Naval Apprentices at Sail Drill on Historic Ship 'Constellation'

A must see for tall ship and early film aficionados, this short film shows naval cadets raising and lowering sales on the USS Constellation. The film is in wonderful condition and is beautiful to watch. The film is not very long at about 2 minutes and is not terribly action packed, but it is a fascinating glimpse of a world gone by, where large sailing ships could often be seen in harbors around the world, and where naval cadets needed to know how to climb rigging and loosen sail. This film and many others like it can be viewed at the Library of Congress' fantastic web site of early motion pictures:

Naval Apprentices at Sail Drill on Historic Ship 'Constellation' (1900)

This Edison feature was shot on November 22, 1900 in Newport, RI. What we basically see is the ship Constellation having its sails raised and lowered by naval cadets. Yes, that's pretty much all that happens for two-minutes but I think history buffs are going to get a real kick out of seeing this famous ship in action. I'd say that they're going to be the main ones who are entertained by this but those who enjoy ships and sailing will probably enjoy look at this old film. There's certainly no action going on and in fact, very little does happen here so it's probably a good bet that modern viewers and even fans of these old movies aren't going to take much from this. The print condition is in very good shape allowing one to clearly see what's going on and thankfully it's also shot extremely well.