For more information, visit the project homepage.
<strong> This week I got involved in another project perfect for CoVid time. Volunteering to help translate a whaling journal from the original cursive manuscript to text so it can be put online. I was transported away from this world to a time when men sailed from New Bedford to Hawaii to hunt whales. </strong>Some days they would lower the boats threes times and return with nothing. Other days they would not even see a whale, and on other days they may see as many as 30 ships all “cutting & boiling”. I can’t imagine the smells and gore, and certainly pityed the whales. It’s a reminder of how prolific so many resources were, and how carelessly we have plundered many of fthem into extinction or near extinction. I wonder now if even the very oceans that sustained this adventurous crew are too far gone. I hope not, but the debate between lives versus livelihoods has not been resolved and we don’t necessarily learn certain lessons quickly.
February 12, 2021