Site Navigation:
Searchable Databases
Articles Archive
Pacific Nautical Heritage...
- Gallery of Light and Buoy Images
- Gallery of Mariners
- Gallery of Ship Images
- Gallery of Ship Wrecks
- Gallery of Monuments and Statues
- Gallery of Nautical Images
- Gallery of Freshwater Images
- Gallery of New Books
Canadian Naval Topics…
- Nautical History Videos
- UNTD
- British Columbia Heritage
- Arctic and Northern Nautical Heritage
- Western Canada Boat and Ship Builders
- Gallery of Arctic Images
- Reflections on Nautical Heritage
- British Columbia Heritage
Site Search:
Looking for more? Search for Articles on the Nauticapedia Site.
Who We Are
We are a small group of volunteers – individuals who all have strong professional backgrounds in maritime heritage. We are all authors of books, articles and papers related to this body of knowledge as well as career links to active marine agencies in Canada. We are all volunteers and do this work as enthusiasts for the love of maritime heritage. Our contributing writers and authors have similar backgrounds and are volunteers when working with The Nauticapedia.
The Curator of the Nauticapedia Project is:
John MacFarlane
As Director of The Nauticapedia Project he is realizing a dream dating back to 1976 to highlight the defining stories of British Columbia’s heritage. He was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, (London U.K.) in 1994. He is the scion of three generations of Pacific coast tug boaters and naval officers. He is a retired Director of the Maritime Museum of British Columbia in Victoria BC and is now the Curator Emeritus of that venerable institution. He is the author of numerous books and articles on maritime, naval and aviation topics including Canada’s Admirals & Commodores; Canada’s Naval Aviators and the Official Guide to Pacific Rim National Park.
Site News: August 18, 2024
The vessel database has been updated and is now holding 93,618 vessel histories (with 15,919 images and 13,842 records of ship wrecks and marine disasters). The mariner and naval biography database has also been updated and now contains 58,620 entries (with 4,020 images).
In 2023 the Nauticapedia celebrated the 50th Anniversary of it’s original inception in 1973 (initially it was on 3" x 5" file cards). It has developed, expanded, digitized and enlarged in those ensuing years to what it is now online. If it was printed out it would fill more than 300,000 pages!
My special thanks to our volunteer IT adviser, John Eyre, who (since 2021) has modernized, simplified and improved the update process for the databases into semi–automated processes. His participation has been vital to keeping the Nauticapedia available to our netizens.
Also my special thanks to my volunteer content accuracy checker, John Spivey of Irvine CA USA, who has proofread thousands of Nauticapedia vessel histories and provided input to improve more than 11,000 entries. His attention to detail has been a huge unexpected bonus in improving and updating the vessel detail content.