Sackets Harbor, NY Shirts

Twice during the War of 1812, the British crossed Lake Ontario to take Sackets Harbor, and twice the village turned them back, first in July 1812 and again in May 1813. Between battles it did something arguably more important: it built the fleet. This little harbor became the American navy's chief shipyard on the lake, launching a dozen warships while thousands of soldiers, sailors, and shipwrights crowded a village that had been frontier wilderness a generation before. The battlefield is a state historic site now, a green headland where the lake wind never quite stops, and the harbor below holds sailboats instead of gunboats. Limestone storefronts from the boom years still face the water, which is more than most boomtowns can say. Our Sackets Harbor design works like a signal flag: the harbor's curve, a tall ship riding at anchor, 1812 lettered plainly beneath. History here is not a theme. It is the founding fact. Sackets Harbor merchants take their places on this page as they join ShirtMap.