The X-24 was a miniature submarine manned by a crew of four and equipped with a couple of detachable explosives. The ground floor includes the 51-foot HMS X-24 midget submarine that the Royal Navy deployed during World War II. The rest of the museum’s collection is spread across two floors of the John Fieldhouse Building. That is enough to give you a glimpse of what the original layout was like in the earliest Royal Navy subs. Nevertheless, the submarine still retains its 18-inch torpedo tube, motor, diesel engine, and gear train. There is a sense of urgency to shore up the eroding lighthouse property and make the structure safe so that one day, visitors may experience a nearly two-centry old relic of Louisiana’s maritime history.Little remains of Holland 1’s original subsystems, which were stripped out before its trip to the scrap-yard. “It is still a functioning lighthouse”, Haase says, “it’s a privately-owned aid to navigation and everything works on it”. The Madisonville Lighthouse is now a rare structure. The working beacon still guides boaters to the Tchefuncte River at Madisonville Both structures were lost to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The Maritime Museum has parts of other Louisiana lighthouses that are no longer standing, like the Fresnel lens from the Chandeleur Lighthouse, and the iron light housing from the Pass Manchac Lighthouse. The Light Keeper’s House at the Maritime Museum in Madisonville The museum has a collection of artifacts from one of the early light keepers, who lived with his family at the lighthouse. The Madisonville Lighthouse was built in 1837 and fell victim to the Civil War, Haase says, “It was destroyed during the Civil War and then rebuilt using the same brick”. Lighthouse and light keeper’s house in the 1800s Volunteers at the museum are trying to raise funds to preserve the aging structure. And hopefully we can bring the general public out there once we get it safe”. Watch video about the historic Madisonville LighthouseĪccording to Maritime Museum board member Lynn Haase, “The Coast Guard gave that lighthouse to the town of Madisonville, and the town of Madisonville in turn gave it to the museum to protect. It is one of the few Louisiana lighthouses not destroyed by hurricanes. The Maritime Museum’s most famous landmark is a working lighthouse at the mouth of the river. The museum features a replica of that sub. WWI naval vessel built at the Jahncke Shipyard Step inside a replica of a Civil War submarineĭuring the Civil War, the South built and tested an early submarine which sank in Lake Pontchartrain. The World War 1 vessels were 300 feet in length. The Jahncke Shipyard in Madisonville received a government contract to build six of the wooden-hulled transport ships. Word War I naval ships under construction at Jahncke Shipyard in Madisonville In the early 1900s, Jahncke was a massive shipbuilder that employed more than 2,000 people, who built large wooden ships for the U.S. The Maritime Museum stands on the shore of the Tchefuncte River on the site the old Jahncke Shipyard. The museum houses a replica of the Steamship Louisiana that transported people back and forth across Lake Pontchartrain from New Orleans to Madisonville. A near life-sized model of the Steamship Louisiana The museum has displays of models and historic pictures that tell the history of shipping in Southeast Louisiana, from skiffs to schooners, and naval vessels to steamships. ![]() The Lake Pontchartrain Basin Maritime Museum in Madisonville, LA ![]() You can see the importance of the area’s waterways at the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Maritime Museum. The town was settled on the banks of the Tchefuncte River, two miles upstream from the northshore of Lake Pontchartrain. Abandoned tugboat docked near the Tchefuncte Riverįrom its earliest days, the town of Madisonville, Louisiana, was focused on water. ![]() ![]() A Madisonville museum has that history on display, including the building of naval ships for the First World War, and an ongoing effort to save Louisiana’s few remaining lighthouses. From early Native Americans to present day fishermen and recreational boaters, Lake Pontchartrain has a long maritime history.
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