The History of Whaling

Podcast Transcript

Whaling is something that humans have engaged in for thousands of years.

For most of that time, indigenous groups conducted it on a small scale for subsistence purposes.

Over time, whaling became commercialized, the annual whale harvest exploded, and whaling became a cornerstone of the early industrial revolution.

Alas, it couldn’t last forever.

Learn more about whaling, its rise, and its fall on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

There is not a whole lot of whaling in the world today. But there was a time when it was a very big deal. During the 19th century, it was arguably one of the most important industries on the planet.

Coastal communities have hunted whales for thousands of years before commercial whaling emerged. Archaeological evidence suggests whaling existed as early as 6000 BC. The earliest evidence of whaling comes from petroglyphs of whale hunting found in Korea.

Whaling was not universal among coastal communities because whales weren’t commonly found everywhere, and they were extremely difficult to hunt.

Whaling was most common among the native people of the Arctic. The Inuit, Ainu, Yupik, and other Arctic peoples developed specialized techniques for hunting bowhead whales. They used every part of the animal for food, fuel, building materials, and tools. These traditional hunts were dangerous but critical for survival in harsh environments.

These early forms of whale hunting didn’t significantly impact whale populations because the numbers hunted were not significant. Arctic populations were small, and whales are very big, so one whale could go a long way.

European whaling began with the Basques in the Bay of Biscay around the 11th century. They initially hunted the North Atlantic right whale, which floated when killed. The Basques exported whale oil and baleen throughout Europe, establishing the first international whale trade.

In Japan, organized whaling dates back to at least the 12th century. Coastal communities developed specialized net-whaling techniques, and these hunts were community efforts requiring dozens of boats and hundreds of people.

As with the people in the Arctic, these early whaling operations were limited by technology and remained relatively small-scale, with hunters using hand-thrown harpoons from small boats launched from shore.

From the 16th to the 19th centuries, whaling evolved from small-scale, shore-based activity into a vast, dangerous, and highly profitable maritime industry. At the heart of this transformation was a growing demand for whale oil, baleen, and other whale-derived products, which powered street lamps and lubricated machines.

Small crews would head out in rowboats, harpoon the whales by hand, and tow the carcasses back to land for processing. The work was slow and physically grueling, but it laid the foundation for more advanced techniques.

By the 18th and 19th centuries, whaling had shifted to the open ocean, driven by the decline of coastal whale populations and the increasing value of whale products. This era saw the emergence of major whaling powers, including the Dutch, British, and Americans, particularly from New England ports like Nantucket and New Bedford, Massachusetts.

Whaling voyages became large, organized expeditions lasting several years and covering thousands of miles. Ships were outfitted with specialized gear such as tryworks, which were onboard rendering furnaces, and provisions to support months at sea.

When a whale was sighted—often by a lookout perched high in the ship’s rigging—the crew launched small open boats, each manned by five to eight sailors. These boats would row toward the whale as silently as possible. The harpooner’s job was to strike the whale with a hand-thrown harpoon, embedding a rope that linked the animal to the boat.

This moment was just the beginning of the real danger. Once harpooned, the whale often took off in a desperate, panicked flight, dragging the boat behind it in what was known as a “Nantucket sleigh ride.” The crew had to hold on for dear life while the whale sped through the water, sometimes for miles until it exhausted itself.

After the chase, the men would carefully approach the tiring whale and use long, barbed lances to pierce its vital organs, particularly the lungs and heart. The process could take hours and was extremely hazardous—one wrong move and the boat could be smashed by a slap of the whale’s tail or capsized by a sudden surge. Many whalemen died during these encounters, either crushed, dragged underwater by entangled ropes, or simply lost at sea.

In one famous case, a whale destroyed an entire ship.

In 1820, the Essex, a whaling ship from Nantucket, was struck and sunk by an enormous sperm whale in the South Pacific Ocean, thousands of miles from land. Of the 20 crew members who escaped in small whaleboats, only eight survived after a grueling 90-day ordeal marked by starvation, dehydration, exposure, and, ultimately, cannibalism.

The survivors drifted across the Pacific, with some dying on the boats and others resorting to drawing lots to determine who would be sacrificed to feed the rest. The captain, George Pollard Jr., and first mate, Owen Chase, were among the few who returned, and their harrowing accounts of survival shocked the public and left a lasting mark on maritime history.

The Essex became the basis for the novel Moby Dick.

Once the whale was dead, the crew would tow it back to the ship and lash it alongside. Processing the carcass began almost immediately. This involved flensing—cutting the blubber into long strips using specialized knives and hooks. The blubber was then chopped into smaller pieces and fed into the tryworks, large iron pots set over brick furnaces built directly on the deck of the ship. Rendering the blubber into oil was dangerous, hot, and exhausting work.

Fire was a constant threat, and burns were common. The rendered oil was poured into barrels and stored in the ship’s hold. In the case of sperm whales, the valuable spermaceti oil found in the head cavity was collected separately and often fetched a premium price.

The dangers of whaling extended beyond the hunt itself. Life at sea was hard, monotonous, and often brutal. Crews lived in cramped quarters, faced disease and malnutrition, and were subjected to harsh discipline. Storms, icebergs, and shipwrecks posed constant risks, especially in remote waters like the Arctic or the South Pacific. Whalemen could be stranded for months or even years if their ship was lost or damaged, and many never returned home.

So why would people go through all this trouble?

In the 19th century, whales were of immense economic importance, forming the backbone of a global industry that fueled lighting, manufacturing, fashion, and maritime economies—especially in the United States, Britain, and parts of Europe.

Whale oil, particularly the high-quality spermaceti oil from sperm whales, was a prized commodity used to fuel lamps, lighthouses, and streetlights, making it essential for nighttime productivity and safety. Regular whale oil was also widely used as an industrial lubricant for machinery during the early Industrial Revolution.

Additionally, whale baleen, the parts of a whale’s mouth that filters plankton also known as whalebone, was in high demand for consumer goods like corsets, umbrella ribs, buggy whips, and hoop skirts due to its strength and flexibility. Whale byproducts even found their way into soaps, candles, and cosmetics.

The whaling industry itself supported thousands of jobs—from sailors and coopers to shipbuilders and oil refiners—and brought enormous wealth to port cities like Nantucket and New Bedford. In this way, whales were not just hunted animals—they were essential natural resources at the heart of 19th-century commerce and industry.

Several factors led to the decline in the whaling industry in the latter half of the 19th century.

The first, and perhaps the biggest reason, was the development of the petroleum industry. In particular, the discovery of petroleum in Pennsylvania in 1859.

Petroleum from the ground was much, much easier to acquire than whale oil, and it was possible to get much more of it.

Kerosene quickly replaced whale oil for lighting, dramatically reducing demand.

Around the same time, the American Civil War devastated the American whaling fleet when Confederate raiders sank dozens of whaling vessels. Additionally, the Union Navy purchased older whaling ships to create a “stone fleet” they sank to blockade Southern ports.

The fashion industry began using steel stays instead of baleen in corsets, while new materials replaced other whale products. By the 1890s, the American whaling industry, which had been the largest in the world, had declined dramatically.

As traditional whaling declined, modern industrial whaling emerged.

Norway pioneered modern whaling techniques with faster ships and explosive harpoons. Norwegian whalers expanded operations to Antarctica, where vast populations of large whales remained untouched.

Japan, which had maintained traditional coastal whaling, adopted modern methods in the early 20th century and became a major whaling nation.

The rich waters around Antarctica became the center of modern whaling. The development of factory ships with onboard processing facilities in the 1920s allowed whalers to process whales entirely at sea, dramatically increasing efficiency.

Modern whaling reached its peak in the 1930s when over 50,000 whales were killed annually.

There was, of course, an obvious problem. Modern whalers were so efficient at killing whales that the populations were dramatically declining.

The reproduction cycle for whales wasn’t like fish, where most of them would reproduce every year. Whales took years to reproduce, and populations couldn’t be easily replaced.

The first international attempts to regulate whaling came in 1931 with the Convention for the Regulation of Whaling, which had limited effectiveness.

The International Whaling Commission or IWC was established in 1946 to regulate the industry, but early efforts focused on maintaining the industry rather than conservation. Quotas were often set too high and poorly enforced.

The Soviet Union engaged in secret, illegal whaling operations, killing over 180,000 whales beyond their legal quotas over the years.

Blue whales, the largest animals ever to exist, were hunted to near extinction—their population falling from an estimated 250,000 to just a few hundred.

Fin whale populations decreased by 70-80%. Humpback whales declined by over 90% in many regions.

Almost every other whale species saw dramatic declines as well.

Whaling had become unsustainable.

By the 1970s, growing environmental awareness and plummeting whale populations created pressure for stronger protection. The United States listed several whale species under its Endangered Species Act in 1973.

In 1982, the IWC adopted a moratorium on commercial whaling, effective from 1986. This landmark decision marked the effective end of large-scale commercial whaling.

While it ended large-scale commercial whaling, it didn’t totally end whaling.

Several countries ignored the moratorium and continued commercial whaling in some form or exploited loopholes in the moratorium. In particular, Japan, Iceland, and Norway.

Japan suspended commercial whaling in 1989 but resumed it in 2019, but only in the country’s territorial waters. The country’s annual quota is usually around 300 whales.

Commercial whaling in Iceland is all but dead. From 2019 to 2021, zero whales were taken, and a limited number have been harvested since 2022. The resumption of whaling by Japan in 2019 made their biggest export market for whale meat dry up.

Norway has an annual quota of about 1,000 to 1,200 whales per year, but the actual harvest is usually only half that number due to low demand.

Indigenous groups in Alaska, Greenland, Russia, and Canada are also permitted to hunt whales for traditional purposes.

Almost all of the whales that are hunted today tend to be smaller, less threatened species, such as belugas, narwhals, minke, and fin whales.

Since the International Whaling Commission imposed a moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986, several whale species have shown promising signs of recovery, though progress varies by region and species.

Humpback whale populations, once driven to near extinction, have rebounded strongly in many areas, particularly in the South Atlantic and North Pacific.

Blue whales have seen slow but steady increases in certain populations, especially off the coast of California, though they remain endangered globally.

Fin whales and southern right whales have also experienced population growth, benefiting from decades of reduced hunting pressure and expanding marine protections.

However, not all species have recovered equally—North Atlantic right whales continue to struggle with dangerously low numbers due to ship strikes and fishing gear entanglements, and western gray whales remain critically endangered.

What little commercial whaling is left in the world is slowly dying out, even in the few countries that still practice it. There is little demand for any whale products, and the fact is, there is more money to be made in whale watching now than there is in whale hunting.

Putting aside subsistence hunting by native peoples, commercial whaling only existed for a short time historically. The development of petroleum fuels and plastics rendered whale products obsolete.

The cessation of large-scale commercial whale hunting has allowed whale populations to recover and, in some cases, totally return, which means that the world will have whales to enjoy for centuries to come.

The Executive Producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The Associate Producers are Austin Oetken and Cameron Kieffer.

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