NEW BEDFORD, Mass., July 2 (UPI) -- The New Bedford Whaling Museum brings to life the glory decades in the 1800s when the Massachusetts port city "lit the world" with whale oil.
The recently expanded museum, located on the charmingly named Johnny Cake Hill, was established in 1903 and honors the sailors who risked their lives in the dangerous pursuit of giant whales in oceans around the world.
"In the 19th century New Bedford was the largest whaling port in the world," said Anne B. Brengle, executive director of the museum.
New Bedford was also the homeport of author Herman Melville, who wrote the classic whaling tale, "Moby Dick."
Detailing the rich history of American whaling in the age of sail, the museum is making plans to celebrate its 100th anniversary in 2003.
"These are very exciting times for a variety of reasons," Brengle told United Press International. It hopes to be able to put on exhibit within the year the skeleton of a rare 48-foot male sperm whale found beached off Nantucket June 7, among other things.
"We are waiting for the pathology reports," she said. "So far it's looking good."
The summer-long process to clean the bones to prepare the skeleton for exhibition is under way.
Visitors are already greeted by the 66-foot skeleton of a rare blue whale suspended from the ceiling of the large room just behind the ticket counter.
The centennial celebration will also include an extensive exhibition of more than 100 ship portraits and arctic scenes by artist William Bradford, who Brengle described as "perhaps the most renowned of local painters."
She said his work is "a perfect thing that sort of celebrates our centennial year."
Featuring hundreds of thousands of whaling-related artifacts, the museum recently added to its collection that of the Kendall Whaling Museum in Sharon, Mass.
"The gift of the Kendall collection places the New Bedford Whaling Museum high among maritime collections worldwide," Brengle said.
With the Kendall merger, "We are the most comprehensive collection related to man's interaction with whales spanning seven centuries, and seven continents, and seven seas," Brengle said. "It's just a remarkable collection."
The collaboration created in New Bedford the largest museum dedicated to the industry that made the whaling capital of the world, in its time, the "richest city in the world."
The museum contains the most extensive collections of whaling-related artifacts, paintings, glassware, some 2,000 scrimshaw objects, whaling tools including various types of harpoons, costumes, some 20,000 photographs, 45 ship models, 60 half-models, and hundreds of exotic objects the whalemen brought back from their long voyages.
The museum covers one of the 13-city blocks that make up the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park, a district established in 1996.
"The museum is certainly a prime destination, but visitors also take the time to see the other attractions that make up the park," including the visitors center and the city's working waterfront, John Piltzecker, park superintendent, told UPI.
New Bedford is a city of many peoples, including descendants of those who went to sea aboard whaling vessels. The city's rich cultural life reflects many traditions, including those of Portugal, Africa, French Canada, Cape Verde, the Azores, Norway, and many others.
Residents of Portuguese background make up more than 50 percent of New Bedford's current population.
Because of that diversity, Piltzecker said the National Park hosts a number of ethnic festivals, including the big event on the waterfront, the Summer Fest, July 12-14.
During the early and mid 1800's New Bedford was the most successful whaling port in the world. Some 329 whaling vessels called New Bedford home port in 1857, more than all other whaling ports combined. The port's fleet employed 10,000 men.
It was the smokeless-burning whale oil that gave rise to the industry, and made fortunes for investors and ship captains.
The decline of whaling around the world was set in motion just two years later, however, with the discovery of petroleum in Pennsylvania. Kerosene -- refined from petroleum -- would in time make hunting whales for their oil obsolete.
Harvested during voyages to far-flung whaling grounds in the world's oceans that lasted two to three years or more, whale blubber was melted down aboard ship to the oil that, among its many uses, was favored for lighting lamps.
That earned New Bedford the reputation as "The City That Lit the World," as visitors learn upon seeing the title to the film that introduces them to the museum.
The film was produced in conjunction with the museum by the National Park Service, which says some 300,000 visitors visit the historic park each year.
In addition to lamp oil, other whale products were highly prized, such as baleen, strips inside their mouths that whales used instead of teeth to feed.
Manufacturers used the baleen -- the same substance in human fingernails -- to make such things as stays for ladies' corsets, hoop skirt frames, buggy whips, parasol ribs, caps, hats, and shoe horns.
However, as kerosene took the place of whale oil, so did the invention of spring steel replace baleen.
When Brengle became director of the museum eight years ago, the attendance was at 48,000. It is now estimated at 110,000 per year and increasing.
"We've more than doubled, and in the last year we've risen 10 percent, which is pretty remarkable given what other museums are experiencing," she said.
Maria Pantages, who handles public relations for the museum, said a large number are return visitors.
"What they are noticing is that they need to spend a greater amount of time now going through the museum, that we've more than doubled our capacity in terms of exhibition space," Pantages said.
"People are truly pleased from the moment they walk in the doors to the moment they leave," she said.
One of the highlights of the museum is the great hall that houses the 85-foot whaling bark Lagoda, at half-scale the largest ship model in existence.
The Lagoda is a favorite with children, such as 6-year-old Katyana Sheridan, who said, "Cool," when told she was allowed to scamper around its polished decks and peer through hatches to the quarters below.
Climbing the riggings, however, is forbidden.
"What are riggings?" she asked.
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(For more information see the web sites whalingmuseum.org; nps.gov/nebe; newbedford.com).
