Frederic Marten News Today

Article body copy If the Basques were the first to commercialize whaling in the 11th century, it was the Americans who took it global. From the 18th to the 20th century, thousands of whaling ships—the majority flying the US flag—scoured the world’s oceans in search of cetaceans. The Americans’ large ships allowed them to process the whales at sea, harvesting the valuable oil, baleen, and ambergris without having to return to port first. Since they were paid by the whale, the American wh...