MUSEUM NEWS istration is $250. (Marcia Myers, VP, Maritime Preservation, NTHP, 1785 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington , DC 20036; 202 673-4000) The Gulf Coast History and Humanities Conference has issued a call for papers for their 18th annual conference, the theme of which is "The Maritime History of the Gulf Coast." Papers presented at the conference, scheduled for 9- I I March, will be publi shed in the Gulf Coast Historical Review. The conference is sponsored jointly by the University of South Alabama, Pensacola Junior College and the University of West Florida. (George H. Daniels, Chair, Dept. of History , or Michael Thomason, Program Coordinator, University of South Alabama, Hi story Department, Mobile, AL 36688; 205 460-6210)

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The Institute for Nautical Archaeology, in cooperation with the Museum voor Scheepsarcheologie and the Rijksdienst voor de IJsselmeerpolders (RIJP) in the Netherlands, has established an archaeology internship for Texas A&M students investigating shipwrecks that have come to light as the result of land reclamation in the Zuyder Zee. Over 350 shipwrecks spanning the history of navigation on the Zuyder Zee from the twelfth to the twentieth centuries have been discovered since the 1940s. The large number of vessels in so small a region affords historians a picture of the development of shipping and shipbuilding in a specific area with a clarity not possible anywhere in the world. Much of the work is rescue archaeology, and owing to constraints of time, money and personnel the museum usually excavates only enough of a wreck to determine its size, age and basic type. Ships are then reburied or dismantled and removed to a ship graveyard used by the museum to store excavated ships below the water table. (Institute for Nautical Archaeology, PO Drawer HG, College Station, TX 77840; 409 845-6694) The Marine Museum of the Great Lakes at Kingston has begun work on the government-funded Great Lakes Historic Ships Research Project (GLHSRP) designed to facilitate the documentation and analysis of historic ships and small craft from the Great Lakes region through the use of an advanced computer system for the study of hull shapes. The project employs the Computer Assisted Design (CAD) "Fast Yacht" software and Hewlett Packard computer hardware in interpreting existing lines plans, such as SEA HISTORY, SUMMER 1988

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