Passaic City record., 1892-05-14
BIG FORTUNES In A JAW.
THE SUPPLY OF wHALEBoNE re-
BECOMING SCARCE.
Bowhead Whales Are Now Worth
$4,000 Each, But Are Difficult
and Dangerous to Catch.

American market handled fully i've hun
dred thousand pounds annually. Now
it is scarcely two hundred thousand
pounds and the foreign supply has ceased
entirely, leaving America to bear the
burden of supplying the world. As to
the matter of price, in 1S42 the best
quality of whalebone in the unfinished
state sold for twenty mine cents pound,
now the same grade brings 1915 for
like quantity. Adding to this the profits
of manufacturers and dealers, the cost of
finished whalebone to the consumer to-
day is about $40 pound.
The ladies of the world will have the
queer looking and erratic bowhead whales
to blame if they are deprived of their
comfort in the future. Not that these
are reduced in numbers or are less prolific
than formerly, but the bowheads have
taken it into their brains to move north
ward. Whether they are bound for the
North Pole or not no one seems to know,
but they approach each year nearer to the
limit of the perpetual ice fields and thus
render it more dangerous and difficult to
the whalers to capture them.
A bowhead whale does or ought to
command every gentleman srepect. Their
variety furnishes the most plentiful sup
ply and best quality of the so-called
whalebone that comes to hand. They
are hunted in the waters contiguous to
the northwestern coast of the North
American continent and are pretty little
creatures Of several tons weight and about
fifty feet in length, of which more than
one-third comprises the head, which con-
tains frequently as much as seventeen
hundred pounds of bone. The question
of respect comes in when the value OF
one Of these creatures is taken into ac-
count. 1t approximates $40, 200.
As has already been said, bowheads
are numerous, but dreadfully hard to
capture. Once they were contented to
swim and feed in the open water of the
Bering Sea and Strait, but now the
whalers have to ascend to higher lati-
tudes, frequently to that of Point Bar
row, which juts out into the Arctic
Ocean at about seventy-two degrees
north. The dangers attendant upon
whaling have thus been increased. The
whaling fleets have been diminished in
numbers, the expenses Of voyage in
creased and even at $40, 900 per whale
the occupation is neither tempting or re-
munerative. But for whalebone, how
ever, it would be given up entirely, for
ordinary whale oil IS absolutely not
worth the cost of the labor of trying the
blubber.
The whalebone itself is found in the
upper jaw of the creatures mouth. This
cavity is of enormous size and is actually
larger than that of the body, thorax and
abdomen combined. The upper jaw is
very narrow, but greatly arched from
before backward to increase the height
of the cavity and to allow for the great
length of the baleen, as the whalebone
blades are technically called. These
blades are suspended from the upper
gum, somewhat like teeth. They are
arranged in two series, separated by the
medal line of the mouth, and number
sometimes as many as five hundred in
dividual blades.
The extreme length of the longest, or
middle blades is from twelve to seventeen
feet. They graduate down to few
feet at either extremity. They are black
in color, fine and highly elastic in tex
ture and fray out at the inner edge and
ends into long, delicate, soft and almost
silky but very tough hairs. When the
mouth is opened these long blades pro-
ject below and over the lower jaw. The
food upon which the creatures subsist
Stra;ne hotwaan the blades and ia retained
within the mouth by the long hair.
After whale has been captured the jaw
containing the blades Is cut from him,
hoisted aboard ship and slowed below.
Whalebone readily commands 1915 a
pound in the raw state in the market to-
day, and the manufacturers beg for it at
that figure.
It is very difficult matter to capture
whale, even after one has been har-
pooned. For instance, at the whaling
station last year bombs we're shot into
two hundred whales, of which between
fifteen and twenty only were caught.
The greatest catch last year reported BY
any one steamer was twenty-one whales.
The average catch is probably eight,
and many sailing vessels get but two or
three. The season lasts from March to
November.
The preparation of the bone for the
consumer is not difficult or particu-
larly interesting process. 1t is taken in
quantities of five hundred pounds or so,
and soaked in water or steamed until it
becomes soft enough to work. 1t is then