The Nome nugget., 1901-11-16


 on to one billion dollars. This com putatiOn was made from the time when this industry was tlourishing in the Netherlands. in the beginning of the eleventh century. The hardy Dutch W ialers were clu sing then on the coasts of Greenl tnd and 1, eland nd as far north as opi.zDt rser. They ad a large fleet oi vessels at onc time, but the continuous war>, whi h liu. lily gave En. land the supp emacy Oi thc seas, finally forced the thrnty Dut,h eI ut of this lucrative industry. Next, HaA- burg, Bremen, London and Llv verpoOl took hand at it, adding materially to their wealth thereby. but grauuaiiy the base ot operations shifted itself to the more nurtherly parts, such as Dundee, Bergen, Iruin,Oe and ham, III .rie,u, Tn the far north of Norway. Today, after more than POO years of arduuus chasing, the valuable Green land or bOwhead whale is nearly eXter- minated in tue North Atlantic, aid the whaling industry is about to die Out entirely from European port
 By far the most important and most enterpri,ing whaling port i'll all times was New Bedford, Mass. The wealth that flowed into this town alone from the whaling industry is estimated at $25O, OOO, ,OUO. Starting out with few small vessels, fitted out jointly by the parish in the last years of the eighteenth century, by the miudle of the nineteenth century there were more than a0O whaling vessels sailing out ot this port, repre- ,ent,hg all in- vested capital of S5O,uO0,OoO. The in- trepld and daring New England wbalrrs excelled every body in lnak Ing su ;cessfal voyages. Cruising for and hun,.ng tne.r prey in every ocean of the wo.ll, tney first found tue rlch whaling grounds of the Ber.ng sea and Arctic ocean, here right at our doors.
 That va, far away from Lome in
 
 a reiJ,lng place closer to their hunting ground. 1his was at first Honolulu, where for years 3OJ or more whaling vessels would consregate every winter. F.Um there they shipped their oil and b-ne around Cape Horn, generally reJui mug hO,Le with thelr own vessels thr. ! ne fnnp vaarS
 The war between the North and South troke he back of the New Bed ford whaling industry. The Conied- craze pr,vateers kept hot alter tn. 8 source of ealth of the North, and the Siberian coast uat yes to this day talk with wonder and awe of the spec,a, le presented to them when the ohenan. doah. ln the summer of lS65, burned nearly the whole New Bedford whaling fe | in the Boring sea. When, how e e New Bedforl leeelved her share oi the Alabama award the vessels were never rebuilt. Whale oil had gradu- ally depreciatel in value, as mineral and vegetable oi.s were conin. Io t v front. Today it hardly pays tor coo. er- age. A couple of disastrous seasons in the Ar t;... wnel Tn OLe year 187l) some 10 vessel, and two y ars later l6 additional vessel, we,e caught bI the ice pack and destroyed, diminished he feet still more. Since that time New Bedford has gradu fly wlt draw. from the whaling industry, the large ac. cumulated wealth O. that town finding other channels ol invt stLlen., such as cotton factories, etc.
 In 1870 San Francisco had nearly ex- clus.vely become the ,eittins cente. for the New Bedford whaling fleet or the Pacific. WhalebOne, up to tha, time hardly worth more than $l a pound. went up to S3 and $l per pound It had become too valuable to risk shipping it around Cape Horn; so il went overland by train. As New Bed ford let go, the San Francisco mer chants took hold moi and more Ot tht Hhaiing industry, and in 1881 the pa ciHc S,eain Whaling Company was Or gan zed.
 From 1881 until 1891 whalebO solt easily and steadily for from $4.50 to 8; per pound. Large catches of whale bone were taken into San Francisco during that time, some years it beiui over one million pounds. The iDdustr! was a boon to the trade in San Fran cisco, the crews and outitters of whal ing vessels spending yearly at leas S2,OOO,OOo. he feet that outfit e there in 1890 for llaskan waters con sisted of 20 steamers and soue 30 sa ing vessels. nearly ali owned aud con trc led by the Pacific Steam Whaling Company, wh" practically had me nopoly of the annual output of whale bone.. They started to drive the pr!c