Podcasts about New Bedford Whaling Museum

New Bedford Whaling Museum chief curator joins us to discuss the exhibit 'Complicated Legacies: Museum History, White Supremacy, and Sculpture,' the legacy of artists and the conversations the museum hopes to spark.

The Artists Index is an AHA! partner and this is the fourth in our series of livestream podcasts. The September AHA! celebrated AHA! @ 25 on Thursday, September 12th from 6 to 7:30 pm. and was co-hosted by our livestream partner and friend Adam Katz, the owner of Play Arcade. Our September AHA! galaxy of guests included Dave Reis, our Jazz Podcast Series podcast host, Ymelda Rivera Laxton, the Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art & Community Projects at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, artist extraordinaire Kat Knutsen, Christina Maiato Fitz Gerald, our Gallery X Documentation Project Scanner, and the newest podcast host of our newest, soon to be premiered Gallery X Documentation Project Podcast Series, Sean FitzGerald. They all sat down with The Artists Index's co-founder and podcast host, Ron Fortier, about their contributions to and views on the September AHA! theme - Aha! @ 25 and its impact on the phenomenal creative community of New Bedford and the South Coast. Once again, it was very loud and noisy with all the arcade games but we still had great conversation. The Artists Index is an AHA! partner and this is the third in our series of livestream podcasts. The September AHA! celebrated 25 years! This podcast was co-hosted by our livestream partner and friend Adam Katz, the owner of Play Arcade.  Learn more at https://theartistsindex.com/  Consider donating, or becoming a sponsor. 

Welcome Drew (Andrew) Furtado, a South Coast Massachusetts Emmy Award-winning visual storyteller. Since 2005, Drew has produced photo, film, and web content for South Coast schools and nonprofit organizations. He currently leads the New Bedford Whaling Museum's communication and marketing efforts. Drew Furtado has transformed how the Museum reaches its potential audiences through digital platforms. Through his digital work, including films like Restart 2020, photography, and illustrated posters, he champions the positive stories of New Bedford and Fall River. Before his association with the New Bedford Whaling Museum, he spent 10 years building the media arts program at Fairhaven High School. His students have received over 30 New England and three national student production awards. Many of his students can be seen throughout the South Coast pursuing their careers in film and communications. Drew (Andrew) Furtado has a master's in Interactive Media from Quinnipiac University and studied at New England Institute of Technology's media arts program. Drew speaks with The Artists Index's cofounder, documentarian, and podcast host, Ron Fortier, about his continuing journey in photography, film, and web content. This episode was recorded at our recording studio at Spectrum Marketing Group at Howland Place in New Bedford. Listen to the artists talk about their work, backgrounds, passions, dreams, and accomplishments.  Also featured are those work in or manage the creative community's economy, promotion, and cultural agenda. We would love it if you considered making a donation. 

Join us on this salty episode of the PEMcast, as we feature a 24-hour reading of the book at the New Bedford Whaling Museum, exhibition curator Dan Lipcan and Moby Dick expert, author Nathaniel Philbrick.

A new exhibition is looking at the traditional art form of scrimshaw through a wider context and contemporary lens. "The Wider World and Scrimshaw" at the New Bedford Whaling Museum in Massachusetts is telling the story through objects. Jeffrey Brown has a look for our arts and culture series, CANVAS. PBS News is supported by - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/about/funders

A new exhibition is looking at the traditional art form of scrimshaw through a wider context and contemporary lens. "The Wider World and Scrimshaw" at the New Bedford Whaling Museum in Massachusetts is telling the story through objects. Jeffrey Brown has a look for our arts and culture series, CANVAS. PBS News is supported by - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/about/funders

Suellen Wedmore and a first-order Fresnel lens on display at the Cape Ann Museum in Gloucester, Massachuetts. Melanie Correia Suellan Wedmore‘s poetry has appeared in many publications and she has won numerous awards, including first place in both the Writer's Digest Rhyming and the Non-Rhyming Poem contests. The poems in Suellen's book A Fixed White Light enter the lives of six of courageous and mostly forgotten female lighthouse keepers, giving readers the opportunity to experience their heroism as well as their trials in a time when they were often met with skepticism and discrimination. Inside the New Bedford Whaling Museum The second guest in this podcast episode is Melanie Correia, associate curator of exhibitions and collections at the New Bedford Whaling Museum in southeastern Massachusetts. The city of New Bedford was a whaling capital and the richest city in the world in the mid-1800s. Today the museum plays a critical role as champions for whale preservation and guardians of the area's heritage and culture.

The New Bedford Whaling Museum's scrimshaw collection, which includes hundreds of whalebone clocks, pie crimpers, musical instruments, canes and umbrellas, is advertised as the largest of its kind in the world.  Naomi Slipp, the museum's chief curator, said these items weren't considered fine art when the museum's founders began collecting them from locals in 1903, […]

Captain Joshua Slocum set sail from Nova Scotia in The Spray, his revamped oyster sloop, on 3rd July, 1898: the first solo circumnavigation of the world.  Sailing alone for no reason other than pleasure was considered a fool's errand at the time, but, motivated by the death of his beloved first wife, Virginia, Slocum sought solace in the sea. His memoir, dedicated to ‘the one who believed the Spray would return', detailed his daring journey and struggle against loneliness. In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly consider how Slocum survived - given his navigational aids of a broken chronometer and tin clock; explain how he evaded pirates in Gibraltar - in the most long-winded way possible; and explore his cheese-inspired hallucinations…  Further Reading: • 'Joshua Slocum and his first Single-handed Sail around the World' (SciHi, 2021): http://scihi.org/joshua-slocum-around-the-world/ • '“The Spray will Come Back”: Solo Circumnavigator Joshua Slocum' (New Bedford Whaling Museum, 2017): https://www.whalingmuseum.org/exhibition/the-spray-will-come-back/ • ‘The Mysterious Disappearance Of A Sea Pioneer' (Timeline, 2019): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5K6ZQiOUG9M Love the show? Support us!  Join 

A Massachusetts museum is assembling works to explore how Indigenous people interacted with whales and the marine environment throughout history. The New Bedford Whaling Museum combines a one-woman show by Shinnecock multi-media artist Courtney M. Leonard with a collection of scrimshaw work by Indigenous artists around the country, putting contemporary and historical expressions side by side. GUESTS Courtney M. Leonard (Shinnecock) Cora-Allan Lafaiki Twiss (Māori: Ngā Puhi, Tainui from the Island of Niue), artist Dr. Nadia Jackinsky-Sethi (Ninilchik tribal member), historian and consultant for the CIRI Foundation Naomi Slipp, Douglas and Cynthia Crocker endowed chair for the chief curator and director of museum learning at the New Bedford Whaling Museum Ymelda Laxton, assistant curator of contemporary art and community projects at the New Bedford Whaling Museum

A Massachusetts museum is assembling works to explore how Indigenous people interacted with whales and the marine environment throughout history. The New Bedford Whaling Museum combines a one-woman show by Shinnecock multi-media artist Courtney M. Leonard with a collection of scrimshaw work by Indigenous artists around the country, putting contemporary and historical expressions side by side. GUESTS Courtney M. Leonard (Shinnecock) Cora-Allan Lafaiki Twiss (Māori: Ngā Puhi, Tainui from the Island of Niue), artist Dr. Nadia Jackinsky-Sethi (Ninilchik tribal member), historian and consultant for the CIRI Foundation Naomi Slipp, Douglas and Cynthia Crocker endowed chair for the chief curator and director of museum learning at the New Bedford Whaling Museum Ymelda Laxton, assistant curator of contemporary art and community projects at the New Bedford Whaling Museum

Welcome, Ymelda Rivera Laxton, the Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art & Community Projects at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. Ymelda is the newest addition to the Whaling Museum's staff.  She is a museum professional. Ymelda has worked at various cultural institutions in Washington, California, Texas, and Massachusetts. She has always been interested in cultural agency and representation in museums. As the Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art & Community Projects, she brings her experience, love, and appreciation of community storytelling in all of its forms. Ymelda Rivera Laxton is originally from Santa Fe, New Mexico, and credits the amazing cultural arts community there for fostering her love and enthusiasm for museums. She resides in Rhode Island with her husband, daughter, and their beagle mutt named Beemo. Ymelda speaks with The Artists Index's cofounder, documentarian, and podcast host, Ron Fortier, about her broad scope of experience and its importance to her new position at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. This episode was recorded with Zoom. The Artists Index uses Zoom to accommodate our guests' schedules and to allow them to remain in the comfort of their homes, especially those who no longer live on the South Coast of Massachusetts.  Our home base and recording studio is at Spectrum Marketing Group in Howland Place in New Bedford.  If you would like to be a guest on The Artists Index or have a suggestion, please let us know! The Artists Index, offers listeners up close and personal conversations with the artists, supporters, and cultural impresarios of our creative community. Our In-Focus podcasts feature artists who talk about their work, backgrounds, passions, dreams, and accomplishments.  Also featured are those who work in or manage the creative community's economy, promotion, and cultural agenda. If you enjoy this podcast please consider making a donation. https://theartistsindex.com/donate/ 

Welcome, once again, Alyssa Botelho from Podcast Episode 175 and Ethan de Aguiar, from Podcast Episode 173. They have teamed up to create the New Bedford Film Festival - which, "celebrates authentic cinematic stories, cultivates bold storytellers, and champions the city's growing creative and diverse economy." The festival will take place in New Bedford (as of this posting) in the South Coast of Massachusetts from April 18 to 21, 2024, their inaugural year. The New Bedford Film Festival event sites are at the New Bedford Ground Work and the New Bedford Creative offices. There will be multiple screening areas. The New Bedford Film Festival offers local filmmakers the unique opportunity to showcase their films as well as simultaneous, panels, and networking events. During the evening segments, the festival features the "Story in a Frame" for filmmakers to take the opportunity to share a screenshot from their project and engage in lively discussions. The New Bedford Film Festival celebrates authentic cinematic stories, cultivates bold storytellers, and champions the city's growing creative economy. NBFF takes place in the vibrant city of New Bedford on the South Coast region of Massachusetts. Alyssa and Ethan say that the festival is committed to their shared vision by, "spotlighting the diverse human experience through cinematic storytelling such as short & feature films, episodic, music videos, documentaries, and PSA shorts through a yearly film festival." Throughout the day, the New Bedford Film Festival invites you to, "explore New Bedford's downtown small business scene where the filmmakers will be offered discounts and promotions when presenting their official NBFF badge." The opening and closing events will be held at the state-of-the-art New Bedford Whaling Museum theater, featuring a red-carpet arrival. And as they say, there's more! The NB48: Filmmaking Challenge Challenge!  event is held in collaboration with the New Bedford Film Festival and sponsored by UMass Dartmouth. It aims to highlight the beauty and diversity of downtown New Bedford as the perfect setting for film narratives. The challenge is a great opportunity to showcase the thriving independent film scene in the New Bedford area and connect with like-minded local filmmakers, actors, and volunteers. The festival's co-founders, Alyssa Botelho and Ethan de Aguiar speak with The Artists Index's cofounder, documentarian, and podcast host, Ron Fortier, once again, about their new and highly successful festival collaboration. The Artists Index uses Zoom to accommodate our guests' schedules and to allow them to remain in the comfort of their homes, especially those who no longer live on the South Coast of Massachusetts. The home base and studio of The Artists Index are located at Spectrum Marketing Group in Howland Place in New Bedford. If you would like to be a guest on The Artists Index or have a suggestion, please let us know! The In-Focus Podcasts are up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of the remarkable creative community of South Coast Massachusetts including New Bedford, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, Westport, and beyond.  

Welcome to Episode 199! We have read A LOT since our last regularly recorded episode in December, so be prepared! In our “Just Read” segment, we talk about books by Lois Hamill, Hisashi Kashiwai, Martha Dickinson Bianchi, Josie Silver, James R. Benn, Alice Hoffman, Kate Jacobs, Tiago Forte, Julie Alvarez, Luanne Rice, Elizabeth Acevedo, Ann Hood, and Abraham Verghese. Phew! Spot any of your favorite authors in that list? The funny thing is, we are also currently reading a bunch of books. Go figure! We also have some fun Biblio Adventures to tell you about. Chris went to the New Bedford Whaling Museum for part of their 2024 Moby-Dick Marathon and then had a lovely browse through the New Bedford Free Library. Emily attended Katherine May's Book Club with special guest Diane Henry, author of the cookbook Roast Figs Sugar Snow. As always, there is a lot more in the episode than we include in our blurb. But we also want to remind you that our first quarter readalong for our year of reading romance is Indigo by Beverly Jenkins. We hope you'll join us. Happy Listening & Happy Reading!

An oozing whale skeleton isn't the only attraction at this Massachusetts museum. Hear how a producer's visit revealed some surprising facts about an industry that helped enrich a city and was inclusive well before diversity became a buzzword. READ MORE IN THE ATLAS: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-oozing-whale-skeleton-of-new-bedford-new-bedford-massachusetts

TrueAnon's Brace Belden returns to the show as the crew continues discussing the war in Palestine. We look at Israel's military shortcomings, the IDF's penile obsession, the domestic propaganda war, and some measures Biden could take we might actually support. We also touch on Gavin Newsom's vetoing of an anti-Caste based discrimination law, and a Ron DeSantis aide who apparently willed himself to death. Catch Will at the New Bedford Whaling Museum's 2024 Moby-Dick Marathon: https://www.whalingmuseum.org/program/moby-dick-marathon-2024/ And keep an eye on TrueAnon's feed for an upcoming announcement that will “end politics as we know it”.

When you take a dip in the ocean, there have likely been times when you got wrapped up in some seaweed. It might feel a little icky or annoying. But, seaweed has played an important role in our lives on many different levels. There's an exhibit on now at the New Bedford Whaling Museum called “A Singularly Marine & Fabulous Produce: The Cultures of Seaweed.” Morning host Luis Hernandez talked with the museum's chief curator, Naomi Slipp. The post ‘Cultures of Seaweed' run deep at the New Bedford Whaling Museum appeared first on TPR: The Public's Radio.

When you take a dip in the ocean, there have likely been times when you got wrapped up in some seaweed. It might feel a little icky or annoying. But, seaweed has played an important role in our lives on many different levels. There's an exhibit on now at the New Bedford Whaling Museum called “A Singularly Marine & Fabulous Produce: The Cultures of Seaweed.” Morning host Luis Hernandez talked with the museum's chief curator, Naomi Slipp.

Oceans, rivers and lakes are chockful of thousands of underwater plants and algae collectively described as seaweed. Demand for seaweed — kelp, specifically — has exploded as scientists have confirmed its dietary benefits and its potential as a tool in the fight against climate change. "Seaweeds have a variety of nutrients and minerals and anti-inflammatory properties that you just can't get from typical land plants," Scott Lindell, research specialist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, told Under the Radar. "Food processing companies are finding ways to integrate seaweed, kelp in particular, into products that Americans are familiar with. There are kelp burgers out there which are vegan and some of the best vegetarian burgers I've ever had." There are now seaweed farms from Alaska to Massachusetts, including Duxbury Sugar Kelp of Duxbury, Mass. Owner-operator, John Lovett, said one reason he got into the business was to explore the environmental impacts of kelp: "I really wanted to... be on the forefront of learning about [kelp], to be able to innovate some of the systems that we use to grow it and really to help other farmers understand the impact that they, too, can have on the environment." From food to biofuel and everything in between, some experts believe this billion-year-old algae is the wave of the future. A new exhibit about seaweed aims to capture part of that excitement. "One of the biggest things that I hope people walk away from the exhibition thinking about is that seaweed is a lot more than they may have known," Naomi Slipp, chief curator at the New Bedford Whaling Museum and curator of "A Singularly Marine & Fabulous Produce: the Cultures of Seaweed". "One of the fun things about having the exhibit up has been engaging in these conversations around contemporary applications for seaweed and its potential for the future." GUESTS Scott Lindell, research specialist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution John Lovett, owner-operator of Duxbury Sugar Kelp Naomi Slipp, chief curator at the New Bedford Whaling Museum

Welcome, Kyle DeCicco-Carey to In-Focus Podcast Number 161! Kyle is the Library Director at the Millicent Library in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, and speaks with us on the fifth and last episode of this series about famous Fairhaven artists. This episode is about Albertus van Beest. Our five-part series of conversations on celebrated Fairhaven artists from days gone by with Kyle have included: Podcast Episode 132  - William Bradford Podcast Episode 133 - Lemuel Eldred Podcast Episode 146 - Robert Swain Gifford Podcast Number 152 - Charles Henry Gifford This series is supported in part by a grant from the Fairhaven Cultural Council, a local agency, which is supported by the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency. Albertus van Beest was born in Rotterdam, where he grew up near the city's wharves. His talent for sketching got the attention of Prince Henry of the Netherlands, who asked him to travel with him and the Dutch fleet to the Mediterranean. According to the New Bedford Whaling Museum, Albert van Beest (1820-1860) "was born in Holland, [and] spent three years collaborating with William Bradford. A talented marine artist, Van Beest was particularly skilled at capturing the drama of shipwrecks and storms at sea." His travels, the first of which were over a span of three summers, took him to Morocco and many other places. He continued sketching on his travels to Brazil, Iceland, Patagonia, and the Falklands. In 1845 he left home and sailed to New York, where he lived for fifteen years. One of van Beest's pupils was Fairhaven, Massachusetts marine painter William Bradford. R. Swain Gifford is also said to have been one of his pupils. Bradford sought him out in New York and invited him to share a studio in nearby New Bedford. They worked and collaborated at that location for three years. Van Beest was as dramatic and temperamental as the scenes and subjects of his marine paintings. He returned to New York City where he died at the age of forty. The In-Focus Podcasts are up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of the remarkable creative community of South Coast Massachusetts including New Bedford, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, Westport, and beyond.  

In this episode, James describes the mid-19th century crazy of panoramas that tours the country and wowed audiences for a while before fading into the background, so to speak.Notes and References:Read the special notice for the Mammoth Panorama in the Inquired and Mirror on Monday, March 26, 1849 HERE.See photos and more information about the Gettysburg Cyclorama HERE.More on John Banvard from Atlas Obscura can be found HERE.In 1918, the New Bedford Whaling Museum acquired the Grand Panorama of a Whaling Voyage Round the World, created by artists Benjamin Russell and Caleb Purrington in 1848, and recently completed work on its preservation. Click here to watch a video of the panorama. This has been a production of the Nantucket Atheneum.It was hosted and edited by Janet Forest. Special thanks to Reference Library Associate James Greider for his knowledge and research. Newspaper announcement voiced by Andrew Cromartie. If you have an idea for what we should talk about next, send us an email at jforest@nantucketatheneum.orgThe Nantucket Atheneum is located at 1 India Street in Nantucket, MA. www.NantucketAtheneum.orgFacebook: @NantucketAtheneumInstagram: @NantucketAtheneum 

The New Bedford Whaling Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston have been facing similar, yet different dilemmas as they create new models for survival.

Welcome, Kyle DeCicco-Carey to In-Focus Podcast Number 146! Kyle is the Library Director at the Millicent Library in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, and will be speaking with us for the third time about Robert Swain Gifford, also known as R. Swain Gifford. Kyle's first visit was Episode 132 about William Bradford. His second was Episode 133 about Lemuel Eldred. This is a five-part series on celebrated Fairhaven artists from days gone by. It is supported in part by a grant from the Fairhaven Cultural Council, a local agency, which is supported by the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency. “Kyle DeCicco-Carey has nearly 20 years of professional library experience. He comes to the Millicent Library from Harvard University, where he was a senior reference archivist in the property information resource center. He has experience as an interim library director at the Mattapoisett Free Public Library, and is president of the Board of Directors of the Mattapoisett Historical Society.” [Fairhaven Neighborhood News] Kyle holds a master's degree in library and information science from Simmons University and, a digital archives specialist certification from the Society of American Archivists. He also holds certifications from the Academy of Certified Archivists and the Harvard Extension School in nonprofit management. He has over twenty years of library, archive, and museum experience. ROBERT SWAIN GIFFORD American Landscape Painter December 23, 1840 – January 15, 1905 Kyle tells us that, “at age two, Robert Swain Gifford came to Fairhaven with his family from Nonamesset Island where he was born in 1840. He had developed a love of art by the time he met Albertus Van Beest as a teen. He would study with Van Beest and William Bradford before opening his own studio in New Bedford, Boston, and later New York.” “His artwork consisted of etchings, oil paintings, and watercolors. His landscapes were influenced by the Barbizon School of Painting. Gifford traveled to the western US and overseas to England, France, Spain, and Egypt creating landscapes of the places he visited. He would later take part in the Harriman Expedition of Alaska and the Bering Straight along with George Bird Grinnell, John Muir, Edward S. Curtis, and others.” Gifford served on the National Academy of Design Council and taught at the Cooper Union School. He died in 1905 in New York and is buried at Rural Cemetery in New Bedford. Several works by Gifford are on display at the Millicent Library in Fairhaven. His work may be seen in Fairhaven Town Hall, The Millicent Library, the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, the New Bedford Whaling Museum, and the Kendall Whaling Museum. Listen in on this conversation as The Artist Index's Co-Founder/Host – Ron Fortier – delves more into Robert Swain Gifford's life, work, and legacy with Kyle DeCicci-Cary. The whole concept of The Artists Index and our journey is still in the making and very organic. If you would like to be a guest or, have a suggestion, please let us know! The In-Focus Podcasts are up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of the remarkable creative community of South Coast Massachusetts including New Bedford, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, Westport, and beyond.  

Welcome, Dr. Naomi Slipp, the Douglas and Cynthia Crocker Endowed Chair for the Chief Curator and Director of Museum Learning at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. Dr. Slipp oversees collections, curatorial, and museum learning across the museum, and manages 14 staff and about 100 volunteers. Prior to her arrival at the Museum, she was the Associate Professor of Art History at Auburn University at Montgomery, Alabama where she taught art history from the Renaissance to Modern Art. Naomi also managed the University's Cason McDermott Art Gallery and directed the Museum Studies Program. She holds a Ph.D. in art history from Boston University from the University of Chicago, and a BA from Hampshire College. Naomi served as the Executive Editor of Panorama: the Journal of the Association of Historians of American Art and worked at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvard Art Museums, Terra Foundation for American Art, and Boston University Art Gallery. She has presented her research widely, including across the United States and in Canada, Belgium, and the UK. as well as publishing extensively. The Artists Index co-founder and Visual Arts Podcast Host, Ron Fortier, talks with Dr. Naomi Slipp about her career, beginnings, and passion for Art. This episode was recorded with Zoom in 2023. We continue using Zoom, our podcast host's studios, and our studio at the Spectrum Marketing Group in Howland Place in New Bedford. The In-Focus Podcasts are up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of the remarkable creative community of South Coast Massachusetts including New Bedford, Dartmouth, Fairhaven, Westport, and beyond. Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

Today on Boston Public Radio: We started the show by opening the lines to hear our listeners' reaction to President Joe Biden's State of the Union Address. Then Art Caplan discussed the shortage of primary care physicians in Massachusetts. He also talked about Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont's plan to try to wipe the medical debt of state residents and a proposal in Florida that would require high school athletes to submit menstrual records to schools to prove their sex. Art Caplan is the Drs. William F and Virginia Connolly Mitty Professor and founding head of the Division of Medical Ethics at NYU School of Medicine in New York City. Then National Security Expert Juliette Kayyem came on to discuss the criminal charges filed against Lindsay Clancy, a Duxbury woman accused of strangling her three children to death. Her lawyer argues she is not guilty because of temporary insanity caused by post-partum psychosis. She also commented on President Biden's State of the Union Address and how Biden handled the Chinese spy balloon that hovered over the U.S. last week. Juliette Kayyem is the former assistant secretary for homeland security under President Barack Obama, and the faculty chair of the homeland-security program at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. GBH News Executive Arts Editor Jared Bowen discussed “Made in China 2.0” through ArtsEmerson, the El Pasado Mío/Cooper Gallery at Harvard's Hutchins Center, Re/Framing the View at New Bedford Whaling Museum, and the documentary “All the Beauty and the Bloodshed.” Michael Curry of the Mass League of Community Health Centers discussed the police reform elements of President Biden's State of the Union speech. He also talked about Boston Mayor Michelle Wu's reparations task force and the resistance the body faces from the public. Then we ended the show by asking our listeners what their favorite unhealthy food is after we read that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi eats a hotdog every day for lunch.

Someone in Maine won the 1.35 Billion Dollar Mega Millions jackpt last night. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen telling Congress that they must act immediately to keep the U.S. from defautling on its debts. A former employee at the New Bedford Whaling Museum is accused of stealing dozens of its artifacts. 5 minutes of news that will keep you in The Loop.

Welcome, Kyle DeCiccio-Carey to In-Focus Podcast Number 132! Kyle is the Library Director at the Millicent Library in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, and will be speaking with us about celebrated Fairhaven resident and painter Lemuel D. Eldred. This is the first of five, Fairhaven Cultural Council grant-supported podcasts with Kyle who will be telling us about some of the town's artists from days gone by. Lemuel Eldred is a great artist to begin this mini-series of podcasts! Lemuel was born and raised in Fairhaven, Massachusetts. The town shares the harbor with New Bedford. He was a marine painter and etcher and had studied with another outstanding Fairhaven painter, William Bradford, and for a short time, at the Academie Julian in Paris (1880). Eldred's work is typical of the late Hudson River School. He moved to Boston in 1876 to establish a studio. Lemuel Eldred was a sought-after and quite popular marine painter. He much enjoyed Bradford's Quaker beliefs and manner but did not join Bradford in his exploratory polar expeditions. His work may be seen in Fairhaven Town Hall, The Millicent Library, the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, the New Bedford Whaling Museum, and the Kendall Whaling Museum. The Artists Index Website Project features the In-Focus Podcasts – up close and personal conversations with the makers, performers, supporters, and cultural impresarios of this remarkable creative community. Each week, we feature a Visual, Performing, or Literary Artist who lives, works or is somehow connected to the South Coast of Massachusetts. We discuss their backgrounds, passions, and dreams. Please join us!     Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

The New Bedford Whaling Museum in Massachusetts is hosting the new exhibit "Loomings," inspired by the title of the first chapter of "Moby-Dick." Painter Christopher Volpe has created works prompted by the novel that take on an apocalyptic tone, with a focus on climate change and our reliance on fossil fuels. Jared Bowen of GBH Boston reports as part of our arts and culture series, "CANVAS." PBS NewsHour is supported by - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/about/funders

The New Bedford Whaling Museum in Massachusetts is hosting the new exhibit "Loomings," inspired by the title of the first chapter of "Moby-Dick." Painter Christopher Volpe has created works prompted by the novel that take on an apocalyptic tone, with a focus on climate change and our reliance on fossil fuels. Jared Bowen of GBH Boston reports as part of our arts and culture series, "CANVAS." PBS NewsHour is supported by - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/about/funders

Spring is in the air and the Book Cougars are on the prowl! Translation: Biblioadventures are ramping up as the weather gets better and Covid rates continue to fall. We can't remember the last time we had two joint jaunts in the same week, so it was a special treat to visit Riverbend Bookshop in Glastonbury, Connecticut and the New Bedford Whaling Museum in Massachusettes. Emily took a solo bibiloadventure to check out the Westport Public Library's renovation and Chris attended a Zoom event with the Society for the Study of American Women Writers. A Snake Falls to Earth by Darcie Little Badger, our first quarter readalong book, generated a lively zoom discussion. Thanks to Emily S, Colleen O, Kim, Melinda O, Julie S, Robin G, Nancy M, Aunt Ellen, Sue D, Katie S, Karen N, Kate G, Robey T, Linda P, and Linda J for joining us! Books discussed in this episode include This Time Tomorrow by Emma Straub (out 5/17/22), Salt by Catrin Kean, The Gloaming by Melanie Finn, Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre by Carole Boston Weatherford & Floyd Cooper, Gordon Parks: How the Photographer Captured Black and White America by Carole Boston Weatherford & Jamey Christoph, Such a Library: A Yiddish Folktale Reimagined by Jill Ross Nadler, It Could Always Be Worse by Margot Zemach, Bubbe & Bart's Matzoh Ball Mayhem by Bonnie Grubman & Deborah Melmon. Audiobooks we're currently listening to via Libro.fm: Emily: Both/And: A Life in Many Words by Huma Abedin Chris: Run Rose Run by Dolly Parton & James Patterson Check out our show notes for links to all of the above and more info about upcoming jaunts and what we're reading next.

In the New Bedford area, there are attractions like Battleship Cove, New Bedford Whaling Museum, and Horseneck Beach in Westport. WBZ's Kim Tunnicliffe reports.

Today on Boston Public Radio: We open the show by asking listeners about their anxiety over climate change. Interim DA Kevin Hayden discusses his intention to revisit the conviction of Charles Bogues in the 1993 murder of Louis Chéry, and his agenda as interim DA. Hayden is the interim District Attorney for Suffolk County, and he's running for election for a full term as DA this fall. Jared Bowen talks about the “Immersive Frida Kahlo” exhibit in Boston, and the New Bedford Whaling Museum's recent 2022 Moby-Dick Marathon. Bowen is GBH's executive arts editor and the host of Open Studio. Andy Ihnatko updates us on the latest tech headlines, focusing on China's use of bots and fake Twitter accounts to push against controversy ahead of the Olympic games. Ihnatko is a tech writer and blogger, posting at Ihnatko.com. Callie Crossley discusses Prince Andrew's settlement with Jeffrey Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre, and the dismissal of Sarah Palin's defamation lawsuit against the New York Times. Crossley hosts GBH's Under the Radar and Basic Black. Sue O'Connell talks about a judge ordering former President Donald Trump, Ivanka Trump, and Donald Trump, Jr., to sit for deposition in the New York investigation into his family business' financial statements. O'Connell is the co-publisher of Bay Windows and the South End News, as well as NECN's political commentator and explainer-in-chief. We then ask listeners whether they'd take a four-day work week, if they had the choice.

The museum posted pictures of these ghastly creatures to social media to highlight the unique animals of the deep. WBZ's Tim Dunn reports.

The town of Barrouallie on the leeward side of the island of St. Vincent has a long history of longshore whaling. Taking to sea in 25-foot wooden whaleboats powered by rowing and sails, the whalers of Barrouallie developed a rich tradition of a capella work songs, many of which share their roots with well-known deepwater sea shanties.  In this episode, we talk with George “Tall 12” Frederick, one of the most successful harpoon gunners in Barrouallie history who also has a genuine claim to being one of the world's last “real” shantymen. He tells us all about his childhood watching his uncles and brothers head out to sea, what it was like spending his days hunting blackfish (pilot whales) and other cetaceans such as porpoises, killer whales, and sperm whales, and how they used their songs to motivate the crew, summon crowds to the shore when returning with a catch, and haul large whales and boats onto the shore. Tall 12 is joined by fellow Vincentian Vince Reid and New England shanty singer Dan Lanier. Collectively, their efforts are helping to preserve and promote the shanty traditions of Barrouallie both at home in St. Vincent and around the world.⚓︎ Shanties featured:- Opening credits: Paddy Doyle's Boots, trad. arranged by Pressgang Mutiny- Live song: Blackbird Get Up (rowing song), trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Seven Long Years, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Bear Away Yankee, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Hey Bully Monday (hauling song), trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Yard-O (ringplay and hauling song), trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: That Poor Old Man, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Blow the Man Down, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Royo Ground, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Goodbye Fare You Well, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Live song: Time for Man Go Home, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Closing credits: Blow the Man Down, trad. arranged by The Barrouallie Whalers- Closing credits photos: The Caldwell Collection, New Bedford Whaling Museum; Carol Entin⚓︎ Find out more about the Barrouallie Whalers Project athttps://www.facebook.com/Barrwhalers⚓︎ Find out more about Pressgang Mutiny here:- pressgangmutiny.com- facebook.com/pressgangmutiny- TikTok, Twitter, and Instagram: @pressgangmutiny

In this episode we caught up with Slater after several months. We talked about how things have changed for him in the wake of the pandemic. Katlyn also had a few updates from back when she was laid off and some of her adventures in Massachusetts including a recent trip to the New Bedford Whaling Museum.

Welcome editor, feature writer, newswriter, and sportsbook author Ralph Hickok to In-Focus Podcast Number 46. There have been thirty episodes since Ralph's first visit on In-Focus Podcast Number 16. In 1973, he became the copy chief at Southeastern Advertising Agency (SEA) in downtown New Bedford. Travel/tourism was a major focus of SEA.  Ralph wrote many of ads, brochures, and other materials for the New Bedford Whaling Museum, Battleship Cove, the City of New Bedford, and Bristol County. He is also a sports historian who has written a number of books about sports history and biography including the Vagabond Halfback The Saga of Johnny Blood McNally  Listen in on his conversation as The Artist Index’s host, Ron Fortier delves more into Ralph’s memories of the Cape Verdean and intertwined Jazz music scene of days gone by!    Music courtesy of www.bensound.com 

The second of six parts of our interview with James Lindgren, an Honorable Mention in this year's John Lyman Prize, his book Preserving Maritime America looks at six maritime museums.  In this episode we discuss the New Bedford Whaling Museum.   The United States has long been dependent on the seas, but Americans know little about their maritime history. While Britain and other countries have established national museums to nurture their seagoing traditions, America has left that responsibility to private institutions. In this first-of-its-kind history, James M. Lindgren focuses on a half-dozen of these great museums, ranging from Salem's East India Marine Society, founded in 1799, to San Francisco's Maritime Museum and New York's South Street Seaport Museum, which were established in recent decades.  Begun by activists with unique agendas—whether overseas empire, economic redevelopment, or cultural preservation—these museums have displayed the nation's complex interrelationship with the sea. Yet they all faced chronic shortfalls, as policymakers, corporations, and everyday citizens failed to appreciate the oceans' formative environment. Preserving Maritime America shows how these institutions shifted course to remain solvent and relevant and demonstrates how their stories tell of the nation's rise and decline as a commercial maritime power.   Dr. James Lindgren: https://www.plattsburgh.edu/academics/schools/arts-sciences/history/faculty/lindgren.html   Preserving Maritime America: A Cultural History of the Nation's Great Maritime Museums https://www.bibliovault.org/BV.book.epl?ISBN=9781625344632   New Bedford Whaling Museum https://www.whalingmuseum.org/ Founded in 1903, the Museum's rich history reveals an intimate relationship with the communities it serves. Motivated by civic pride and a desire to preserve the artifacts and narratives of the region, the museum was founded by the children of the progenitors of the American whaling industry. The Old Dartmouth Historical Society was established “to create and foster an interest in the history of Old Dartmouth (now the City of New Bedford, Acushnet, Dartmouth, Fairhaven and Westport, MA). This area incorporates more than 185 square miles with a population exceeding 180,000. Today, members hail from many more communities.   The steady growth of its collection, programming, membership and physical plant illustrate the museum's relevancy to these communities. A touchstone to the region's past, the museum has evolved as a crossroads through which diverse communities intersect, conveying their rich cultures. The Museum can claim many superlatives amongst its holdings including the world's largest: library of whaling logbooks, prints, journals; collection of scrimshaw; Japanese whaling art and literature outside of Japan; Dutch Old Master marine paintings in the New World. The Museum's complete coverage of 19th and 20th century whaling technology makes it a global center for scholarly research. The Museum is home to the world's largest ship model, Lagoda, a half-scale whale ship built in 1916 by the aging shipwrights of New Bedford's famed fleet. The Museum displays four species of complete whale skeletons, including a Blue whale, the world's largest mammal plus a mother and fetus of the highly endangered Northern Atlantic Right whale.

Vintage guitar and amp dealer/repairman Steve Soest joins us for a very special Truth About Vintage Amps episode. Steve shares stories of meeting Leo Fender, Doc Kauffman and other legends from the world of electric guitars; he recounts of some of his days of vintage gear buying and selling; and he even walks us through the time he joined Dick Dale's band. Plus: What to do with a free Hammond M-3 organ, the New Bedford Whaling Museum and much more...  Submit your question to Skip here: podcast@fretboardjournal.com or leave us a voicemail or text at 509-557-0848. This episode is sponsored by Grez Guitars.  http://www.soestguitar.com http://www.skipsimmonsamps.com https://www.fretboardjournal.com  

The New Bedford Whaling Museum has repurposed its website to provide a 'museum from home' experience. But there's far more than what you would see if you could visit the museum right now.

The New Bedford Whaling Museum has repurposed its website to provide a 'museum from home' experience. But there's far more than what you would see if you could visit the museum right now.

Milton Brightman graduated from the Swain School of Design in 1976 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in painting. He worked for the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), Commonwealth of Massachusetts from 1979 to 2017, retiring as Regional Coordinator for the Southeastern Massachusetts State Park system.  Milton’s work has been shown at the New Bedford Art Museum, The Federal Reserve in Boston, One Man Show, Bristol Art Museum, as well as all shows at Gallery X since 1992. Currently his work can be seen at the New Bedford Whaling Museum and the Panorama Exhibition at the Kilburn Mills. Music courtesy of www.bensound.com

Talia talks with comedian Jamie Loftus about chapters 5 and 6, "Breakfast" and "The Street." We talk about breakfast, social anxiety, the New Bedford Whaling Museum, the false promises of capitalism and the musky, erotic smells of the women of Salem, Massachusetts. Theme song by Noam Hassenfeld.

Herman Melville boarded a whaling ship out of New Bedford in 1841 for a five year adventure that served as the inspiration for his novel Moby Dick, the epic tale of Capt. Ahab and his obsessive search for the Great White Whale. Every year since 1996, the New Bedford Whaling Museum has be host to the Moby Dick Marathon, a 25 hour continual reading of the American classic, and people from around the world come to participate. In Episode 19, Tyler and Carter talk with Bob Rocha of the Museum about the history of whaling in the city of New Bedford, the Moby Dick Marathon and all of the other events that are put on for the weekend. Listen in! Many thanks to this episode's sponsors: Latitude Yacht Brokerage, First Light Boatworks & Marine Railway

The City of New Bedford wanted to increase its high school graduation rates. As their response, New Bedford Whaling Museum launched the High School Apprenticeship Program, which provides resources and support to students that deepen community engagement and cultivate college and career readiness. Director of Apprentices and Interns Christina Turner and then Vice President of … Continue reading "Episode 65: Museum Apprenticeships Transform Lives of New Bedford Youth"

Reporter Jennette Barnes reads her story on Jean MacCormack's impact on the community, leading to her being honored on June 13 at the New Bedford Whaling Museum.

New Bedford, Massachusetts is known for its profitable fishing port. It even draws visitors by celebrating Moby Dick, a novel inspired by whalers there. But facing a crackdown on fishing by regulators, the city is starting to look at another source of revenue – offshore wind. We take a look inside the hidden, often lucrative world of Vermont sheriffs, and mourn (or celebrate??) the end of L.L. Bean's lifetime return policy. Plus: responding to racism on campus through art, and Palestinian storytellers in Boston. A man looks at a harpoon display at the New Bedford Whaling Museum (John Bender/RIPR) Keeping Tabs on the Sheriff When Attorney General Jeff Sessions at a speech to the National Sheriffs Association said “The office of sheriff is a critical part of the Anglo-American heritage of law enforcement,” he prompted many shocked observers to wonder where that leaves people of color within that heritage. It's also thrown a pretty harsh spotlight on the job of sheriff. But do you even know who your sheriff is? In 2006, an anonymous whistleblower tipped the Vermont state auditor off to financial misdeeds in the Windham County Sheriff’s Department, which was led by Sheila Prue. If you live in Connecticut, that’s a trick question! County government is nonexistent in the Nutmeg State — that’s why there are no sheriffs — but it’s not very strong in other New England states either. While Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and Massachusetts have elected sheriffs, their elections don’t get much attention. That lead a listener to the Vermont Public Radio podcast Brave Little State to ask: if voters aren't holding these elected officials accountable, then who is? VPR investigative reporter Emily Corwin dug in and joins us to share some surprising tales of sheriffs going bad — and virtually getting away with it. So, did that dog bed you purchased from LL Bean five years ago get chewed by its occupant? Up until last week, you could just take it back and get a replacement for no charge. But the iconic Maine company is changing its famous unconditional return policy — one that has been a part of the brand since it started more than a century ago. The change comes as a response to the growing number of customers who have been taking advantage of the policy. Maine Public Radio’s Patty Wight reports. “The Last Arrow,” by Thomas Moran, is one of the works slated for sale by the Berkshire Museum. Image courtesy of Sotheby’s And there are plenty of complaints about a deal the Massachusetts attorney general struck with Berkshire Museum. The deal allows, with some conditions, the museum to sell up to 40 works of art — including two Norman Rockwell paintings — to fund renovations and boost its endowment. A group of the museum’s members said it will press forward in a lawsuit attempting to block the sale. New England Public Radio’s Adam Frenier has more. A Maritime Past and Future in New Bedford Boats docked at the Port of New Bedford. (Lynn Arditi/RIPR) New Bedford, Massachusetts was on the front page of the New York Times this week. The headline: “A Famed Fishing Port Shudders as Its Codfather Goes to Jail.” Back in October, fishing magnate Carlos Rafael, also known as “the Codfather,” was sentenced to 46 months in federal prison for mislabeling his catch and money-laundering. But with Rafael behind bars, the men who worked for him are barred from catching groundfish with his boats. Some of Rafael's boats and permits have even been seized by regulators. And as the Times reports, the ripple effects can be felt across the usually bustling port of New Bedford, which has gone eerily quiet. Visitors listen to Moby Dick read aloud, during the annual Moby Dick Marathon at the New Bedford Whaling Museum. (John Bender/RIPR) Yet while the fishing sector sits in limbo, another industry is just gearing up off Massachusetts' South Shore — offshore wind. Right now, the Commonwealth is developing what could be the nation's first large-scale offshore wind project, and New Bedford wants to be a big part of it. Rhode Island Public Radio's environmental reporter Avory Brookins takes a look at that city's bet on offshore wind energy. In the mid 19th Century, New Bedford was one of the world’s whaling capitals. The whaling industry is long gone, but New Bedford is drawing in fans of the world most famous leviathan. RIPR’s John Bender has the story. The RIPR newsroom has been exploring New Bedford for their series “One Square Mile,” and there’s lot’s more at ripr.org. RIPR and the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth are holding a public forum on Wednesday, February 21 called “After the Codfather: The Future of New Bedford’s Fishing Industry.” Admission is free, registration required. Cultural Catharsis A painting of Trayvon Martin was part of a performance piece by Imo Nse Imeh at Westfield State University. (Jill Kaufman) NEPR An art professor recently spent four days painting a six-foot-tall portrait of Trayvon Martin, while spectators came and went. The performance took place at Westfield State University, near Springfield, Massachusetts, where last semester there were numerous reports of racist messages left around campus. New England Public Radio’s Jill Kaufman reports. Nadia Abuelezam performs on stage at “Palestinians, Live!” a night of storytelling in Cambridge, Mass, on January 28. Photo by Annie Sinsabaugh When we hear about Palestinians in the news, it's usually in the context of conflicts or negotiations with Israel. With their stories being so highly politicized, the personal narratives of Palestinians don't often make it to American ears. Nadia Abuelezam, a Palestinian-American living in the Boston area, wants to change that. In 2015, she launched an event series called Palestinians, Live! featuring true stories told on stage. The stories are later released on Palestinians Podcast, which Nadia also created. Reporter Annie Sinsabaugh went to a recent Palestinians, Live! event at the Oberon Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where she found not only entertainment but a community. About NEXT NEXT is produced at WNPR. Host: John Dankosky Producer: Andrea Muraskin Executive Producer: Catie Talarski Contributors to this episode: Emily Corwin, Patty Wight, Adam Frenier, Patrick Skahill, Avory Brookins, John Bender, Jill Kaufman and Annie Sinsabaugh Music: Todd Merrell, Ben Cosgrove, “New England” by Goodnight Blue Moon, “Sama’i” and “Julnar” by Huda Asfour, “September Mountains” by “DrumTamTam” Get all the NEXT episodes. We appreciate your feedback! Send critique, suggestions, questions, story leads, and diaspora stories to next@wnpr.org. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week on StoryWeb: Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick. This episode is dedicated to the memory of Tim Kamer. Here is a book whose fortunes have gone down and up, down and maybe up again. When Herman Melville’s epic novel Moby-Dick was published in 1851, much (if not most) of the reading public began to suspect that he had gone insane. The popular author of best-selling travel books seemed to have gone off the deep end (as it were). Dedicated to Nathaniel Hawthorne, whose friendship had inspired Melville throughout the writing of the novel, Moby-Dick sold only about 3,200 copies during Melville’s lifetime. To Melville’s way of thinking – and to subsequent generations of American literary scholars in the 20th century – he had found his true calling with the psychologically and philosophically complex Moby-Dick. The year 1919 saw the centennial of Melville’s birth, igniting the “Melville Revival.” In the 1920s and following, Melville became an established part of the literary “canon,” and it seemed that his literary genius was finally getting the acclaim it deserved.   But in later decades of the 20th century, long, ponderous, 19th-century novels lost their appeal. No one (fortunately) read James Fenimore Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans anymore, and while some people claimed to have read Moby-Dick, it was more likely that most of them had not actually read the tome. I have read, studied, and taught Moby-Dick several times – and my estimation of it deepens and grows every time I do. By no means is every part of the novel a page turner (parts of the long, drawn-out quest to find and kill the infamous white whale could serve as an insomnia aid). By no means is it all narrative, all story (the cetology chapters come to mind). And by absolutely no means is it clear what Melville wants us to think about this loose and baggy monster of a book. But there is so very much about the book that is amazing, even breath-taking. First, there are the marvelous opening chapters, in which Ishmael (for so he tells us to call him) goes to New Bedford, Massachusetts, to look for employment on a whaling ship, work Melville himself had done for some years (hence the popularity of his South Sea travel books). The third chapter – “The Spouter Inn” – tells of his night spent with the cannibal Queequeg. To my mind, these chapters represent the best storytelling in the book. Second, there is Melville’s literally encyclopedic knowledge of whales and the study of whales (cetology). While many readers are tempted to skim (or even skip) the cetology chapters so they can “get back to the story,” Melville includes meaty, essential material here, as well as in the justly famous chapter titled “The Whiteness of the Whale.” In short, you’ll learn a lot about whales from reading this book, though at a slower pace than you might fancy. A third fascinating facet of Moby-Dick is the exposé it offers of the whale oil industry, which is quite akin to the oil industry today. Melville describes the dangerous working conditions, shows the greed of the captains of industry, not just Ahab’s monomaniacal pursuit of Moby-Dick but the greed of the entire industry. Directed by Ric Burns, the PBS series Into the Deep: America, Whaling, and the World provides careful insight into the largest global industry of the 19th century. The series’ biography of Melville shows how skillfully Melville washed the gum from his readers’ eyes as to what was going on in this destructive industry. Another good, basic overview of the whaling industry can be found at the Awesome Stories website. And you might also find it fun to explore the New Bedford Whaling Museum website, including information about the museum’s Melville-related workshop, tours, and lecture. Need another reason to read Moby-Dick? Read it as a postmodern novel! Yes, you heard that right. Though modernist scholars loved it back in the 1920s, ‘30s, ’40, and ‘50s, it’s more a postmodern novel than it is a modern one. It blends genres, defies rules, goes all “meta” on us, as when Ishmael tries to interpret the painting in the New Bedford bar. But it’s “The Doubloon” chapter near the end of the novel that shows us the pre-postmodern tricks Melville was up to. Pip, the black cabin boy, has gone mad, having fallen overboard and been rescued from the depths of the ocean. Though he has physically survived his near-drowning, he has been changed forever mentally. But in Chapter 99, “The Doubloon,” Melville shows us that Pip does make some sense if you know how to listen to him. Ahab has nailed a golden doubloon to the ship’s mast. It’s worth a fortune. The first man to spot Moby-Dick can have the coin. In this chapter, Ahab, Starbuck, Stubb, Flask, and other characters walk up to the doubloon, give their explanations of what the coin’s engraving means, and walk away. The explanations range from the astrological to the very practical (the coin is worth $16, which would buy 960 cigars). But it is Pip, who in his topsy-turvy mental state, truly sees what is going on. “I look, you look, he looks; we look, ye look, they look,” he says. “I look, you look, he looks; we look, ye look, they look.” In other words, we all have a piece of the truth, and we all try to make sense of the world from our particular vantage point. This subjectivity is a hallmark of the postmodern enterprise. Now of course, Melville wasn’t a postmodernist. After all, Moby-Dick precedes the postmodern movement by more than a century. But maybe Melville was that far ahead of his contemporaries. Maybe he could see and embrace radical subjectivity – and maybe that it is a key reason why American readers thought Melville, like Pip, had lost his mind. When you look at Moby-Dick from all these angles, it’s hard not to appreciate and applaud Melville for his stunning achievement. Yes, the novel is hard to read. Yes, it’s long and dense. And yes, some of its lengthier passages are boring. But taken in its totality, it is a masterwork. Though Melville was immensely popular at the beginning of his writing career with the publication of several travelogues, he ultimately fell into utter obscurity. Deeply disappointed over the failure of American readers to embrace his more complex work, Melville quit writing by the end of the 1850s and spent the rest of his life working as a customs inspector in Manhattan. By 1876, all of his books were out of print, and near the end of his life, a New York newspaper – located just a few blocks from Melville’s residence – speculated about whether the now-minor figure in American literature was still alive! When Melville died in 1891, he was working on a new story, Billy Budd: Sailor. It would not be published until 1924. In all, Melville earned just over $10,000 for his writing during his lifetime. There’s so much more to say about Melville, about Moby-Dick, and about his other novels and short stories – but I’ll leave it there for now. Suffice it to say that Moby-Dick rewards careful reading. It’s not for the faint of heart or for those who like their fiction to be short and sweet. In fact, if you work up the courage to dive into this leviathan of a book, you may find it helpful to have Robert A. diCurcio’s chapter-by-chapter companion reader at your side. Titled “Nantucket’s Tried-Out Moby-Dick,” it’s available for free online. The novel itself is also available for free online, but for this hefty volume, you might be better off with a hard copy. Multiple editions are available, but I like the Modern Library edition. Finally, if you want to learn more about Melville’s life, check out Andrew Delbanco’s biography, Melville: His World and Work, or Hershel Parker’s famous two-volume biography. And when you have the time, indulge yourself in the rare treat of listening to more than 140 individuals as they read the novel’s 135 chapters and the epilogue. Titled “The Moby-Dick Big Read,” the project features such luminaries as Mary Oliver, Sir David Attenborough, Tony Kushner, and Benedict Cumberbatch. Each reading is accompanied by an original work of art that illustrates the chapter. What a great way to experience this American epic! Visit thestoryweb.com/mobydick for links to all these resources. Listen now as I read Chapter 3, “The Spouter Inn.” The chapter describes Ishmael’s attempts to understand the inn’s inscrutable painting and relates the tale of Ishmael and Queequeg’s night together in the inn. You can follow along with Chapter 3 at Project Gutenberg.   Entering that gable-ended Spouter-Inn, you found yourself in a wide, low, straggling entry with old-fashioned wainscots, reminding one of the bulwarks of some condemned old craft. On one side hung a very large oilpainting so thoroughly besmoked, and every way defaced, that in the unequal crosslights by which you viewed it, it was only by diligent study and a series of systematic visits to it, and careful inquiry of the neighbors, that you could any way arrive at an understanding of its purpose. Such unaccountable masses of shades and shadows, that at first you almost thought some ambitious young artist, in the time of the New England hags, had endeavored to delineate chaos bewitched. But by dint of much and earnest contemplation, and oft repeated ponderings, and especially by throwing open the little window towards the back of the entry, you at last come to the conclusion that such an idea, however wild, might not be altogether unwarranted. But what most puzzled and confounded you was a long, limber, portentous, black mass of something hovering in the centre of the picture over three blue, dim, perpendicular lines floating in a nameless yeast. A boggy, soggy, squitchy picture truly, enough to drive a nervous man distracted. Yet was there a sort of indefinite, half-attained, unimaginable sublimity about it that fairly froze you to it, till you involuntarily took an oath with yourself to find out what that marvellous painting meant. Ever and anon a bright, but, alas, deceptive idea would dart you through.—It's the Black Sea in a midnight gale.—It's the unnatural combat of the four primal elements.—It's a blasted heath.—It's a Hyperborean winter scene.—It's the breaking-up of the icebound stream of Time. But at last all these fancies yielded to that one portentous something in the picture's midst. That once found out, and all the rest were plain. But stop; does it not bear a faint resemblance to a gigantic fish? even the great leviathan himself? In fact, the artist's design seemed this: a final theory of my own, partly based upon the aggregated opinions of many aged persons with whom I conversed upon the subject. The picture represents a Cape-Horner in a great hurricane; the half-foundered ship weltering there with its three dismantled masts alone visible; and an exasperated whale, purposing to spring clean over the craft, is in the enormous act of impaling himself upon the three mast-heads. The opposite wall of this entry was hung all over with a heathenish array of monstrous clubs and spears. Some were thickly set with glittering teeth resembling ivory saws; others were tufted with knots of human hair; and one was sickle-shaped, with a vast handle sweeping round like the segment made in the new-mown grass by a long-armed mower. You shuddered as you gazed, and wondered what monstrous cannibal and savage could ever have gone a death-harvesting with such a hacking, horrifying implement. Mixed with these were rusty old whaling lances and harpoons all broken and deformed. Some were storied weapons. With this once long lance, now wildly elbowed, fifty years ago did Nathan Swain kill fifteen whales between a sunrise and a sunset. And that harpoon—so like a corkscrew now—was flung in Javan seas, and run away with by a whale, years afterwards slain off the Cape of Blanco. The original iron entered nigh the tail, and, like a restless needle sojourning in the body of a man, travelled full forty feet, and at last was found imbedded in the hump. Crossing this dusky entry, and on through yon low-arched way—cut through what in old times must have been a great central chimney with fireplaces all round—you enter the public room. A still duskier place is this, with such low ponderous beams above, and such old wrinkled planks beneath, that you would almost fancy you trod some old craft's cockpits, especially of such a howling night, when this corner-anchored old ark rocked so furiously. On one side stood a long, low, shelf-like table covered with cracked glass cases, filled with dusty rarities gathered from this wide world's remotest nooks. Projecting from the further angle of the room stands a dark-looking den—the bar—a rude attempt at a right whale's head. Be that how it may, there stands the vast arched bone of the whale's jaw, so wide, a coach might almost drive beneath it. Within are shabby shelves, ranged round with old decanters, bottles, flasks; and in those jaws of swift destruction, like another cursed Jonah (by which name indeed they called him), bustles a little withered old man, who, for their money, dearly sells the sailors deliriums and death. Abominable are the tumblers into which he pours his poison. Though true cylinders without—within, the villanous green goggling glasses deceitfully tapered downwards to a cheating bottom. Parallel meridians rudely pecked into the glass, surround these footpads' goblets. Fill to this mark, and your charge is but a penny; to this a penny more; and so on to the full glass—the Cape Horn measure, which you may gulp down for a shilling. Upon entering the place I found a number of young seamen gathered about a table, examining by a dim light divers specimens of skrimshander. I sought the landlord, and telling him I desired to be accommodated with a room, received for answer that his house was full—not a bed unoccupied. "But avast," he added, tapping his forehead, "you haint no objections to sharing a harpooneer's blanket, have ye? I s'pose you are goin' a-whalin', so you'd better get used to that sort of thing." I told him that I never liked to sleep two in a bed; that if I should ever do so, it would depend upon who the harpooneer might be, and that if he (the landlord) really had no other place for me, and the harpooneer was not decidedly objectionable, why rather than wander further about a strange town on so bitter a night, I would put up with the half of any decent man's blanket. "I thought so. All right; take a seat. Supper?—you want supper? Supper'll be ready directly." I sat down on an old wooden settle, carved all over like a bench on the Battery. At one end a ruminating tar was still further adorning it with his jack-knife, stooping over and diligently working away at the space between his legs. He was trying his hand at a ship under full sail, but he didn't make much headway, I thought. At last some four or five of us were summoned to our meal in an adjoining room. It was cold as Iceland—no fire at all—the landlord said he couldn't afford it. Nothing but two dismal tallow candles, each in a winding sheet. We were fain to button up our monkey jackets, and hold to our lips cups of scalding tea with our half frozen fingers. But the fare was of the most substantial kind—not only meat and potatoes, but dumplings; good heavens! dumplings for supper! One young fellow in a green box coat, addressed himself to these dumplings in a most direful manner. "My boy," said the landlord, "you'll have the nightmare to a dead sartainty." "Landlord," I whispered, "that aint the harpooneer is it?" "Oh, no," said he, looking a sort of diabolically funny, "the harpooneer is a dark complexioned chap. He never eats dumplings, he don't—he eats nothing but steaks, and he likes 'em rare." "The devil he does," says I. "Where is that harpooneer? Is he here?" "He'll be here afore long," was the answer. I could not help it, but I began to feel suspicious of this "dark complexioned" harpooneer. At any rate, I made up my mind that if it so turned out that we should sleep together, he must undress and get into bed before I did. Supper over, the company went back to the bar-room, when, knowing not what else to do with myself, I resolved to spend the rest of the evening as a looker on. Presently a rioting noise was heard without. Starting up, the landlord cried, "That's the Grampus's crew. I seed her reported in the offing this morning; a three years' voyage, and a full ship. Hurrah, boys; now we'll have the latest news from the Feegees." A tramping of sea boots was heard in the entry; the door was flung open, and in rolled a wild set of mariners enough. Enveloped in their shaggy watch coats, and with their heads muffled in woollen comforters, all bedarned and ragged, and their beards stiff with icicles, they seemed an eruption of bears from Labrador. They had just landed from their boat, and this was the first house they entered. No wonder, then, that they made a straight wake for the whale's mouth—the bar—when the wrinkled little old Jonah, there officiating, soon poured them out brimmers all round. One complained of a bad cold in his head, upon which Jonah mixed him a pitch-like potion of gin and molasses, which he swore was a sovereign cure for all colds and catarrhs whatsoever, never mind of how long standing, or whether caught off the coast of Labrador, or on the weather side of an ice-island. The liquor soon mounted into their heads, as it generally does even with the arrantest topers newly landed from sea, and they began capering about most obstreperously. I observed, however, that one of them held somewhat aloof, and though he seemed desirous not to spoil the hilarity of his shipmates by his own sober face, yet upon the whole he refrained from making as much noise as the rest. This man interested me at once; and since the sea-gods had ordained that he should soon become my shipmate (though but a sleeping-partner one, so far as this narrative is concerned), I will here venture upon a little description of him. He stood full six feet in height, with noble shoulders, and a chest like a coffer-dam. I have seldom seen such brawn in a man. His face was deeply brown and burnt, making his white teeth dazzling by the contrast; while in the deep shadows of his eyes floated some reminiscences that did not seem to give him much joy. His voice at once announced that he was a Southerner, and from his fine stature, I thought he must be one of those tall mountaineers from the Alleghanian Ridge in Virginia. When the revelry of his companions had mounted to its height, this man slipped away unobserved, and I saw no more of him till he became my comrade on the sea. In a few minutes, however, he was missed by his shipmates, and being, it seems, for some reason a huge favourite with them, they raised a cry of "Bulkington! Bulkington! where's Bulkington?" and darted out of the house in pursuit of him. It was now about nine o'clock, and the room seeming almost supernaturally quiet after these orgies, I began to congratulate myself upon a little plan that had occurred to me just previous to the entrance of the seamen. No man prefers to sleep two in a bed. In fact, you would a good deal rather not sleep with your own brother. I don't know how it is, but people like to be private when they are sleeping. And when it comes to sleeping with an unknown stranger, in a strange inn, in a strange town, and that stranger a harpooneer, then your objections indefinitely multiply. Nor was there any earthly reason why I as a sailor should sleep two in a bed, more than anybody else; for sailors no more sleep two in a bed at sea, than bachelor Kings do ashore. To be sure they all sleep together in one apartment, but you have your own hammock, and cover yourself with your own blanket, and sleep in your own skin. The more I pondered over this harpooneer, the more I abominated the thought of sleeping with him. It was fair to presume that being a harpooneer, his linen or woollen, as the case might be, would not be of the tidiest, certainly none of the finest. I began to twitch all over. Besides, it was getting late, and my decent harpooneer ought to be home and going bedwards. Suppose now, he should tumble in upon me at midnight—how could I tell from what vile hole he had been coming? "Landlord! I've changed my mind about that harpooneer.—I shan't sleep with him. I'll try the bench here." "Just as you please; I'm sorry I can't spare ye a tablecloth for a mattress, and it's a plaguy rough board here"—feeling of the knots and notches. "But wait a bit, Skrimshander; I've got a carpenter's plane there in the bar—wait, I say, and I'll make ye snug enough." So saying he procured the plane; and with his old silk handkerchief first dusting the bench, vigorously set to planing away at my bed, the while grinning like an ape. The shavings flew right and left; till at last the plane-iron came bump against an indestructible knot. The landlord was near spraining his wrist, and I told him for heaven's sake to quit—the bed was soft enough to suit me, and I did not know how all the planing in the world could make eider down of a pine plank. So gathering up the shavings with another grin, and throwing them into the great stove in the middle of the room, he went about his business, and left me in a brown study. I now took the measure of the bench, and found that it was a foot too short; but that could be mended with a chair. But it was a foot too narrow, and the other bench in the room was about four inches higher than the planed one—so there was no yoking them. I then placed the first bench lengthwise along the only clear space against the wall, leaving a little interval between, for my back to settle down in. But I soon found that there came such a draught of cold air over me from under the sill of the window, that this plan would never do at all, especially as another current from the rickety door met the one from the window, and both together formed a series of small whirlwinds in the immediate vicinity of the spot where I had thought to spend the night. The devil fetch that harpooneer, thought I, but stop, couldn't I steal a march on him—bolt his door inside, and jump into his bed, not to be wakened by the most violent knockings? It seemed no bad idea; but upon second thoughts I dismissed it. For who could tell but what the next morning, so soon as I popped out of the room, the harpooneer might be standing in the entry, all ready to knock me down! Still, looking round me again, and seeing no possible chance of spending a sufferable night unless in some other person's bed, I began to think that after all I might be cherishing unwarrantable prejudices against this unknown harpooneer. Thinks I, I'll wait awhile; he must be dropping in before long. I'll have a good look at him then, and perhaps we may become jolly good bedfellows after all—there's no telling. But though the other boarders kept coming in by ones, twos, and threes, and going to bed, yet no sign of my harpooneer. "Landlord!" said I, "what sort of a chap is he—does he always keep such late hours?" It was now hard upon twelve o'clock. The landlord chuckled again with his lean chuckle, and seemed to be mightily tickled at something beyond my comprehension. "No," he answered, "generally he's an early bird—airley to bed and airley to rise—yes, he's the bird what catches the worm. But to-night he went out a peddling, you see, and I don't see what on airth keeps him so late, unless, may be, he can't sell his head." "Can't sell his head?—What sort of a bamboozingly story is this you are telling me?" getting into a towering rage. "Do you pretend to say, landlord, that this harpooneer is actually engaged this blessed Saturday night, or rather Sunday morning, in peddling his head around this town?" "That's precisely it," said the landlord, "and I told him he couldn't sell it here, the market's overstocked." "With what?" shouted I. "With heads to be sure; ain't there too many heads in the world?" "I tell you what it is, landlord," said I quite calmly, "you'd better stop spinning that yarn to me—I'm not green." "May be not," taking out a stick and whittling a toothpick, "but I rayther guess you'll be done brown if that ere harpooneer hears you a slanderin' his head." "I'll break it for him," said I, now flying into a passion again at this unaccountable farrago of the landlord's. "It's broke a'ready," said he. "Broke," said I—"broke, do you mean?" "Sartain, and that's the very reason he can't sell it, I guess." "Landlord," said I, going up to him as cool as Mt. Hecla in a snow-storm—"landlord, stop whittling. You and I must understand one another, and that too without delay. I come to your house and want a bed; you tell me you can only give me half a one; that the other half belongs to a certain harpooneer. And about this harpooneer, whom I have not yet seen, you persist in telling me the most mystifying and exasperating stories tending to beget in me an uncomfortable feeling towards the man whom you design for my bedfellow—a sort of connexion, landlord, which is an intimate and confidential one in the highest degree. I now demand of you to speak out and tell me who and what this harpooneer is, and whether I shall be in all respects safe to spend the night with him. And in the first place, you will be so good as to unsay that story about selling his head, which if true I take to be good evidence that this harpooneer is stark mad, and I've no idea of sleeping with a madman; and you, sir, you I mean, landlord, you, sir, by trying to induce me to do so knowingly, would thereby render yourself liable to a criminal prosecution." "Wall," said the landlord, fetching a long breath, "that's a purty long sarmon for a chap that rips a little now and then. But be easy, be easy, this here harpooneer I have been tellin' you of has just arrived from the south seas, where he bought up a lot of 'balmed New Zealand heads (great curios, you know), and he's sold all on 'em but one, and that one he's trying to sell to-night, cause to-morrow's Sunday, and it would not do to be sellin' human heads about the streets when folks is goin' to churches. He wanted to, last Sunday, but I stopped him just as he was goin' out of the door with four heads strung on a string, for all the airth like a string of inions." This account cleared up the otherwise unaccountable mystery, and showed that the landlord, after all, had had no idea of fooling me—but at the same time what could I think of a harpooneer who stayed out of a Saturday night clean into the holy Sabbath, engaged in such a cannibal business as selling the heads of dead idolators? "Depend upon it, landlord, that harpooneer is a dangerous man." "He pays reg'lar," was the rejoinder. "But come, it's getting dreadful late, you had better be turning flukes—it's a nice bed; Sal and me slept in that ere bed the night we were spliced. There's plenty of room for two to kick about in that bed; it's an almighty big bed that. Why, afore we give it up, Sal used to put our Sam and little Johnny in the foot of it. But I got a dreaming and sprawling about one night, and somehow, Sam got pitched on the floor, and came near breaking his arm. Arter that, Sal said it wouldn't do. Come along here, I'll give ye a glim in a jiffy;" and so saying he lighted a candle and held it towards me, offering to lead the way. But I stood irresolute; when looking at a clock in the corner, he exclaimed "I vum it's Sunday—you won't see that harpooneer to-night; he's come to anchor somewhere—come along then; do come; won't ye come?" I considered the matter a moment, and then up stairs we went, and I was ushered into a small room, cold as a clam, and furnished, sure enough, with a prodigious bed, almost big enough indeed for any four harpooneers to sleep abreast. "There," said the landlord, placing the candle on a crazy old sea chest that did double duty as a wash-stand and centre table; "there, make yourself comfortable now, and good night to ye." I turned round from eyeing the bed, but he had disappeared. Folding back the counterpane, I stooped over the bed. Though none of the most elegant, it yet stood the scrutiny tolerably well. I then glanced round the room; and besides the bedstead and centre table, could see no other furniture belonging to the place, but a rude shelf, the four walls, and a papered fireboard representing a man striking a whale. Of things not properly belonging to the room, there was a hammock lashed up, and thrown upon the floor in one corner; also a large seaman's bag, containing the harpooneer's wardrobe, no doubt in lieu of a land trunk. Likewise, there was a parcel of outlandish bone fish hooks on the shelf over the fire-place, and a tall harpoon standing at the head of the bed. But what is this on the chest? I took it up, and held it close to the light, and felt it, and smelt it, and tried every way possible to arrive at some satisfactory conclusion concerning it. I can compare it to nothing but a large door mat, ornamented at the edges with little tinkling tags something like the stained porcupine quills round an Indian moccasin. There was a hole or slit in the middle of this mat, as you see the same in South American ponchos. But could it be possible that any sober harpooneer would get into a door mat, and parade the streets of any Christian town in that sort of guise? I put it on, to try it, and it weighed me down like a hamper, being uncommonly shaggy and thick, and I thought a little damp, as though this mysterious harpooneer had been wearing it of a rainy day. I went up in it to a bit of glass stuck against the wall, and I never saw such a sight in my life. I tore myself out of it in such a hurry that I gave myself a kink in the neck. I sat down on the side of the bed, and commenced thinking about this head-peddling harpooneer, and his door mat. After thinking some time on the bed-side, I got up and took off my monkey jacket, and then stood in the middle of the room thinking. I then took off my coat, and thought a little more in my shirt sleeves. But beginning to feel very cold now, half undressed as I was, and remembering what the landlord said about the harpooneer's not coming home at all that night, it being so very late, I made no more ado, but jumped out of my pantaloons and boots, and then blowing out the light tumbled into bed, and commended myself to the care of heaven. Whether that mattress was stuffed with corn-cobs or broken crockery, there is no telling, but I rolled about a good deal, and could not sleep for a long time. At last I slid off into a light doze, and had pretty nearly made a good offing towards the land of Nod, when I heard a heavy footfall in the passage, and saw a glimmer of light come into the room from under the door. Lord save me, thinks I, that must be the harpooneer, the infernal head-peddler. But I lay perfectly still, and resolved not to say a word till spoken to. Holding a light in one hand, and that identical New Zealand head in the other, the stranger entered the room, and without looking towards the bed, placed his candle a good way off from me on the floor in one corner, and then began working away at the knotted cords of the large bag I before spoke of as being in the room. I was all eagerness to see his face, but he kept it averted for some time while employed in unlacing the bag's mouth. This accomplished, however, he turned round—when, good heavens! what a sight! Such a face! It was of a dark, purplish, yellow colour, here and there stuck over with large blackish looking squares. Yes, it's just as I thought, he's a terrible bedfellow; he's been in a fight, got dreadfully cut, and here he is, just from the surgeon. But at that moment he chanced to turn his face so towards the light, that I plainly saw they could not be sticking-plasters at all, those black squares on his cheeks. They were stains of some sort or other. At first I knew not what to make of this; but soon an inkling of the truth occurred to me. I remembered a story of a white man—a whaleman too—who, falling among the cannibals, had been tattooed by them. I concluded that this harpooneer, in the course of his distant voyages, must have met with a similar adventure. And what is it, thought I, after all! It's only his outside; a man can be honest in any sort of skin. But then, what to make of his unearthly complexion, that part of it, I mean, lying round about, and completely independent of the squares of tattooing. To be sure, it might be nothing but a good coat of tropical tanning; but I never heard of a hot sun's tanning a white man into a purplish yellow one. However, I had never been in the South Seas; and perhaps the sun there produced these extraordinary effects upon the skin. Now, while all these ideas were passing through me like lightning, this harpooneer never noticed me at all. But, after some difficulty having opened his bag, he commenced fumbling in it, and presently pulled out a sort of tomahawk, and a seal-skin wallet with the hair on. Placing these on the old chest in the middle of the room, he then took the New Zealand head—a ghastly thing enough—and crammed it down into the bag. He now took off his hat—a new beaver hat—when I came nigh singing out with fresh surprise. There was no hair on his head—none to speak of at least—nothing but a small scalp-knot twisted up on his forehead. His bald purplish head now looked for all the world like a mildewed skull. Had not the stranger stood between me and the door, I would have bolted out of it quicker than ever I bolted a dinner. Even as it was, I thought something of slipping out of the window, but it was the second floor back. I am no coward, but what to make of this head-peddling purple rascal altogether passed my comprehension. Ignorance is the parent of fear, and being completely nonplussed and confounded about the stranger, I confess I was now as much afraid of him as if it was the devil himself who had thus broken into my room at the dead of night. In fact, I was so afraid of him that I was not game enough just then to address him, and demand a satisfactory answer concerning what seemed inexplicable in him. Meanwhile, he continued the business of undressing, and at last showed his chest and arms. As I live, these covered parts of him were checkered with the same squares as his face; his back, too, was all over the same dark squares; he seemed to have been in a Thirty Years' War, and just escaped from it with a sticking-plaster shirt. Still more, his very legs were marked, as if a parcel of dark green frogs were running up the trunks of young palms. It was now quite plain that he must be some abominable savage or other shipped aboard of a whaleman in the South Seas, and so landed in this Christian country. I quaked to think of it. A peddler of heads too—perhaps the heads of his own brothers. He might take a fancy to mine—heavens! look at that tomahawk! But there was no time for shuddering, for now the savage went about something that completely fascinated my attention, and convinced me that he must indeed be a heathen. Going to his heavy grego, or wrapall, or dreadnaught, which he had previously hung on a chair, he fumbled in the pockets, and produced at length a curious little deformed image with a hunch on its back, and exactly the colour of a three days' old Congo baby. Remembering the embalmed head, at first I almost thought that this black manikin was a real baby preserved in some similar manner. But seeing that it was not at all limber, and that it glistened a good deal like polished ebony, I concluded that it must be nothing but a wooden idol, which indeed it proved to be. For now the savage goes up to the empty fire-place, and removing the papered fire-board, sets up this little hunch-backed image, like a tenpin, between the andirons. The chimney jambs and all the bricks inside were very sooty, so that I thought this fire-place made a very appropriate little shrine or chapel for his Congo idol. I now screwed my eyes hard towards the half hidden image, feeling but ill at ease meantime—to see what was next to follow. First he takes about a double handful of shavings out of his grego pocket, and places them carefully before the idol; then laying a bit of ship biscuit on top and applying the flame from the lamp, he kindled the shavings into a sacrificial blaze. Presently, after many hasty snatches into the fire, and still hastier withdrawals of his fingers (whereby he seemed to be scorching them badly), he at last succeeded in drawing out the biscuit; then blowing off the heat and ashes a little, he made a polite offer of it to the little negro. But the little devil did not seem to fancy such dry sort of fare at all; he never moved his lips. All these strange antics were accompanied by still stranger guttural noises from the devotee, who seemed to be praying in a sing-song or else singing some pagan psalmody or other, during which his face twitched about in the most unnatural manner. At last extinguishing the fire, he took the idol up very unceremoniously, and bagged it again in his grego pocket as carelessly as if he were a sportsman bagging a dead woodcock. All these queer proceedings increased my uncomfortableness, and seeing him now exhibiting strong symptoms of concluding his business operations, and jumping into bed with me, I thought it was high time, now or never, before the light was put out, to break the spell in which I had so long been bound. But the interval I spent in deliberating what to say, was a fatal one. Taking up his tomahawk from the table, he examined the head of it for an instant, and then holding it to the light, with his mouth at the handle, he puffed out great clouds of tobacco smoke. The next moment the light was extinguished, and this wild cannibal, tomahawk between his teeth, sprang into bed with me. I sang out, I could not help it now; and giving a sudden grunt of astonishment he began feeling me. Stammering out something, I knew not what, I rolled away from him against the wall, and then conjured him, whoever or whatever he might be, to keep quiet, and let me get up and light the lamp again. But his guttural responses satisfied me at once that he but ill comprehended my meaning. "Who-e debel you?"—he at last said—"you no speak-e, dam-me, I kill-e." And so saying the lighted tomahawk began flourishing about me in the dark. "Landlord, for God's sake, Peter Coffin!" shouted I. "Landlord! Watch! Coffin! Angels! save me!" "Speak-e! tell-ee me who-ee be, or dam-me, I kill-e!" again growled the cannibal, while his horrid flourishings of the tomahawk scattered the hot tobacco ashes about me till I thought my linen would get on fire. But thank heaven, at that moment the landlord came into the room light in hand, and leaping from the bed I ran up to him. "Don't be afraid now," said he, grinning again, "Queequeg here wouldn't harm a hair of your head." "Stop your grinning," shouted I, "and why didn't you tell me that that infernal harpooneer was a cannibal?" "I thought ye know'd it;—didn't I tell ye, he was a peddlin' heads around town?—but turn flukes again and go to sleep. Queequeg, look here—you sabbee me, I sabbee—you this man sleepe you—you sabbee?" "Me sabbee plenty"—grunted Queequeg, puffing away at his pipe and sitting up in bed. "You gettee in," he added, motioning to me with his tomahawk, and throwing the clothes to one side. He really did this in not only a civil but a really kind and charitable way. I stood looking at him a moment. For all his tattooings he was on the whole a clean, comely looking cannibal. What's all this fuss I have been making about, thought I to myself—the man's a human being just as I am: he has just as much reason to fear me, as I have to be afraid of him. Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian. "Landlord," said I, "tell him to stash his tomahawk there, or pipe, or whatever you call it; tell him to stop smoking, in short, and I will turn in with him. But I don't fancy having a man smoking in bed with me. It's dangerous. Besides, I ain't insured." This being told to Queequeg, he at once complied, and again politely motioned me to get into bed—rolling over to one side as much as to say—"I won't touch a leg of ye." "Good night, landlord," said I, "you may go." I turned in, and never slept better in my life.