German Maritime Museum

This article is about the museum in Bremen. For the museum in Stralsund, see German Oceanographic Museum.

The German Maritime Museum (German: Deutsches Schifffahrtsmuseum (DSM)) is a museum in Bremerhaven, Germany. It is part of the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Scientific Community. The main museum building was opened on 5 September 1975 by then-president of Germany Walter Scheel, though scientific work already had started in 1971.

German Maritime Museum

Deutsches Schifffahrtsmuseum
The main museum building
Established	September 1975 (1975-09)
Location	Bremerhaven, Germany
Coordinates	53°32′24″N 8°34′37″E
Type	Maritime museum
Owner	Bremerhaven
Website	dsm.museum

Funnel of Otto Hahn

The museum consists of the building planned by Hans Scharoun as well as several museum ships in the Old Harbour of Bremerhaven, including the Seute Deern windjammer. The building and the 8 ships of the museum fleet, located between the Old Harbor and the Weser dike, as en esemble were placed under Bremen Cultural heritage management in 2005.

In 2000 at the 25th anniversary of the museum, the Hansekogge, a ship constructed around 1380 that was found in the Weser river in 1962, was presented to the public after having undergone a lengthy process of conservation in a large preservative-filled basin.

History

The German Maritime Museum (DSM) was founded in Bremerhaven in 1971 to replace the Museum of Marine Science in Berlin, which had been destroyed during World War II. Its task is to collect, record, research and present documents and artefacts pertaining to German maritime history. For this purpose, the DSM is equipped with laboratories and technical facilities for the examination, conservation and restoration of different types of water craft as well as other objects. It also houses a wide range of artefact collections and a dedicated archive and specialist library with adjacent reading room. The DSM is publisher of two periodicals as well as four scientific monograph series.

In 2024 the buildings of the museums were restuarted. The federal government and state governments of Bremen have spent 42 million euros. The museums management said, this is to little to keep the museum and fleet running in the future.

Research

DSM research is focussed on the following fields:

• pre-industrial shipping in Central Europe
• German shipping in early modern times
• the impact of industrialisation on German commercial shipping
• the history of marine research
• man's use of the sea's resources through the ages

Exhibitions

Permanent exhibitions at the DSM include:

• Central European shipping in the prehistoric, Roman and medieval periods (with the Bremen cog of 1380 as main exhibit).
• German shipping in early modern times (1500 to 1800).
• German shipping in the post-1800 industrial age (with the paddle-steamer "Meißen" of 1881 as main exhibit), military shipping (with the "Seehund" class submarine of 1945 as main exhibit), industrial ships' engines (with engines and reactor control panel of the nuclear-powered vessel Otto Hahn of 1968 as main exhibit).
• Shipping Channels (navigation, marine cartography, navigation marks, navigable waters).
• Outdoor museum port with coastal, inland and sea vessels from 1867 to 1985 as well as cargo handling equipment, buoys etc. Flagship is the world's largest preserved cargo sailing ship made of wood – the bark Seute Deern of 1919; it was announced in October 2019 that, in the light of a survey which found that the ship is beyond repair, Seute Deern is to be broken up in situ.
• An extension opened in 2000 is home to the other sections – polar and marine research, whaling, deep-sea fishery, sea-rescue as well as sailing as a sport and rowing.
• The Wilhelm Bauer, a sample of the Type XXI submarines operated by the Kriegsmarine for a short time near the end of WW II; this is the last fully intact, floating example of this class of craft.

External links

• Official website (in German and English)