Project Mayflower
Today, the Mayflower II—the replica of the 1620 ship that brought the Pilgrims to America and launched a nation—is seen by some 2.6 million visitors to Plymouth annually and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. But there is much more to the replica’s story than meets the eye. In fact, the origins of Project Mayflower began in the 1950s not with an American, but with a British World War II veteran named Warwick Charlton who had what seemed an impossible build an historically accurate replica, sail her across the Atlantic, and present the finished product as a thank you to his country’s wartime ally. What Charlton didn’t know was that the son of a powerful New England financier had the same idea. Henry (“Harry”) Hornblower II wanted a replica just as badly, though for a different as a tourist attraction for a new museum he was building in Massachusetts, soon to be known as Plimoth Plantation, where the original Mayflower had landed centuries before. Despite different personal motives, Charlton and Hornblower agreed to join forces when they met by chance in 1955…