A few from the New Bedford Whaling Museum, where I spent yesterday researching for the Hallelujah Wonder book...
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| Mandible of a Humpback. This one is still seeping oil. If you look closely, you will see a plastic plate catching the drip. |
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| skeleton of the Humpback. |
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| I forget the name of this thing, but it was used by captains and sailors to hop ships. They'd string a rope between the two ships and pulley this thing across over the ocean. Ninety percent of sailors, captains included, did not know how to swim. |
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| Harpoon number 17 was invented by a blacksmith and revolutionized whaling. The blacksmith, an escaped slave, never made a fortune from it even though every harpoon after it was based on his model. He was afraid that if he filed a patent, his old master would come and claim him. And his money. |
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| Today's view of the port. |
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| Scrimshaw. |
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| Close up of the oil in the whale bone. |
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| Those two knobby bones are what's left of the legs whales used to have. |
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| A whaling scene by William Bradford. |
Great stories...the oil in the whalebone, the harpoon invented by a slave, the fact that most sailors could not swim.
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