Sag Harbor Whaling Museum: More Than a Whaling History

The Whaling Museum, it’s not just about whaling. It’s a history of a town, its people, and its purpose. There are a great many things in the Whaling Museum with little to do with whaling. You’ll find plenty of facts and relics from the whaling industry, true, but you’ll find items you’ll not find in any other “Whaling Museum”. There are toys, women’s clothing, household items, and various other artifacts that provide a vivid picture of how our harbor community lived, played, and worked.

While not a large building, our museum is not small when it comes to inventory. You can find larger whaling museums, with wide open rooms, perhaps a few more charts, and pictures, maybe even whole whale skeletons. But you’ll not find a museum with more historical content, or more local history of a community built around the whaling industry. Every room, every display case, every wall and shelf, is jamb packed with artifacts, and each relic with its own story to tell. This inventory could easily fill a much larger museum, and volumes could be written about the fascinating treasures all hidden in plain sight. With so many objects in such a confined space, it would be impossible to provide a complete write up on every one. We’d need a building five times the size to fit all the plaques. I could never hope to describe the intricacy of everything you could find in the Whaling Museum, but I will detail for you one example of the stories locked in these artifacts, waiting to be found.

I spied a rare treasure with a very rich history, belied by its simple label. If you go too fast, you just might miss it. This museum is not one you should try to get through in a hurry, not if you hope to see everything it has to offer. Take your time, and you’ll be sure to notice an old rusted sword. It was sword given to sailors aboard whaling ships. Perhaps, to defend their ships, or perhaps to defend themselves should they anchor in a foreign port. How and why this sword was used is not the most fascinating aspect of this sword. The real story for me is that this sword must have been one of the earliest weapons commissioned by the government of the United States. Consider that the United States of America was still a very young country when whaling was Sag Harbor’s main industry, and you might guess that this sword is one of the earliest U.S. made weapons. Even more interesting is the fact that this sword is not an original design, but a copy of a French military short sword, and for the U.S. government to issue swords that were a copy of a French design, strongly suggests these weapons were indeed commissioned very early in our nation’s history.

The U.S., being a new country, was not very wealthy, did not have the best means of manufacturing, and had few established industries. As such we copied most technologies from other countries, and weapon design was no different. This old whaler’s sword is an excellent example of an early U.S. copy of a French short sword. The length of the steel, the pattern of the groves, the scallop design on the hilt, and even the eagle perched on the end of the hilt are all copies of the French design. The French had just recently helped the United States of America win our independence for Britain, and France was one of the most technically advanced countries in the world at the time, so it only made sense that we would copy their weapons. The one notable difference between the French made short swords, and this American copy, is that the American copy is of much lower quality. The poor quality is another good indicator of its age, but also an excellent reminder that our nation was not always a mighty military power. Our great nation, the greatest nation in the world, was not established by the military might commanded by the founding fathers, but rather by the strength of their will, and the power of their ideas.

That’s a pretty good story from just one object of the hundreds. There are so many more stories waiting to be heard, you just need to be willing to look, and listen to what the relics have to say.