In 1946, within the organizational structure of the Baltic Institute, Szczecin Maritime Museum was established. In 1950 it became a branch of the later National Museum. It accepted part of the exhibits from the collections of the Stadtmuseum and Pommersches Landesmuseum. Within the structure of the Maritime Museum Branch there was established a model building shop, natural and ethnographic branch. An important part of the collections were the exhibits after the first Polish maritime museum organized in 1934 by Stanislaw Ledóchowski. They took over several models of ships, printing blocks, glass negatives, archives, publications after him.
Collection
Marine engineering
In the museum there are located a few items from ss Captain K. Maciejewicz. The most important of these is the crane which was exhibited as a monument in Szczecin downtown. In addition, there are the elevator steam generators, steam engines, steering, small equipment from different vessels. Complete equipment of the bridge of the steamer SS Poznan have been preserved.
Watercraft
The collection includes two vessels: the fishing boat Swi 38 (type KU 131) built in 1950 in Ustka and lifeboat from s.s. Poznan.
Port facilities
The most important exhibits are three gantry cranes from the twenties of the last century, exposed at the waterfront old town, representing review of Szczecin.
Models vessels
The collection contains hundreds of models of vessels. They were built at different scales and time, since the nineteenth century up to today. The most important place among them is occupied by the models from Stanisław Ledóchowski’s museum, including a model of a passenger ship SS Polonia.
A very rare object is, dating from the early twentieth century, half-model of yacht Kaiser Wilhelm. It is one of the few remnants of the Szczecin plant Vulcan.
Important for the identity of the maritime people in the region are models of units produced in the shipyards of Szczecin (Shipyard Adolf Warski, Shipyard Nowa Sp. z o.o., Marine Yacht Shipyard Leonid Teliga).
Other models
A unique object originates from the early twentieth century. It is a 1:2 scale "working" model of the ship's steam engine. The model is made of spruce and served didactic purposes.
Navigation devices
The collections contain the eighteenth century octants and sextants of various production, from the nineteenth century to contemporary, compass (magnetic, gyrocompasses, solar and astro compasses), chronometers, rangers, radar and navigation maps.
Technical collection
The most valuable pieces in the collection are tube radios from the first half of the twentieth century. Some of them are objects from the most famous interwar Polish factories Electrit in Vilnius. The collection also includes cameras, measuring instruments, TVs, etc.