Acton, William,
A WHALING CAPTAIN'S LIFE: The Exciting True Account by William Acton
for His Son, William.
. NEW copy, trade PAPERBACK. (Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2008).
Over 110 black & white plates, 128 pages.
~~~ This little volume, originally published in 1838,
was penned by a whaling captain for his son. Irresistibly collectable, this edition- featuring 112 original
black-and-white plates -retains all the charm of the original, including descriptions of successful voyages,
whale hunting advice and sailing superstitions.
$13.00
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Ash, Christopher,
WHALER'S EYE.
$35.00
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Braginton-Smith and Duncan Oliver,
CAPE COD SHORE WHALING: America's First Whalemen.
. NEW copy, trade PAPERBACK. (Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2008).
Over 35 black & white photographs, 128 pages.
~~~ Drawing on rare documents
never before published, whaling journals and diaries, Oliver and Braginton-Smith recreate
a bygone age when men fought one another for rights to the sea.
$20.00
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Chase, Owen, First Mate,
THE WRECK OF THE WHALESHIP ESSEX:
A First-hand Account of One of History's Most Extraordinary Maritime Disasters.
$25.00
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Gibson, Arrell Morgan,
YANKEES IN PARADISE: The Pacific Basin Frontier.
University of New Mexico Press, 1993. NEW copy. Still in shrinkwrap. First Edition.
Bibliography, index, 502 pages.
~~~ This book "...views America's expansion in the Pacific
Basin from 1784 to1861 as part of the nation's
frontier experience. . . . [The book] argues that the same agents were at work on this
maritime frontier as on the frontier onland. Explorers, hunters and fur traders,
merchants, miners, farmers, missionaries, military men, and writers added to
American knowledge of the Pacific Basin, established and enlarged the American
presence, drew government attention to the region, leading to the Americanization
of the area." (Library Journal).
~~~
From Choice: "Gibson's book is devoted to a rather forgotten area of US involvement, the Pacific Basin. Because this was a commercial rather than a settlement frontier, it remained overshadowed by the epic continental expansion of the 19th century. . . . Gibson narrates the story of Americans searching for whales and markets and marketable commodities, such as hides or guano. This is also the story of missionaries, naval men, island paradise seekers, and even of popular authors, whose writings about the Pacific caught the public eye. . . . An excellent resource for readers at all levels seeking to learn more about the role Americans played in the Pacific".
~~~ OUT OF PRINT .
$50.00
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Haley, Nelson Cole (Harpooner in the Ship Charles W. Morgan),
WHALE HUNT: The Narrative of a Voyage.
$35.00
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Hand, Douglas, GONE WHALING: A Search for Orcas in New Waters. NY: 1994, 1st edition,
Simon and Schuester. VG+/VG+ Blue and green boards; illustrations $25.00 From the Publisher
After seeing a sensual, weathered cedar carving of an orca (killer whale) intertwined with a human being, Douglas Hand sets off for the Pacific Northwest, traveling from aquariums to the wind-blown straits of the Queen Charlotte Islands. He encounters scientists and mystics, and from each perspective gleans insight into the essence of the orca and our relationship to the natural world.
$25.00
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Heffernan, Thomas Farel,
MUTINY ON THE GLOBE: The Fatal Voyage of Samuel Comstock.
. NEW copy, hardcover with dust jacket. (WW Norton,, 2002).
280 pages.
~~~ Samuel Comstock Knew He was born to do some great thing, but his only legacy was a reign of terror. Two years out of Nantucket on a whaling voyage, he organized a mutiny & murdered the officers of the Globe. It was a premeditated act: in his sea chest Comstock carried the seeds & tools with which he would found his own island kingdom. Witness & chronicler of the mutiny was Comstock's horrified brother. Within days of settling on Mili Atoll in the Marshall Islands, Comstock was murdered by his fellow mutineers. Six innocent seamen, including Comstock's brother, seized the Globe & escaped; most of the rest were killed by natives. Two survivors lived for twenty-two months, half-prisoners & half-adoptees of the islanders, until they were rescued by a landing party from the U.S. schooner Dolphin. The Globe's story is one of terror, adventure, endurance, & luck. It is also the story of one of the most bizarre & frightening minds that ever went to sea.
$24.95
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Jonaitis, Aldona, THE YUQUOT WHALERS' SHRINE. Seattle: 1999, 1st edition, U of WA
Press. As new in as new dust jacket 0295978287 black boards; oversize; illustrations $32.50
Providing as much a historical monograph as an anthropological study, Jonaitis, director of the University of Alaska Museum and professor of anthropology at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, details the history of the Nootka Whalers' Shrine, from its origins in Yuquot (Friendly Cove), to its acquisition by George Hunt in 1905, for the American Museum of Natural History, and its subsequent interest to anthropologists, historians, and even film makers. This book is full of b&w photographs and drawings, including several from 1904 of the shrine as well as each of the pieces it contained. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
260 pgs
$32.50
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Lowenstein, Tom, ANCIENT LAND, SACRED WHALE: The Inuit Hunt and Its Rituals. NY:
1996, 2nd printing, North Point. VG 0865474885 trade paperback $10.00 196 pgs. British poet and ethnographer Lowenstein has done research among the Tikigaq people of Point Hope, Alaska, for nearly 20 years. For three seasons he served as a crewman in a skinboat during the whale hunt; here he introduces the village, the oldest continuous settlement on the continent, and its topography. From the storyteller Asatchaq, Lowenstein heard about the whale myth and the elaborate rituals of the hunt, which he retells in poems in these pages. According to the myth, the Tikigaq peninsula was once a whale-like creature; after it was killed by a harpooner, it lived on as both body and spirit and remains a source of sustenance and the focus of worship. The rituals for the hunt still constitute an extended drama that begins in autumn and culminates with the springtime hunt. In a lengthy narrative poem, Lowenstein reconstructs the hunt as it occurred prior to contact with Europeans. This vivid portrait of an ancient culture is a remarkable blend of poetry and anthropology. Illustrations.
$10.00
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Martin, Kenneth R.,
DELAWARE GOES WHALING: 1833-1845.
The Hagley Museum, Greenville, Delaware. 1974. Staple-bound booklet, illustrated, 64 pages.
Table of contents: Introduction; The Growth of American Whaling; Whaling Fever Comes to Wilmington, 1833;
Delaware Whalemen Put to Sea, 1834; The Growth of the Wilmington Whaling company, 1835-1840; Life Aboard the Wilmington Whaleships;
Hard Luck and Disappointment, 1840-1846; Selected Bibliography.
$15.00
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Maxwell, Gavin, HARPOON VENTURE. NY: 1952, 1st edition, Viking. VG-(minor white spots
to boards, owner's name to title page) in G (price blacked out, fading to spine, minor tears and chips)
dust jacket Green boards; illustrations $35.00
$35.00
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Maxwell, Gavin, HARPOON VENTURE
. Harpoon Venture. NY: 1996, 1st (of this) edition, Lyons. VG+
trade paperback; illustrations. Gavin Maxwell, best known as the author of
Ring of Bright Water, describes in thrilling detail the story of his four
years hunting the basking shark. When Maxwell acquired a small island in the
Hebrides off Scotland shortly after World War Two, he decided to hunt the
thirty-foot leviathan of the northern waters for commercial purposes. Every
step of the way, however, presented danger and difficulties, making this a tale
of a mighty sea chase with precious few peers among books of maritime adventure.
$12.50
$12.50
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McManus, Michael,
A TREASURY OF AMERICAN SCRIMSHAW.
$40.00
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[Melville] Severin, Tim, IN SEARCH OF MOBY DICK: The Quest for the White Whale. NY: 2000, 1st edition, Basic Books. VG+ in as new dust jacket. Green boards. From Publishers Weekly:
"In the role of adventurer-cum-historian, Severin (The Brendan Voyage, etc.) has built leather boats and
replicas of ninth-century Arab dhows in order to re-create the voyages of St. Brendan, Jason and the Argonauts,
and Sindbad. His new adventure explores Melville's white whale and the culture of the gifted harpooners who are
the last people on earth to hunt whales from small boats. Melville himself met such men when he deserted a whaling
ship in French Polynesia in 1842, and Severin returns to the same island, Nuku Hiva. There he collects the
information that allows him to dissect the myths and facts of Melville's Typee, and convincingly argue that
Moby-Dick was influenced by Melville's contact with the Nuku Hivans. Severin also expounds on the disaster of
the whaleship Essex, the habits of the great mammals themselves and the spiritual and mystical aspects of
the Polynesians' whale hunts. A description of a young islander's coming of age in a successful hunt is transfixing.
The author's firsthand account of whaling from a small boat is equally powerful. Severin is mystified that the whales
don't flee as the hunters draw near enough to attack: "Where is their sense of self-preservation?" But the hunters
know: the whale gives himself to those who have performed the ritual; just as surely, the whale will punish those
who are greedy or negligent. This, Severin suggests, is the root of Melville's spiteful cetacean: Ahab was unworthy,
and Moby-Dick delivered divine retribution in accordance with islander lore. The islanders' generations of
experience, legend and myth are the authorities for Severin, as valid to him as any laboratory test results, and his
description of their culture is profoundly moving." $22.50
$22.50
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Ommanney, F.D.,
LOST LEVIATHAN:
Whales and Whaling.
$35.00
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Robotti, Frances Diane,
WHALING AND OLD SALEM.
$40.00
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Rothenberg, David,
THOUSAND MILE SONG: Whale Music in a Sea of Sound.
. NEW copy, hardcover with dust jacket. (Basic Books,, 2008).
304 pages.
~~~ Whale song is an astonishing world of sound whose existence no one suspected before the 1960s. Its discovery has forced us to confront the possibility of alien intelligence-not in outer space but right here on earth. Thoughtful, richly detailed, and deeply entertaining, Thousand Mile Song uses the enigma of whale sounds to open up whales’ underwater world of sonic mystery. In observing and talking with leading researchers from around the globe as they attempt to decipher undersea music, Rothenberg tells the story of scientists and musicians confronting an unknown as vast as the ocean. His search culminates in a grand attempt to make interspecies music the likes of which no one has ever heard (until, that is, they listen to the accompanying CD), by playing his clarinet with whales in their native habitats, from Russia to Canada to Hawaii.
$27.50
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Spence, Bill,
HARPOONED: The Story of Whaling.
$35.00
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Stackpole, Edouard A.,
THE SEA-HUNTERS:
The New England Whalemen during Two Centuries 1635-1835.
$40.00
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Whipple, A.B.C.,
YANKEE WHALERS IN THE SOUTH SEAS.
$30.00
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