Our New London logo carries Connecticut's oyster shell over "1636" — the shared emblem of every Merlin Classics Connecticut town, marking the founding year of the Connecticut Colony. The oyster shell is the state's maritime shorthand: abundance, the shoreline, the working coast. Printed black-and-white with the worn look of an old oyster-crate label or a piece of coastal signage, it reads as vintage New England. What makes this one New London is the place behind it: the Whaling City, the Coast Guard Academy, the deep harbor on the Thames. On a tee or a cap it reads less like a souvenir and more like a piece of the Connecticut shoreline — worn plain.
The Whaling City on the Thames — a deep-water port that once sent more whaleships to sea than almost anywhere on Earth, and today trains the officers of the U.S. Coast Guard. New London sits at the mouth of the Thames River where it opens into Long Island Sound, on one of the deepest harbors on the Atlantic coast. The Pequot lived on this water long before John Winthrop the Younger founded the town in 1646; by the early 1800s it was the second-busiest whaling port in the world, and in the next century it became the home of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy and its tall ship, the Eagle. Whaling wealth, Revolutionary fire, and the Coast Guard — this page tells the story.
Why People Visit New London Connecticut
- Visit the U.S. Coast Guard Academy and, when she's in port, the barque Eagle.
- Tour Fort Trumbull State Park, the granite fort with harbor views and coastal-defense exhibits.
- See New London Harbor Light and the offshore New London Ledge Lighthouse.
- Walk Whale Oil Row and the historic downtown around Bank Street and the 1833 Custom House.
- Spend a summer day at Ocean Beach Park, or catch a show at the Garde Arts Center.
- Ride the Cross Sound Ferry across to Orient Point, or sail for Block Island.
