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Originally established in 1973, the Nauticapedia is maintained online by John MacFarlane who (in June 2025) donated the entire project to the Maritime Museum of British Columbia. Several hundred contributors have submitted images and information that make the entries rich and interesting. John MacFarlane is a volunteer producing this nautical heritage site for the Maritime Museum of British Columbia with information on the nautical history of the Pacific coast heritage and other topics of general maritime interest. Click the links on the left side of the page to see the archived articles.

Maritime Museum of British Columbia

The Nauticapedia is owned and operated by the Maritime Museum of British Columbia in Victoria B.C. Canada. To learn more about the Museum and its many different activities go to Maritime Museum of British Columbia.

OUR SPONSORS

We gratefully acknowledge the financial support for the Nauticapedia from our sponsors who are commited to preserving and presenting the nautical heritage of British Columbia.

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SEARCHABLE DATABASES

Searchable Vessel Database Vessel Database

Follow this link to find the search portal for the searchable vessel database. This gives access to more than 97,200 vessel histories, many of which are illustrated with an image. Also records of more than 15,000 ship wrecks and nautical disasters.


Searchable Biography Database Biography Database

Follow this link to find nore than 58,600 biographies of mariners, naval personnel and persons with associations to the nautical history community.


NEW VIDEOS

Nauticapedia Video Channel Video Collection

Follow this link to find links to YouTube videos related to nautical history.


ARTICLES and IMAGES

Articles Articles Collection

Follow this link to find links to articles on nautical heritage and history.


NEW NAUTICAL HISTORY BOOKS

Book Reviews Book Reviews

Follow this link to find book reviews related to the nautical history of British Columbia.


FEATURED REFERENCE TABLES

The Nominal List of Members of the Royal Naval Canadian Volunteer Reserve (RNCVR)

29/02/2016 Did your grandfather serve in the Canadian Navy during the First World War? To participate in the First World War naval effort Canada formed the Royal Naval Canadian Volunteer Reserve (RNCVR) which filled out the forces needed to make the navy operational. This is a nominal list of 7,300 of the more than 8,000 who served as members of this organization. There is no publicly available list of members and this represents the result of more than 25 years of research through publicly available sources to produce this one. Each entry is linked to the biography database so interested viewers can see what we have for each name.


Canada’s Naval Aviators

29/02/2016 Few Canadians know about the Royal Canadian Navy’s contribution to Naval Aviation. More than 2,000 Canadians and some other naval aviators who served in Canada comprised this group. Originally published in hard cover by John MacFarlane and Robbie Hughes more than 25 years ago this list has now revised and available to visitors to The Nauticapedia.


The Royal Canadian Naval Reserve University Naval Training Division (UNTD)

Bill Clearihue has developed and updated the definitive Nominal List for the University Naval Training Division (UNTD) of the Royal Canadian Naval Reserve which contains the names of almost 7,000 former members and details of their service. Other lists available from him detail the former members known to be deceased and a list of former members who achieved positions of note in their civilian or military careers. Clearihue will update these lists from time–to–time and they will be updated on this site.


Canada’s Admirals & Commodores

Canada’s Admirals & CommodoresBook Cover

Canada has a rich naval heritage which tends to have a low public profile. To the detriment of the Navy and our awareness of our national culture and history, Canada’s naval contribution in two World Wars, the Korean conflict and the many United Nations and NATO operations is hidden from public view. The great contribution of the navy is both interesting and important – but it is difficult for history lovers to access the information. In 1994 the second edition of Canada’s Admirals and Commodores was published (ISBN #0–09693001–2–3). Since that time we have been maintaining updates to the entries found in that publication as well as tracking names of all subsequent appointments.


Nauticapedia

Site News: March 1, 2026

The vessel database has been updated and is now holding 101,190 vessel histories and the mariner and naval biography database has also been updated and now contains 58,624 entries.

Recently Bill Clearihue (Toronto), Kyle Stubbs (Seattle), Captain George Schneider San Diego), Tad Roberts (Gabriola Island) and Don Feltmate (Nova Scotia) have all joined the team as research correspondents.

My thanks to Vancouver photographer Ray Warren who is beginning the long process of filling gaps in the photo record of the vessel histories in the vessel database. Ray has been documenting the ships of Vancouver Harbour for more than 60 years.

Thanks to our chief Canadian contributor, Mike Rydqvist McCammon, for the hundreds (approaching a thousand) of photos he continues to contribute to illustrate British Columbia’s floating heritage.

My very 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. He provides advice whenever needed. His participation has been vital to keeping the Nauticapedia available to our netizens.

Thanks to John Spivey (our long term U.S. contributor) who is in his 6th year of fact checking all of the entries in the vessel database, one-by-one. This has resulted in thousands of updates (beyond counting) and corrections which might never have occurred without his intervention.

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