Our Progress

The SS United States Conservancy owns an extensive collection of ship artifacts, fixtures, furnishings, vintage audio-visual material, and archival documentation that tell the story of the SS United States and situate America's Flagship in its cultural and historical context. For over a decade, the Conservancy has advanced plans for a future museum to house its collections and has explored both shipboard and land-based design possibilities and visitor experiences.

As plans for the vessel’s deployment as an artificial, underwater reef take shape, we are committed to creating a complementary, unique, and dynamic, land-based museum that will incorporate state-of-the-art immersive experiences for visitors. Our forthcoming museum will draw from our work over the years mounting major temporary physical and digital exhibitions, leveraging our significant collection of one-of-a-kind artifacts, artwork, furniture, archival documentation, and documentation of the ship’s design, construction, career, and history. We have also loaned items from our collections to exhibitions at the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of American History, the Peabody-Essex Museum, and the Norman Rockwell Museum. We are actively exploring additional exhibition and partnership opportunities as we plan for a permanent museum and immersive visitor experience in Destin-Fort Walton Beach, Florida near the ship's deployment location.

The Conservancy has initiated a comprehensive museum planning process including a series of conceptual charrettes. With support from The Roz Group and Eisterhold & Associates, these resulted in evocative renderings and potential interpretive themes for a future shipboard museum. We also conducted a comprehensive museum and curatorial planning survey of our membership that explored a range of potential thematic and design elements in the Conservancy's future SS United States museum. CLICK HERE to learn more about this work.

Learn about our recent digital exhibitions by clicking HERE.

Our Evolving Plans

With support from our generous supporters and Okaloosa County, the Conservancy will be evaluating locations and designs for the land-based SS United States museum during the coming. The vision is to not only showcase the ship's rich history through artifacts, but also explore the cultural importance of the ship's mid-century modern design and the record-breaking engineering that made her a marvel of the 20th century. The Conservancy plans to encompass major architectural features from the vessel - such as one or both funnels, the radar mast, and other iconic elements - into the museum, as well recreate iconic spaces for the public to enjoy. Museum visitors will also have the unique opportunity to experience the ship's iconic spaces and travel back in time through virtual- and augmented reality-enhanced displays.

The museum and visitor center will feature exciting and inspiring displays that explore the SS United States’ emergence as a singular American post-war achievement. It will explore a range of compelling themes, including 20th century industrial innovation, mid-century modern art and design, maritime history, and American cultural identity and artistic expression.

During this planning and construction period, the Conservancy will also continue to expand its permanent collections, develop additional traveling and temporary exhibitions, expand its oral history initiative, and design educational modules that explore the role of the SS United States in the context of Cold War history, labor relations, maritime transportation, immigration, gender, race and ethnicity, and other themes.