[lit-ideas] Re: Whales on our Minds

This reminded me of a nice piece in the Guardian about one of the sources for 
Moby Dick.  

http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,2041191,00.html 

"Sir Clifford's whale has been articulated throughout; so that, like a great 
chest of drawers you can open and shut him, in all his bony cavities - spread 
out his ribs like a gigantic fan - and swing all day upon his lower jaw. Locks 
are to be put upon some of his trap-doors and shutters; and a footman will show 
round future visitors with a bunch of keys at his side. Sir Clifford thinks of 
charging twopence for a peep at the whispering gallery in the spinal column; 
threepence to hear the echo in the hollow of his cerebellum; and sixpence for 
the unrivalled view from his forehead."

Sir Clifford and his whale were real and Melvilles description was inspired by 
Thomas Beale's book "The Natural History of the Sperm Whale" which offered a 
more sober examination of Sir Clifford's whale.  The skeleton, which is in 
Yorkshire, has been buried for some time and is now being exhumed.  

Other whalarobilia.  One of my favourite places is Whitby which has an 
impressive Whale Jaw Arch
http://tinyurl.com/2oo3mn and this newsletter http://www.yvbsg.org.uk/dec03.pdf 
has a little piece about whale bones used as building materials.

Best wishes
Rupert
Almost in Yorkshire


-----Original Message-----
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On 
Behalf Of David Ritchie
Sent: 30 May 2007 18:10
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: RitchieRo@xxxxxxx; Elizabeth Forbes
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Whales on our Minds

You have probably been following the story of the whales that took a wrong turn 
up the Sacramento river.  Well here in Oregon we too have a whale tale, but it 
has alas turned felonious.  In P.G. Wodehouse's day young folk contented 
themselves with the occasional lifting of a policeman's helmet.  But is that 
sufficient for the youth of today?  
No!  They make off not only with the Fed's unburied flesh, but also with the 
right half of a baleen.

I quote:

The Oregonian State park officials plan to bury the carcass of a 40-foot-long 
gray whale in the sand area about a mile north of the rocky beach where it 
washed ashore last weekend. John Allen, the north coast regional manager for 
Oregon Parks and Recreation said the earliest that the whale could be moved 
would be Thursday. "There's a high tide on Wednesday night, so we're hoping the 
whale will be washed out to sea and take care of the problem," Allen said. "If 
it washes back ashore, we hope it's a more sandy area where we can bury it." A 
contractor will use a tractor to drag the carcass to a sandy area, and a 
backhoe will be used to dig a hole to bury the 30-ton whale. Allen said it 
takes about a year for a whale to decompose. The whale washed ashore at Seal 
Rock about 10 miles south of Newport either late Saturday or early Sunday after 
being spotted in the ocean. The whale had been dead for several days. Bruce 
Mate, director of Oregon State University's Marine Mammal Institute in Newport, 
said an examination of the whale did not find a cause of death. He said tissue, 
urine, eye fluid and other samples will be tested at OSU's Veterinary 
Diagnostic Laboratory in Corvallis to see whether they give clues as to what 
killed the animal. Mate said the whale was a mature female at least 5 to 10 
years old. He said the whale had a basketballsized abscess on its caudal 
peduncle -- the tail area that connects to the whale's flukes. 
"This abscess is clearly something that had been going on for some time with 
this poor animal," Mate said, "but it's not clear whether that had anything to 
do with its death." A sample of the abscess also will be examined. Sgt. Todd 
Thompson of the Oregon State Police said Tuesday that someone had removed the 
baleen from the whale's right jaw and parts of the body and skin, which 
violates federal law. Oregon State Police and law enforcement agents of the 
National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration are investigating.


So remember, if you should come across a large whale of any sort, be sure to 
keep your swiss army knife secure in your back pocket.

And no, I assure you, the baleen is not currently serving any kind of 
sculptural function in my own back yard..

David Ritchie,
Portland, Oregon

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