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    Alaska's Whaling Coast
    Alaska's Whaling Coast
    Alaska's Whaling Coast
    Ebook167 pages1 hour

    Alaska's Whaling Coast

    By Dale Vinnedge

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    About this ebook

    In 1850, commercial whaling ships entered the Bering Sea for the first time. There, they found the summer grounds of bowhead whales, as well as local Inuit people who had been whaling the Alaskan coast for 2,000 years. Within a few years, almost the entire Pacific fleet came north each June to find a path through the melting ice, and the Inuit way of whaling in fact, their entire livelihood would be forever changed. Baleen was worth nearly $5 a pound. But the new trading posts brought guns, alcohol, and disease. In 1905, a new type of whaling using modern steel whale-catchers and harpoon cannons appeared along the Alaskan coast. Yet the Inuit and Inupiat continue whaling today from approximately 15 small towns scattered along the Arctic Ocean and the Bering Strait. Whaling for these people is a life-or-death proposition in a land considered uninhabitable by many, for without the whale, whole villages probably could not survive as they have for centuries.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateMay 5, 2014
    ISBN9781439644973
    Alaska's Whaling Coast
    Author

    Dale Vinnedge

    Dale Vinnedge is a recognized expert on international whaling. He is past president of the Friends of the National Maritime Museum Library, and research for this book took him to some of these traditional whaling villages along the Alaskan coast.

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      Book preview

      Alaska's Whaling Coast - Dale Vinnedge

      author.

      INTRODUCTION

      Whaling in Alaska was being prosecuted thousands of years ago, and this whaling has continued through to this year. The last chapter of whaling in Alaska is currently being played out between the whales and today’s Inuit and Inupiat native whalers.

      For millennia, bowhead and beluga whales have been migrating north from the Pacific Ocean to the Arctic Ocean during the spring. The whales navigate north as leads (passageways) develop in ice that formed in the sea during the winter, returning in open water (no ice) in the fall. These whales have been hunted for thousands of years by indigenous peoples. Along the coastlines of Alaska, Inuit and Inupiat natives in skin boats (umiaks) have attacked the whales with spears and lances for at least 2,000 years. Their methods are steeped in custom and tradition and have changed little over the centuries until recently.

      After 1850, their whaling methods—and, in fact, their entire livelihood—would be changed forever. The bark Superior found a large number of whales in the Arctic Ocean. In just a few years, many whalers and almost the entire Pacific fleet came north around June of each year to find a path through the melting ice. The whalers spread out over the Arctic Ocean and began to have contact with the natives who lived along the coast of Alaska. Whalers from America and Europe brought goods to trade (beads, cloth, and so on) but also brought guns, ammunition, and alcohol. The whalers unknowingly also brought illnesses such as measles and venereal diseases, which the natives had no natural defense for. The trade in guns and alcohol was so pervasive that the US government commissioned the revenue cutter Bear to protect the whalers in Alaskan waters from other countries and to police the illegal traffic in firearms and alcohol. The whalers built trading posts, some of which, such as Point Barrow, became small towns as the natives took up residence nearby.

      The bowhead whales yielded baleen used in the manufacture of corset stays, buggy whips, and more, and in 1905, it was worth nearly $5 per pound. But around the same time, petroleum products began to replace baleen with early plastics that were far cheaper and less dangerous to acquire. The market for baleen practically disappeared, leaving only a few ships in the whaling and trading business. A few ships managed to whale into the 1920s.

      A new type of whaling was introduced in Norway in the 1860s. Svend Foyn, a Norwegian, invented the harpoon cannon and the steel whale catcher ship, which enabled the whaling industry to go after species of whales previously ignored as unattainable. This new type of whaling was centered around meat and oil, and the industry was soon resurrected. The Norwegians began to exploit whales in all oceans of the world, and around 1910, whaling companies began to show up in southern Alaska. They built onshore whaling stations and hunted the whales into the 1930s and 1940s; this industry stopped before World War II and did not start up again after the war.

      The Inuit and Inupiat whalers continue to go whaling from approximately 15 small towns scattered along the Arctic Ocean and some of the small islands in the Bering Strait. For these natives, whaling is a life-or-death proposition in a land considered uninhabitable by many; without the whale, whole villages probably could not continue to live as basically as they have for many years.

      This detailed photograph shows whale men on a three-masted schooner stripping a whale upon the starboard side of the ship.

      One

      EARLY WHALING

      IN ALASKA

      The earliest known whaling in Alaska was from Point Hope in the northwest corner of the state and goes back, judging by carbon dating, about 2,000 years. The village of Point Hope has been continuously occupied during this length of time. It is hard to accurately pinpoint how long other communities have been whaling, because the native Inupiat people are nomadic, with some towns having been recently established by natives who moved there from different places.

      Whaling methods remained basically unchanged from early times until locals made contact with commercial whalers who arrived in the mid-19th century and showed the natives more efficient equipment and processes. With only a few changes, Point Hope methods have managed to remain the least changed among the villages that are still whaling today.

      There are currently two whaling seasons in Alaska. The first—the spring season—is practiced along the edges of the frozen ice as leads develop in the ice. As the winter ice between Point Hope and the eastern Russian territory begins to break up and melt, the area slowly becomes navigable for the bowhead and beluga whales. These whales navigate from the northern Pacific Ocean through the straits into the Arctic Sea, passing Point Hope at the northwestern point of Alaska.

      The second whaling season—the fall season—occurs when the whales that have spent the summer months in the Arctic Ocean, to the northeast of Alaska, begin to return along the northern Alaska coast to warmer waters in the Pacific Ocean. Whaling in the fall season is very different from the spring season, because the ice has melted and therefore the whaling methods need to be different. Point Barrow and a few other small villages in eastern Alaska are the only villages that pursue the whales in the fall. Point Barrow is the only village in which whalers pursue the whales in both the spring and fall seasons.

      Prior to each whaling season, preparation includes traditional ceremonies and practices. A whale’s tail preserved from the previous season is distributed in a ceremonial fashion with all families of the community receiving portions of it. The members of the whaling crew begin to cut up the tail; the captain receives a strip about four inches wide, then each crew member gets long strips from the side of the tail. The remaining skin and blubber are cut up, and while the cutting is occurring, the captain relates stories of past whaling seasons, much to the enjoyment of those present. After the stories are told, the captain and crews sit down and are served their meals first. Everyone then passes their plates forward for their share of meat and blubber (muktuk). Finally, people form a line to get a share of the whale tail to take home.

      Later, near the start of the season, the whaling captain and his crew begin to clean and repair the whaling equipment. This basic equipment consists of the skin boat (umiak), paddles, a pair of oars, two or three sealskin floats, heavy rope, harpoons, and more. The paddles and oars are scraped clean to make them look bright and new. This was done as a throwback to aboriginal times, when it was thought that clean whaling equipment would please the whale and it would allow itself to be killed. The sealskin floats are inflated and any other equipment that is used is checked and made ready. In aboriginal days,

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