For almost 200 years, in small towns from Lyme to East Windsor, more than 40 family-owned yards crafted wooden ships by hand. Shipbuilding was Connecticut's first important industry and was second only to farming in total employment. The golden era of shipbuilding extended from 1750 to 1850, though a few yards continued building up to the Civil War and later. In river towns at the same time grew up "men of iron," who became risk-taking merchants and courageous masters of trading schooners, privateers and Atlantic packets. To document the Connecticut River Valley's maritime contributions, in context with national events, this book vividly covers such subjects as the early mariners and traders, coastal and West Indian vessels, privateering, Connecticut's navy, river-built packets, shipyard owners and workers, river steamboats and twentieth-century shipbuilders.
