lucky cola A Picturesque New England Town’s Debt to the Right Whale

The North Atlantic right whale is highly endangered, its survival as a species in doubt. There are only about 370 of these dark, bulbous baleen whales remaining. No one knows exactly how large the population once was, but most estimates place it at almost 30 times that number. Those that remain migrate up and down the Eastern Seaboard each year from their calving grounds off Florida northward in search of food.

Many species are in peril worldwide. This species of whale — first assaulted by whaling, now the collateral victim of shipping and fishing — could be functionally extinct within two decades. But many of the same communities that once grew rich on whales’ slaughter are now uniquely positioned to help save the right whale. They can advocate reducing ships’ speeds, institute new fishing practices and begin to rectify the wrongs of the whaling industry.

For much of the year, the right whales inhabit the waters off Cape Cod, Nantucket and New Bedford, Mass., near where they were once killed by early American whalers. Some of the same places that practiced the bloody trade of whaling became, over the years, cute, quaint, tourist-filled — and rich. In whaling’s early years, Nantucketers, taking after the Wampanoag natives, would hunt whales from boats launched from beaches. Only later did the sperm whale — a more valuable prize, found far offshore, requiring larger ships to hunt — take precedence, driving the whaling economy.

By the time American whaling had slowed substantially in the late 19th century, there may have been fewer than 100 right whales left. And although the population rebounded slightly until about 2011, migratory shifts (likely prompted by climate change), coupled with the fishing and shipping industries’ reluctance to act, have left them in a perilous position.

Today, the shipping that supplies American businesses and consumers — and the fisheries that stock many larders — operate everywhere the right whales swim. Americans’ desire for cheap seafood and unwillingness to pay marginally more for imported goods incentivize industry to ignore the whales’ plight.

Treating nature as nothing more than a commodity — or as a regrettable speed bump on the way to material gain — is not only immoral but also an attitude that fundamentally cheapens humanity. It is corrosive not just to the whales and the numerous other species and ecosystems similarly endangered and destroyed but even to our own souls.

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