Item #5087 Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.
Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.

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Cutting In A Whale : A Series of Twenty-Five Photographs. Taken on Board Bark California.

New Bedford, Mass.: H. S. Hutchinson & Co., 1903. Oblong 4to album (25.5 x 31.5 cm), full leather with gilt title at front cover. 25 silver print photographs, 18.5 x 23.5 cm, with printed captions opposite each.

A rare whaling book comprising twenty-five vivid and visceral photographs taken aboard the bark California off the coast of Japan.

These photos are remarkable for closely documenting the gruesome business of whaling: the cutting up and hoisting aboard of sperm and right whales, piece by piece; lowering blubber into the ship’s blubber room; rendering the blubber; and cleaning up and repairing the whaling ship. The album begins with a shot of the lowering of the “cutting stage” upon which whalers are subsequently shown severing a whale’s 18-ft. jaw with cutting spades. Next, the jaw is hoisted up and the blubber, gum, and teeth are removed from the jaw. The “junk”—weighing some eight tons—is then separated from the “case” and hoisted aboard—these two whale parts being the most valuable. The case is then “bailed out,” which contains some 20 barrels of “almost pure spermaceti.” Several photos capture the severing of the whale’s head and its being hoisted aboard. Finally, the blubber is lowered into the blubber room and is boiled on the ship and “tried.” One shot shows a man turned around to face the camera and about to drop a piece of blubber into a pot. The series concludes with shots of men cleaning up and repairing boats and equipment. The final shot shows the California sailing away for home. Some of the captions provide considerable detail: “Cutting hole through scalp for head chain showing the right whale’s ‘bonnet’ and the bone exposed by the dropping away of lower lip.” A few photos are slightly blurry, as one would expect for action shots taken at sea.

Many of these images feature the intrepid whalers who worked on the California, including African-Americans as well as laborers of apparently Asian extraction, the latter possibly recruited in a Japanese port. A record in the collections of the New Bedford Whaling Museum indicates that the California entered the Port of Hakodate, Japan on 13 July 1904, following quarantine inspection. The California was built in New Bedford in 1842 and undertook numerous whaling voyages to the Arctic Ocean and elsewhere.

The shipmaster for the voyage documented here was Capt. William F. Joseph of the notable Joseph family of New Bedford. During the early 20th century, Joseph captained many whaling vessels and began work on the bark California as early as 1896—a tenure that continued until at least 1904. Joseph undertook several Arctic whaling voyages as shipmaster and made frequent journeys to Japan, Barbados and St. Eustatius.

Bookseller and stationer H. S. Hutchinson & Co. of New Bedford was founded in 1864 by Henry S. Hutchinson.

Rare. OCLC records just four copies.

REFERENCES: New Beford Whaling Museum. Inventory of the Joseph Family Papers at whalingmuseum.org

CONDITION: Spine and edges deteriorated, title page lightly soiled, tonality of photos generally strong.

Item #5087

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