What’s New?
- Biographies: Jamaica Kincaid, Marilyn Nelson, Clifford Ashley, Sylvia Earle, and Phillis Wheatley
- Audio: Harriet Beecher Stowe's The Pearl of Orr’s Island
- Video: Derek Walcott reads "Sea Grapes"
- Featured Author: Ursula K. Le Guin
Tag Archives: 18th Century
Wheatley, Phillis
by Jenny Liou and Claire Morgan (2022) WHEATLEY, PHILLIS (c. 1753-1784). Phillis Wheatley was the first African American, and one of the first women, to publish a book of poetry in the American colonies. As is the case with many Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, Middle Passage and Enslavement, Passenger Travel, Race/Ethnicity and the Sea
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Rowson, Susanna H.
by Philip Barnard (2000) ROWSON, SUSANNA H[ASWELL]. (1762-1824). Born in Portsmouth, England, Susanna H. Rowson became an actress, educator, prolific writer in several genres, and notably the author of Charlotte Temple (1791), America’s first best-selling novel. Rowson’s father, William Haswell, was Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Atlantic Ocean, Fiction, Merchant Marine, Multimedia/Multimodal, Passenger Travel, Plays
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Jones, John Paul
by Kay Seymour House (2000) JONES, JOHN PAUL (1747-1792). Born in Scotland, John Paul went to sea as an apprentice at age twelve. After inheriting property in Virginia, he added “Jones” to his name and became a lieutenant in the Continental Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, 20th Century, Navy/Coast Guard, Nonfiction, War
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Irving, Washington
by James J. Schramer (2000) IRVING, WASHINGTON (1783-1859). The first American to succeed as a professional author, Washington Irving was born in New York City in the last year of the American Revolution. Although he is best known today as the Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Atlantic Ocean, Fiction, Island Life, Nonfiction, Short Story
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Freneau, Philip
by Ted Olson (2000) FRENEAU, PHILIP [MORIN] (1752-1832). An “occasional” poet born in New York City, Philip Freneau during his long life wrote lyric and narrative poems on a wide range of subjects. Since he spent many years working on Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Caribbean, Fiction, Merchant Marine, Middle Passage and Enslavement, Poetry, War
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Fanning, Nathaniel
by Daniel E. Williams (2000) FANNING, NATHANIEL (1755-1805). Nathaniel Fanning’s Narrative of the Adventures of an American Navy Officer (1806) is one of the most reliable, graphic, and extensive eyewitness accounts of the famous battle between the Bonhomme Richard and Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, First-person narrative, Navy/Coast Guard, War
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Fanning, Edmund
by Michael P. Dyer (2000) FANNING, EDMUND (1769-1841). Captain Edmund Fanning of Stonington, Connecticut, was the younger brother of naval officer Nathaniel Fanning. In a memorial to the U.S. Congress in 1833, Edmund Fanning urged the legislature to support funding Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Exploration, First-person narrative, Navy/Coast Guard, Whaling/Sealing
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Equiano, Olaudah
by Arnold Schmidt (2000, rev. 2021) EQUIANO, OLAUDAH (1745-1797). By the time he died at the end of the eighteenth century, mariner, author, and abolitionist Olaudah Equiano had likely become the wealthiest and most famous Black man in the Atlantic Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, Arctic, Atlantic Ocean, audio, Caribbean, First-person narrative, Gulf of Mexico, Merchant Marine, Middle Passage and Enslavement, Navy/Coast Guard, Race/Ethnicity and the Sea, video, War
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Dunlap, William
by Robert Beasecker (2000) DUNLAP, WILLIAM (1766-1839). William Dunlap, born in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, showed considerable artistic aptitude at an early age and in 1784 was sent to England to study painting under Benjamin West. There, however, he became Continue reading text links
Delano, Amasa
by James L. Gray (2000) DELANO, AMASA (1763-1823). Amasa Delano, whose Voyages and Travels (1817) was the source for Herman Melville’s “Benito Cereno” (1855), was born in Duxbury, Massachusetts. After serving briefly in the Continental army during the American Revolution, Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Exploration, First-person narrative, Indian Ocean, Pacific Islands, Pacific Ocean, War
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Dana, Richard Henry, Sr.
by Joseph Flibbert (2000) DANA, RICHARD HENRY, SR. (1787-1879). Richard Henry Dana Sr. was born into a prominent Cambridge, Massachusetts, family. He was educated at Harvard, leaving without a degree in 1807. He studied law and passed the bar in 1811 Continue reading text links
Cuffe, Paul
by Brad S. Born (2000) CUFFE, PAUL (1759-1817). Seaman, captain, shipowner, businessman, author, and African colonizer, Paul Cuffe was born 17 January 1759, on Cuttyhunk Island, Massachusetts, the seventh child of his African-born father and Ruth Slocum, a Wampanoag Indian. Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean, First-person narrative, Merchant Marine
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Cooper, James Fenimore
by Thomas Philbrick (2000) COOPER, JAMES FENIMORE (1789-1851). With The Pilot (1824) James Fenimore Cooper invented the sea novel, for the first time employing the dominant literary form of the nineteenth century as the vehicle for a fiction in which the Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Coastal Life, Fiction, Navy/Coast Guard, Nonfiction, Whaling/Sealing
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Coker, Daniel
by Richard J. King (2000) COKER, DANIEL (1780-1846). The son of a white servant and a black slave, Daniel Coker was born in Maryland as Isaac Wright, changing his name when he escaped to New York. After buying his freedom, Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, First-person narrative, Middle Passage and Enslavement
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Byles, Mather
by John T. Shawcross BYLES, MATHER (1707-1788). Congregational minister, sermonizer, and poet, Mather Byles was the grandson of Increase Mather. Among his publications are two notable volumes, Poems on Several Occasions (1744) and Poems. The Conflagration. . . The God of Tempest and Continue reading text links
Burts, Robert
by Peter H. McCracken BURTS, ROBERT (17??-1839). Robert Burts was born in Maryland and entered the navy in 1833 as a midshipman. He sailed to the Mediterranean on the sloop Ontario, but upon return in 1836 he began a string Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Navy/Coast Guard, Piracy
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Bowditch, Nathaniel
by Daniel Finamore (2000) BOWDITCH, NATHANIEL (1773-1838). Mathematician, navigator, and astronomer, Nathaniel Bowditch authored the book that since 1802 has been the standard reference for celestial navigators worldwide. Schooled only to age ten, Bowditch taught himself mathematics and several foreign Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, 19th Century, Children's Writing, Exploration, Nonfiction, Science/Nature
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Blatchford, John
by Daniel E. Williams (2000) BLATCHFORD, JOHN (1762-1794). John Blatchford’s account of his voyages is one of the more extraordinary sea narratives from the American Revolution. First published in 1788 and soon republished in at least half a dozen other Continue reading text links
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Tagged 18th Century, Atlantic Ocean, First-person narrative, War
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