About Us

SEAMAHP, co-founded by Dr. Calvin Mires and Captain Laurel Seaborn, is an innovative non-profit organization that creates hands-on programs in maritime heritage and encourages collaboration and support of local community partners, museums and organizations to further that goal.

Calvin Mires is a Maritime Archaeologist (Research Associate III) at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute and a professor at Bridgewater State University in Massachusetts. He has over seven years of experience as the staff archaeologist for East Carolina University’s Program in Maritime Studies, one of the only departments in the United States dedicated to teaching graduate students history, theory, and techniques in maritime archaeology. He has trained and supervised over a 100 students and worked on over 30 different projects around the world. He holds several diving and boating certifications, including NAUI dive instructor. Calvin wrote his doctoral research on how the non-diving public perceives and values preservation of maritime archaeological heritage. He is interested in understanding how people today relate to the important role maritime history and heritage has contributed to society. With this expanded knowledge, effective and informed policies can be created that protect maritime heritage resources as well as offer the public enhanced benefits and educational opportunities.

Laurel Seaborn currently works as a visiting professor at Salem State University MA, and a sailing instructor. She has worked as crew and captain aboard both modern and historic sailing ships, including Lady Washington, a replica of an 1750s brig, Gazela, the 1883 Portuguese barkentine, and Kaskelot, a 1930s ship-rigged British vessel. From those experiences, she gained first-hand knowledge of types of vessels, their construction, and life at the sea. She graduated from East Carolina University in North Carolina from the Maritime Studies Program, including Underwater Archaeology. Besides various sites and shipwrecks for field schools, she has worked as archaeological technician, research vessel mate, and acting field director on projects for NC Underwater Archaeology Branch on the pirate Blackbeard’s shipwreck of Queen Anne’s Revenge in Beaufort, NC. Her master’s thesis focused on the maritime archaeology of shipboard women in the nineteenth century, and she is expanding her research into a book.

Our Community Partners

We encourage collaboration and support of local community partners, museums and organizations to further the goal of place-based, experiential learning that brings maritime stories to life for our students.

We partnered with Salem Maritime National Historic Site for the Trails & Sails Event to do public outreach, including putting together wooden ship frame puzzles, and practicing in water with an ROV (remote operated vehicle)!