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History-Of-Whaling-Museum.Pdf WHALING MUSEUM Hadwen & Barney Oil and Candle Factory as the Whaling Museum, 1967 JACK E. BOUCHER, LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, PRINTS AND PHOTOGRAPHS DIVISION, HABS MA-908-2 100 Nantucket Historical Association WHALING MUSEUM Whaling Museum The Whaling Museum is the flagship site of the Nantucket Historical Association’s fleet of properties. From its origin in 1930 in the Hadwen ADDRESS & Barney Oil and Candle Factory, 13–15 Broad Street where the story of the industry that TH made Nantucket a celebrated place CONSTRUCTED . BIKE PA CLIFF CLIFF RD RD. BIKE Hulbert Ave. PA was told THthrough a collection of whal- Hadwen & Barney Oil ing implements, to its twenty-first-cen - and Candle Factory Civil War Brant Point Monument Tristram Con East Lincoln Ave. tury reinterpretation andHomesite expansion, Marker the 1847 W illard St Wa museum has consistentlyCli Road been a major PeterCornish Foulger St Museum N. Beach St . lsh St Swain St attraction for residents and visitors. 1971 . Easton Street . OldestWilliam House Hadwen and Nathaniel Whaling Museum N & Kitchen orth Ave. N. Centre St Way BarneyGarden were partners in one of the larg- 2005. Kite Hill MacKay Way Chester St est whale-oil manufacturing firms on Harborview S. Beach St Nantucket Harbor . N. Water St theSunset island Hill inLane the mid-nineteenth. cen- West Chester St tury, Hadwen & Barney. In 1848, they . North Liberty St . Sea St . Steamboat purchased the oil and candle factory Centre St NHA Whaling Museum Step Ln. Wharf Wyers Way Franklin St. Lily Pond Park & Museum Shop building on Broad Street at the head Ash St. Old New Easy St . Ash Ln. North . North of New . North Wharf (now Steamboat Cemetery Cemetery Academy Ln. Academy IKE PATH S. Old North MADAKET RD. B Lily St Wharf) built by Richard Mitchell & SonsGay St. Broad St. Wa . Grove Lane Wharf . ter St in 1847, a year after the Great Fire . Chestnut St . Thomas Macy Straight estminster St Quince St FederalOak St St . Wharf W Centre St Warehouse . swept through the area. The GreekHussey St New Whale St Cambridge St Straight Wharf Old South Gardner St. Revival-style industrial building (similar W India St . Wharf Candle St ashington St . Woodbury Ln Union St Salem St to the Thomas Macy WarehouseMacy-Christian on . House Commercial Walnut Ln. Liberty St . Straight Wharf) was originally the coreWinter St . Wharf . D New Lane Main Street . e Greater a c Barnabas Ln. of a complex of buildings devoted o Light Lowell Pl. NHA Research Library n Commercial St Howard Ct Howard Fire Hose . ’s ’s Ct Folger-Franklin Memorial Ray Whitney Gallery & W Cart House a Boulder and Bench y Hadwen Quaker Meeting House Washington St TH Properties Guide | Whaling Museum . Fair St. Orange St 101 PA Upper Main St Judith Chase Ln. KE I Madaket Rd. House . B RD Lucretia Mott Ln F . Quaker Road . LIF Thomas . C MADAKETTH RD Old BIKE PA Summer St School St Gaol Macy Pleasant St . Quaker . House Charter St . Cemetery Vestal St. Hillers Ln. MilkNew St Dollar Green Ln. r eet Pine StreetDarling St . Saratoga Lane Tattle Ct . Copper Ln. Starbuck Ct . Fayette St . 1800 Farmer St . Milk St . House Twin St . Meader St Francis St Mt. V Mill St. Lyon St . Mulberry St . Candle House Ln. W New Mill St a ernon St Jeerson St Angola St. Weymouth St . s . Eleanor Ham . Eagle Ln. y h Ma a i rs n alt h W P Pony Field E. Dover St S g r t o Silver Street o Joy St s Union St p n . Prospect e S. Mill St c S t . t . S Hill tr E Mill Hill Lane ee Old Mill West Dover Street Coon St x t . t Cemetery York Street . Beaver St York Street . Boyer’s Alley PROSPECT ST Spring St Warren Street New Street Hummock Pond Rd. BIKE PA Lower Orange St . Back Street TH Atlantic Ave. Gardner Perry Ln . Vesper Lane Williams Street Cherry Street Williams Ln. Bear Street Sparks Ave. Lower Pleasant Street TH A SURFSIDE BIKE P WHALING MUSEUM Captain George A. Grant demonstrates harpoon technique, 1934. P16714 102 Nantucket Historical Association WHALING MUSEUM to oil processing and candle manufacturing, supplying oil for street lamps in London and Paris and lighthouses along the Atlantic coast of the United States. Elegant, sweet-smelling spermaceti candles made in the factory graced the tables of the wealthy at home and abroad. In 1850 alone, Hadwen & Barney produced 4,000 boxes of spermaceti candles plus more than 450,000 gallons of refined sperm oil. After the local whaling industry failed — the last whaleship sailed from Nantucket in 1869 — the building was used as a warehouse, and much later as an antiques shop. In 1929, it was purchased by the Nantucket Historical Association to house a collection of whaling arti- facts donated by Edward F. Sanderson, a Congregational minister who had become interested in the island’s whaling history after he pur- chased the historic house known as Moors End at 19 Pleasant Street for his summer home. The Whaling Museum opened in the Hadwen & Barney Oil and Candle Factory in 1930, with Sanderson’s extensive collection of whaling implements and other material relating to the industry displayed in the authentic refinery building. Harpoons, lances, blubber hooks, cutting spades, and a whaleboat fitted out for action were enlivened with the whaling tableaux and commentary of “custo- dian” George Grant, a veteran of the trade who served as interpreter of the exhibit for more than a decade. The collections of the NHA continued to expand in the twentieth century. While the Whaling Museum featured the industry that made Nantucket an internationally recognized name in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the Fair Street Museum showcased artifacts that told the story of island life in all its variety, and the NHA’s house mu- seums interpreted domestic life during successive historical eras. But space to preserve and exhibit the relics of an earlier age was always at a premium. Fortunately, descendants of Nantucket’s founding English families continued to support efforts to preserve and present local history. Just as the Coffin family gathered forces to commemorate an ancestral home on Sunset Hill (the Oldest House, ca. 1686), Admiral William Mayhew Folger, a descendant of early settler Peter Foulger [original spelling], left a bequest to the NHA in 1929 that honored his ancestor. He specifically required the NHA to use the funds from his bequest to construct a building similar to the Coffin School, a Greek Properties Guide | Whaling Museum 103 WHALING MUSEUM Peter Foulger Museum, 1970s P4365 Revival-style brick building built on Winter Street in 1852 with funds donated by Sir Isaac Coffin, a British admiral descended from Tristram Coffin. Admiral Folger’s gift was received in 1968, after the death of his last surviving beneficiary, and following his wishes, the building at the corner of Broad and North Water streets was completed in 1971, pro- viding new exhibit halls, a library room, office space, and, as always, more room to store collections. The NHA library and artifact collections were housed in their own dedicated buildings in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, freeing up the Broad Street compound for reinvention and expansion. A new museum was designed, incorporating the 1847 Hadwen & Barney Oil and Candle Factory and the 1971 Peter Foulger Museum on the op- posite corner of the block as part of a new, expanded site that bridged the two buildings with exhibit and program space, including Gosnell Hall, where a forty-foot-long sperm-whale skeleton is suspended from 104 Nantucket Historical Association WHALING MUSEUM the ceiling. The Hadwen & Barney Oil and Candle Factory, featuring the massive lever-press, is in- terpreted as an industrial site where the compli- cated process of refining oil and making sperma- ceti candles is explained. New exhibition spaces extend above and around Gosnell Hall, including a scrimshaw and decora- tive arts gallery and gal- leries for changing ex- hibits about Nantucket life, arts, and ideas. Daily summer programs in- clude the popular and Whale hunt lecture in Gosnell Hall informative Whale Hunt lecture, a dramatic multimedia experience that brings to life the toil and danger faced by men in pursuit of whales. Be sure to climb the circular staircase to Tucker’s Roofwalk, perched atop the Whaling Museum, where the panorama of the harbor pres- ents a changing scene governed by the season and the weather and by the layers of history that make Nantucket such a storied island. And don’t forget to visit the Museum Shop adjacent to the Hadwen & Barney Oil and Candle Factory, where you will find a carefully selected mixture of merchandise relating to Nantucket’s present and past. Properties Guide | Whaling Museum 105 WHALING MUSEUM Renovated and expanded Whaling Museum WARREN JAGGER. 2005 106 Nantucket Historical Association WHALING MUSEUM Properties Guide | Whaling Museum 107.
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