Programs Blog

March 17, 2025 

Location: SEA., Woods Hole, MA 

Weather: Rainy, 52° F 

Hello everyone and Happy St. Patrick’s Day! My name is Elle Lansing, and I am a junior at Lafayette College studying environmental science. This past Friday we visited the Whaling Museum in New Bedford, Massachusetts. We started off with a self-guided tour of the museum with short lessons from Rich King and Rick Miller. We learned all about the whaling industry in New Bedford. Rich shared knowledge on the types of whales caught, which included right whales and sperm whales. Rick then discussed the type of equipment used for whaling and the specific boats required. We then had time to walk around the museum and explore different exhibits. One of the coolest features of the museum was a large ship in the center hall. Rick pointed out key features of the ship to prepare us for our voyage. 

The next portion of our museum tour included an opportunity to access the archives. We were able to transcribe the entries of whalemen’s logbooks. This was especially cool because the entries took place along our cruise track! It was interesting to read about the recordings of whalers during their voyages. The archivist at the museum shared that she had read over 400 logbooks in the archives. Her favorite part of digitizing the logbooks was reading about how whalers got lonely and shared their emotions through poetry or songwriting. 

We then had a break for lunch on the observation deck where we did the Human Uses of Ocean Space Census worksheet. One of the questions on the sheet asks us to count the number of commercial vessels. We tried our best to count but there were so many fishing vessels from our view. 

Our class walked down to the pier to meet with the former mayor of New Bedford, NOAA fisheries administrator, and former President of SEA, John Bullard. He showed us the fishing boats at the harbor and explained the history of New Bedford’s fishing industry. New Bedford is the most valuable fishing port in the country, known particularly for scallops. John explained how the fishing industry is different from other industries such as the automotive industry or the aviation industry. This is because each fisherman has different opinions and needs. Instead of large companies comprising the industry there are individual cohorts that are fiercely independent. 

We ended our wonderful field trip with a trip to get Boba tea! We then drove home back to SEA, Friday was a great day!