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Commercial whaling is banned. Yet every year, Japan, Norway and Iceland kill around 1,500 whales. Thousands more dolphins and small whales are slaughtered in bloody hunts in countries around the …
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The IWC was set up in 1946, and it took 20 years for the countries involved to agree to stop killing blue whales because there were virtually none left. As …
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In 1930, Right Whales are the first to be protected from commercial whaling. And in 1931 the Blue Whale Unit was introduced to measure and ultimately regulate nations’ quotas for …
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As technology advances, the carnage increases. Factory whaling ships, with stern slipways and explosive harpoons make killing whales so much easier. And the conversion of whale oil to margarine begins, …
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The rocket-powered explosive harpoon is invented by Sven Foyn and Thomas Roys. More species are exposed to exploitation.

After experiencing life aboard a whaling ship, American writer Herman Melville writes the classic Moby Dick, or The Whale is a novel. The book is sailor Ishmael’s narrative of the obsessive …
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King’s Lynn ships join others from Britain in Arctic waters, hunting for whales.  The era of organised whaling begins.

The Greenland Fishery house in King’s Lynn becomes a tavern, home …
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With the arrival of The Mayflower in Massachusetts, Whaling becomes an important part of the New England economy.

Reports of Bowhead Whales around the Spitsbergen Archipelago by explorer William Barents draws hundreds of whale-ships to the Northern waters.

Whaling as an industry began around the 11th Century when the Basques started hunting and trading the products from the northern right whale (now one of the most endangered of …
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