In gist, whale oil was one of the most important commodities in the 1800s, functioning in varied ways. The oil was the only source used in soap, oiling engines, and lamps, making it one of the ...

Normally, whale skeletons are depleted of this oil through natural processes when ... The oil from skeletons like this was not used to illuminate the lamps of the world during the high days ...

New Bedford was once the city that lit the world, exporting vast quantities of whale oil for lamps in the early 1800s. Workers packed the docks, unloading casks of oil that had been extracted at ...

The lamp is driven by oil - originally, it was whale oil, but we don't use that anymore, so it's vegetable oil now,' he said. 'Lighting the lamp is pretty unique and it requires a bit of ...

In a world lit only by fire, whale oil for lamps was especially valuable; and in the 17 th century, whales were often spotted near the mouth of Delaware Bay. In 1631, de Vries and his partners ...

Between the 1820s and 1920s, the demand for whale oil — prized for its nondrying and noncorroding properties in candles, lamps and the machinery of the burgeoning Industrial Revolution — was ...

So, we’d have to go back to killing whales for whale oil and going to bed at dusk. How about public sewers? Unthinkable. After all, to have a sewer system, you have to have a sewer plant ...