Schooner FAME of Salem

Schooner FAME of Salem FAME is a re-creation of a War of 1812 privateer that sails from Salem, MA. FAME is a re-creation of a privateer from the War of 1812.
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It has been honored with the coveted "Best of the Best" award as one of the top 1% of attractions worldwide by Tripadvisor. She sails daily from May-October out of her historic home port of Salem, MA. For more info, visit SchoonerFame.com.

THROWIN' IT BACK TO... 2019! FAME sailing with AMERICAN EAGLE at the Gloucester Schooner Festival. Tix are still availab...
06/19/2025

THROWIN' IT BACK TO... 2019! FAME sailing with AMERICAN EAGLE at the Gloucester Schooner Festival. Tix are still available for our annual fly-by on August 31 at SchoonerFame.com! But they will sell out.... they always do!

Five Top Things You’ll See on your Salem Cruise!2) You’ll see lighthouses — lots of them! We generally can see five or s...
06/18/2025

Five Top Things You’ll See on your Salem Cruise!

2) You’ll see lighthouses — lots of them!

We generally can see five or six lighthouses on a typical trip. The Derby Wharf and Hospital Point lighthouses we usually see quite close up, as they are right in Salem Harbor. But after that it depends on where the wind is coming from, because the wind determines our route for each trip.

If the wind carries us to Beverly, you get a good look at the Hospital Point lighthouse. If we end up sailing to Marblehead, you’ll see the hundred-year-old steel tower of the Chandler Hovey Light. Either way, off in the distance you’ll see the lighthouse at Baker’s Island, once an important landmark. And if you’re joining us for a sunset cruise, you’ll see all these lights come on as the sun nears the horizon. You may even sight the distant blink of the Eastern Point Light, 12 miles away in Gloucester. See our other blog entries for more on each light!

On this date in 1812, President Madison signed the declaration of war, officially initiating the War of 1812. On June 1 ...
06/18/2025

On this date in 1812, President Madison signed the declaration of war, officially initiating the War of 1812. On June 1 Madison had delivered a war message to Congress, outlining American grievances against Great Britain and recommending a declaration of war. He detailed British violations of American maritime rights, including impressment of sailors and interference with trade. He also cited British encouragement of Native American attacks on American settlers. The House of Representatives voted 79-49 in favor of war on June 4, and the Senate followed suit with a narrower 19-13 vote on June 17.

On this date in 1814, the Baltimore privateer Midas handed over a group of prisoners to the US Marshall in Savannah, Geo...
06/17/2025

On this date in 1814, the Baltimore privateer Midas handed over a group of prisoners to the US Marshall in Savannah, Georgia. The Midas had captured the British privateer Dash, with 41 men on board, 19 of whom were black and “reported to be slaves”.

Whether or not these men were actually slaves in unclear. Although Britain had outlawed the slave trade, slavery was still legal and indeed widespread in the British colonies. On board the Dash, however, these men were serving as petty officers (one was the carpenter, another the bosun) and seamen, so they certainly were combatants.

Depositing prisoners with the US Marshall had become a significant source of income for privateers by this stage of the war. Earlier in 1814, the imbalance of prisoners had led Congress to authorize a bounty of $100 per captured British sailor, with the goal of accumulating prisoners who could then be exchanged for Americans being held by the British.

Officials in Georgia took custody of the black prisoners, but listed them as slaves, and refused to pay the bounty, although the British had never refused to exchange prisoners on account of their race. The British had gone so far as to emancipate American slaves that fell into their hands during the Revolution and in the War of 1812, settling them in British possessions or in some cases arming them to fight against their former masters. This tactic greatly alarmed white Americans living in southern states (such as Georgia) with large enslaved populations.

Obviously, classifying black men as anything other than slaves, and exchanging them one-for-one for white Americans, opened a can of worms in a nation that was sharply divided over slavery. US Attorney General Richard Rush, consulted on the case, replied brusquely that “the slaves of the enemy taken and brought into port … were not objects of the bounty provided by the act.”

The owners of the privateer were forced to get an Act of Congress in order to receive the bounty, which was not paid until 1822.

Five Top Things You’ll See on your Salem Cruise!1) You’ll see the sails go up… and the captain turn off the motor! Yes, ...
06/16/2025

Five Top Things You’ll See on your Salem Cruise!

1) You’ll see the sails go up… and the captain turn off the motor!

Yes, we really do sail our traditional wooden schooner, and we love the reaction we get when our guests realize that the wind alone is powering our progress through Salem Sound! One of our skippers calls out “Welcome to the 19th century!” as he cuts the motor.

As long as the weather is reasonable, guests are welcome to take a turn at the tiller and feel the pressure of the water on the rudder as FAME sails along. The schooner’s eight-foot-long locust tiller is a thing of beauty, handcrafted especially for FAME at the local boatyard where she was launched in 2003.

Happy birthday, Ila! Camper, CIT, and now deckhand (in absentia).
06/16/2025

Happy birthday, Ila! Camper, CIT, and now deckhand (in absentia).

"Crew was exceptionally friendly and knowledgeable. Right amount of chatting and quiet. Beautiful day on the water for t...
06/16/2025

"Crew was exceptionally friendly and knowledgeable. Right amount of chatting and quiet. Beautiful day on the water for three generations on Father’s Day."

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

— Get Your Guide review, June 2025

“Salem simply matters. The first town founded in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the last important scene of witchcraft pe...
06/15/2025

“Salem simply matters. The first town founded in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the last important scene of witchcraft persecution in Western history, the site of the House of Seven Gables, and the birthplace of Nathaniel Hawthorne — this spot represents to Americans much that is significant about their past. Yet the role seafaring played in its history usually passes without notice. How many of us realize that Salem was originally settled by fishermen, that most of the presiding judges in the witch trials of 1692 were shipowners, that Hawthorne’s seven-gabled house was constructed out of profits earned in the codfish trade, and that Hawthorne himself was the son, grandson and great-grandson of sea captains? Salem was first and last a seafaring community…”

— Daniel Vickers, Young Men and the Sea

On this date in 2003, our representation of the privateer schooner Fame was launched from Harold Burnham’s boatyard in E...
06/14/2025

On this date in 2003, our representation of the privateer schooner Fame was launched from Harold Burnham’s boatyard in Essex.

“The Fame was launched in the traditional way, which is what we call a side launch. We lean the boat over onto one bilgeway, and skate it into the water on its keel.

“People have asked why we still do it that way, and the fact of the matter is that in my yard there’s no other way to do it. In other places where they’ve built these traditional boats, they build them in a parking lot and then they drive a crane in and pick it up and lower it into the water with the crane. When you’re building in a mud bog, which is basically what I’m doing, you don’t have that option.

“But the other thing about a traditional launch is that it’s a lot of fun. The aura of uncertainty draws people from miles and miles to see these launchings, and also they want to share in that process of watching the boat slide into the water for the first time. It’s quite an event.

“While it’s a great event for everybody else, it’s a lot of work for myself and the crew. And so on launch day, my first concern is getting the boat safely into the water. Everything else is secondary. The Fame was the biggest boat that I had launched using that technique, and it involved quite a bit of thought. As it was, it didn’t go as quickly as it might have.

“But the interesting thing about using that technique is, you never know exactly when it’s going to go — there’s no way of triggering it, so sometimes they go hard and sometimes they go easy. The Fame went harder than some, but the end result was that we launched her and it took only about two and a half hours with a 20-ton jack to push it off the bank.

“That may seem like a lot of work, but the real story is that there were only about 60 billable man hours involved in the whole job, and the cost of it was a fraction of what it would have cost to bring a crane in, or to do it in any other way.”

Bring the Dads, bring the Grads! Lots of room Saturday at 5:00 and 7:00, and on Sunday, Fathers Day, at 11:30, 1:30, 5:...
06/14/2025

Bring the Dads, bring the Grads! Lots of room Saturday at 5:00 and 7:00, and on Sunday, Fathers Day, at 11:30, 1:30, 5:00 and 7:00! Get the lowest rates (and the best service) by booking direct at SchoonerFame.com!












It's almost Flag Day! One of our favorite holidays :) You may have noticed that FAME flies a custom-made flag based on h...
06/13/2025

It's almost Flag Day! One of our favorite holidays :) You may have noticed that FAME flies a custom-made flag based on historical paintings of Salem vessels from the Federal period. All flags back then were handmade, so there were endless variations!

Happy birthday, Captain Justin!
06/12/2025

Happy birthday, Captain Justin!

Address

86 Wharf Street
Salem, MA
01970

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 7pm
Tuesday 9am - 7pm
Wednesday 9am - 7pm
Thursday 9am - 7pm
Friday 9am - 7pm
Saturday 9am - 7pm
Sunday 9am - 7pm

Telephone

(978) 729-7600

Website

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FAME is a replica of a privateer from the War of 1812. She sails daily from May-October out of her historic home port of Salem, MA. For more info, visit SchoonerFame.com.

#1 ranked boat in Salem, #1 ranked tour in Salem, #1 ranked outdoor activity in Salem according to TripAdvisor (October 2018)