New Bedford Whaling National Historic Site

Whale bones, harpooning boat

July 25 – I thought we would leave earlier for New Bedford, MA but we didn’t leave until after 9.  We drove through Providence, RI and into MA and it was an easy 90 minute drive.  We zipped into the parking garage after checking the parking rates!  It was a two block walk to the visitor center of the New Bedford Whaling National Historic Park.  The park is a 13 block waterfront district but individual and groups continue to operate their properties.  There are 2 visitor centers, one inland and one on the city marina. 

A beautiful model

After watching the excellent movie about “The City that Lit the World” we checked out the various displays in the visitor center.  New Bedford was the leading producer of whale oil used for lighting.  Then once the whales were getting close to extinction things changed.  Actually the whales provided baleen also which was used for many tools and corset stays.  The sperm whale teeth were carved into scrimshaw baskets, salt and pepper shakers, pie crimpers and many other useful objects as well as artistic pieces. 

Down the street was the New Bedford Whaling Museum and that was really nice.  There was a

Assortment of pie crimpers

room of model whaling ships of all sizes.  There was an entire display of models of the Charles Morgan that we were on in Boston.  Hanging from the ceiling in the main hall are skeletons of 3 kinds of whales, one with the fetus that was in it when it was found dead.  We learned about the ships and the methods of securing the whales, butchering them and rendering them into oil.  The ships often left MA and picked up crews in the Azores and Cape Verde.  Many of these crew members ended up settling in the states.  The Azores were settled by the Portuguese, so there are many descendants in MA.  It was a very interesting museum.

We had lunch at a Portuguese diner.  I had their sausage which was sliced and on a native roll with rodellas, which are like thick potato chips, some are crispy and some are not quite.  The fry oil was fresh and they were delicious.  Bill had an Azore burger which was on a native roll with sautéed onions and provolone cheese and his came with rodellas also.  It was a big lunch!

Pulpit at the Seamen's Bethel

We walked to the marina to the other visitor center where I was able to get lighthouse stamps.  That was exciting.  The building is where the fishermen who kinda took over once whaling was no longer profitable went for the daily auction of their catch.  The entire auction took 22 minutes from start to finish.  There are a lot of commercial fishing boats still in the area.  We checked out a couple of shops on our walk back to the Seamen’s Bethel, which is a house of worship for the seamen when they came to port.  The pulpit in current use was installed in 1959 based on the one in the “Moby Dick” book.  Further along our walk was the US Custom House which is the oldest continuously operating custom house in the US.  It dates to 1836.  There’s also a Double Bank building which was built to house 2 banks which was unusual. 

It was getting late and we knew the drive home would be longer with the Friday traffic so we headed back to the car.  It took about 2 hours home and we pulled in around 6:30.  The park was filling up with19 new arrivals today.  After dinner we did our 1 mile walk around the park and showered for 9 AM work tomorrow.