Our mission is to provide waterfront access, and promote historic preservation. We foster an understanding of the NY Harbor as a waterway carrying commerce and commuters as well as a means for culture and recreation.

Our Tug & Barge tour traveled to seven ports of call in 2009 and had over 11,000 visitors visit the historic vessels. Town docks in Hoboken, Manhattan’s Hudson River Park Pier 84, Poughkeepsie, Waterford, Hudson and Kingston bustled with barge tours, tug trips, showboat performances, contradances, lectures, discussions, recycled objects art workshops, music and theatre.

Tug & Barge Tour 2010 is now in its planning stages. Visit our What's New section to browse our current and upcomming exhibits and performances. Through these programs, we aim to 1) create docking facilities for historic/educational vessels along the shores of our water highways and 2) develop a network of traveling tugs, barges, fireboats, sloops and other floating stages that will serve to raise the public's awareness of the history and ongoing daily significance of water highways to our lives today.

The Museum shares these common goals with other educational movements including Working on Water and the North River Historic Ship Society.

We ask that you consider becoming a sponsor and DONATE to our historic preservation efforts. To donate by mailing a check, download and print our latest newsletter.

The next time you happen to be in Red Hook during our Open Hours, be sure to stop by as simply vising the historic floating barge museum supports our goal to preserve maritime heritage. The Museum is constantly collaborating and making great contributions to maritime history and the Red Hook neighborhood.

View our Captain's Log for our latest news and updates. We invite you to contact us for information about our education programs or visit our links of resources.

School and Group Tours are available other times by appointment. We welcome camps, school groups, tourist groups, bike and bus tours and others by appointment. Cost is $7/person for an hour-long visit. For schools, we offer a curriculum on the rescue of the barge by a clown and juggler and how goods were transported prior to today’s bridges and tunnels.

Visitors can also learn about our harbor geography, rise and fall of the tides, guess the color of the water and more. The visit ends with a juggling performance by Showboat Captain David Sharps,

Our youngest visitors are our biggest fans. Our favorite quote:
"How do you keep up with yourself? You must be very tired" Hugh, Peter and Mary (4-18-2000).

Visit the barge during our Open Hours on Thursdays 4-8pm and Saturdays 1-5pm or by appointment for groups to see the exhibition on the walls, “Showboats-‘Round the Bend!” tells the story of the American showboat along the nation’s water highways. Produced with The Theatre Museum, NYC and watch the showboat video!

The exhibition will be concluding soon and Arriving in spring 2010: Tugboat Art by Richard Samuelson

Our permanent collection includes a 94 year old wooden covered barge and a visit aboard to see the bells and gongs for tugboat communicating, rope cannon, showboat captain’s attire, the ever-popular ball machine by George Rhoades, and much more.

During the summer of 2002, the museum completed a critical Drydock Project to repair the last surviving railroad barge and protect it from further damage from wood-eating shipworms. We ask that you consider becoming a sponsor and contribute to this preservation project. [ Click Here ] for project details. We invite you to contact us for information about our education programs or visit our links of resources.

The Municipal Arts Society of New York awarded the Waterfront Museum its 2003 Certificate of Merit for the work we have done to make life better in NYC. The United Nations designated the Lehigh Valley Railroad Barge #79 the “Regional Craft of the Year of the Oceans ’98” for its efforts in opening up access to waterfronts for the general public within the NY Harbor.

Since 1994, the Waterfront Museum has docked at off Conover Street in Red Hook. Special thanks to Greg O'Connell and Kings Harbor View Associates for creating a this wonderful walkway and garden and for offering the Museum a long term homeport for our programs and operations. The Museum is especially grateful to Red Hook's John Quadrozzi, Jr. of Gowanus Industrial Park, Inc. for offering us temporary dock space in the Gowanus Bay from 2002-2005 while we built our current facility.

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