NEW MARITIME STUDIES INITIATIVE DETAILED IN TALK JAN. 28

Jonathan Phillips, an Old Dominion University assistant professor of history, will deliver a lecture on the history of the Chesapeake Bay and the university's new maritime studies initiative at 3:30 p.m. on Monday, Jan. 28, at the Center for Coastal Physical Oceanography.

The lecture, which is part of a spring seminar series, will be held in the center's quarters on the third floor of the Innovation Research Park @ ODU building in the southeastern corner of the campus. Events in the series are free and open to the public.

Phillips is a specialist in American military history, but he also is a sailing enthusiast and it was his interest in local waters that led him to take on a maritime history project launched jointly by ODU and the Virginia Maritime History Foundation (VMHF).

He and the VMHF developed a course, History 396, "Shifting Sands, Tidal Waters: Exploring the Culture and Environment of the Chesapeake Bay, 1850s to Present," that debuted in January. He and his students will spend a week in March exploring the Chesapeake Bay on the VMHF's pilot schooner, Virginia.

Phillips and representatives from other ODU academic divisions, including oceanography, biology, geography and business, have formed an informal maritime studies group and are building a relationship with the VMHF to promote more studies and research focusing on coastal Virginia.