Take Me to The Water: Histories of The Black Pacific

Take Me to The Water: Histories of The Black Pacific is open now at the Maritime Museum of San Diego, where it runs daily from 10 AM to 5 PM through December 31, 2026. The exhibit is hosted aboard the ferryboat Berkeley, one of the museum's historic vessels, so you'll be walking through the gallery on a boat rather than in a traditional museum hall.

It covers five centuries of Black mariner legacies—whaling, fishing, sailing, exploration, and defense—that helped shape the U.S. Pacific. The whole point is to push back against the white-dominated accounts of maritime history. From the 16th to the 20th century, Black whalers, commercial mariners, fishers, explorers, soldiers, and sailors worked the Pacific Coast and the high seas. Others carried cargo, manned waterfront docks, or spent their time surfing, swimming, and studying the ocean. It's a wide look at how Black people have been part of the water on this coast for a long time.

The exhibit was developed with UC San Diego curator Dr. Caroline Collins, a San Diego native and co-founder of the research collective Black Like Water. It draws on her scholarship to bring together maritime history and storytelling. Museum president and CEO Christina Connett Brophy described it as a way to expand the understanding of Black origins in America beyond the slave ship.

Admission is included with general admission to the museum, so you can see this and the rest of the collection in one go. The museum is at 1492 North Harbor Dr., San Diego, CA 92101, and it's open every day from 10 AM to 5 PM until the end of the year.