. Pirates lodge in the popular consciousness as being romantic figures rather than feared and cruel strong arm maritime robbers and murderers.

"Fire" a cannon; a hit with
rambunctious kids

Naturally, this divergent phenomenon is bound to emerge in any serious consideration of pirates, so when an opportunity to visit the St. Augustine Pirate and Treasure Museum in St. Augustine, FL, emerged, this was one of the things that prompted a site visit. The divergence of romantic figures or objects of fear are a matter of interpretation.

The museum is along the main thoroughfare along the seaboard of the town of St. Augustine within sight of the Castillo de San Marcos, the fort built to protect the city from attack, pirate or legitimate military.

The museum had moved from Key West in 2010 when the museum owner, Pat Croce, decided that St. Augustine was a better fit, since the town had been attacked by pirates more than a few times and he felt the power of place.

The museum delivers on many fronts. There is a lot of pirate stuff there, and not just random items from the 17th and 18th century in display cases.

Pistol and sword of Thomas Tew

Let's be honest by remembering that there is a popular appeal to pirates, especially to children, so it is geared for them in mind, but it has enough real artifacts and honest portrayals of real pirates and their scary and bloody past. It is an immersive experience with mood lighting, interactive screen displays, and set dressing. Visitors can place a "portfire" to "cannon" and hear it boom, or try their hand at simple knots. There is also a special effect movie created by Disney "Imagineers" (there was a school group in there at the time so I have not further details about what that is).

Guestbook or condemning
your life to the pirate code?

For the historians who want to know more about pirates, there are artifacts with provenance, research, foot notes, historic quotes, and depictions. Famous pirates are addressed, as well as lesser known small time pirates. However, the pirates who had been to St. Augustine were highlighted for their role in shaping the town's history. In other words, there was a direct attempt to interpret pirate presence in St. Augustine and make it meaningful to the visitor.

On a few flat panel text and pictures boards are comments and ideas about why pirates hold appeal to people or how they have become more benign. One panel compared the tyrannical rule of the sea captain over his crew to the democratic "equal share in the spoils" system pirates enjoyed, and how pirates could "remove" the captain if the crew felt that he needed to be "replaced". Signing pirate articles held them to a code of behavior that they agreed to obey, compared to the will of a regular captain. Of course, signing the articles meant death if caught by civil authorities or death by the crew if breached. Apparently some of the spoils went to benefiting fellow pirate brethren in case of sickness or injury.

A no joke real pirate chest from Thomas Tew. It comes with
a separate locked area for extra valuable things.

There is a intended path of visitation that is part of the museum floor plan. However, if you are caught behind a school group with a costumed pirate interpreter, it does tend to create traffic bottlenecks. So visitor beware on that front.

Of course there was treasure. It's the Pirate and Treasure Museum. It included two chests from known pirates, Capt. Tew and Capt. Kidd. The treasure came from private archaeological finds and included artifacts from all sorts of different cultures around the world.

"Capt. Jack Sparrow's" sword
with retractable point for
cinematic"stabbing"

Finally, the museum ends with media depiction of pirates in the social consciousness. It mentions Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island as being a part of making pirates both popular and sympathetic while depicting their cruelty. The Errol Flynn film Captain Blood was also mentioned (along with his screen used jacket) with "Pirates of Penzance", "Peter Pan", and the "Pirates of the Caribbean" ride and movies.

While the golden age of piracy is over and those of that era are enjoying a latent and unexpected reversal of fortune for their high sea crimes, at the St. Augustine Pirate and Treasure Museum, their history, fact, and fiction are discussed and examined in detail at this one-of-a-kind place. See their website for ticket prices and further details. Of all the tourist trap places to see in St. Augustine, the Pirate museum is not a tourist trap, in my opinion, but a worthwhile interpretive experience worthy of being something a visitor should not miss.

Site Visit: Savannah, GA and the Old Town Trolley Tour

"Savannah, being the classy Southern lady she
is, bought this replica of a Parisian water
fountain from a mail order catalog for
$12,000."

This last February we visited Savannah, Georgia. Being a history minded family, we enjoy our trips a little differently than most people, so a "visit" to any place is simply not a casual stroll down Main street looking at the sights or feverishly searching for shops that are not available where we live. We aim for old stuff. Savannah is full of old stuff. In planning the trip we came across a trolley tour company that toured the interesting sights around the city. When my wife said it was called the "Old Town Trolley Tours", I instantly told her to book.

In my growing up, our family would visit cities around the country and one of the things we did was take a "Old Town Trolley Tour" if it was available. We had taken the ones in Washington, DC, and Boston, MA. I think it may have had an influence in shaping my interests into a historian, so when my wife mentioned it, as far as I was concerned, it was a done deal.

Old Town Trolley Tours are a touring company that operate a trolley service on a route that includes city highlights which tourists are interested in. Many of these are historical in nature so I'm happy, but include architectural, political, unusual, and beautiful locations or things. They offer unlimited on-off privileges and all day service. The trolleys are also a bright orange with green roof, so they are instantly recognizable. Wait time is about 20 minutes between pickups. The best part is that the trolley driver gives a nearly nonstop narration of things of interest and share details about them. Each driver has a different perspective of each stop and sight, and usually a humorous one! They give tours in 7 major cities. I mentioned Washington DC, Boston, and Savannah, but they also served St. Augustine, FL, Key West, FL, San Diego, CA, and Nashville, TN,

"The Pirates House - boasts the oldest building in Georgia. It
had a wine cellar that had a hidden tunnel that went all the
way to the river so the pirates could enter and exit unseen. It
also was a tunnel where patrons would be Shanghai'd out to
sea. A policeman went in just to socialize later found himself
on a ship to the Indies and it took him 2 years to return." 

Savannah is the oldest city in Georgia, being so close to the sea and on a navigable river. It was where John Oglethorpe chose to locate the capitol of the newly commissioned colony of Georgia. The tour started at the downtown Welcome Center and History Museum. We chose to go through the whole circuit once, stop for lunch, then step off and on at the locations we wanted to learn more about or examine more closely. The driver explained the Savannah's civic layout and how it was designed around town squares and wards, and brought up what was important about some of those squares and who they were named for and why, or what notable things were located there. We later stopped off at Forsyth Park to get out and stretch our legs for a bit and let the kid run around the playground with other kids. Sitting on a trolley was exciting, but he does get restless. We made our way following the trolley route, looking at Pulaski Square and the monument to Casimer Pulaski, among other sites. We also stepped off out onto River Street and poked into the street vendors and strolled along the river, hoping to burn off some more restless energy. It was fascinating wandering around the factor's walks, places where the big-wigs of the cotton industry went to look over stocks, inventory, and make trades. It was the financial heartbeat of the Old South, much like Wall St. is today, but for the cotton industry. Overall, Savannah is a beautiful city worth visiting if given a chance.

"The Waving Girl statue- waved to ships for
years. Legend says she died of a broken heart
and tired arms."

Old Town Trolley Tours is an interesting way to see the sights of various cities, and learn about the past and what makes each city so unique. The tour is certainly worth the time and the money spent on it. The friendly banter of the drivers, on-off privileges, all day operation, frequent stops are all pluses. It is a great idea if you have only one day to see a city or if you are going to start a longer stay and want to get a feel for where things are. It does however take a good amount of your day; at least half of your day is going to be tied up doing this in order to make it worthwhile. Despite the interesting anecdotes, the script for each place is not very deep. There is very little interpretation and meaning gathering in the tour. They rely on a rapid pace of general information with a solid dose of trivial interest to keep the visitor engaged. This is not to say that it is not fun, interesting, or bad; it is what it is, an overall tour.

If you are interested in visiting one of the cities where Old Town Trolley Tours operates, I would recommend investigating what they offer and take the time to see the different cities. You can find out more by going to their website: Trolley Tours