A tour of Durban’s dark whaling past

Dressed in sneakers and armed with Instagram, 120 curious Durbanites met on the steps of the Durban City Hall on Saturday, ready to get into the bus and trek to the restricted military area on the south side of the Bluff to visit the city’s former whaling station.

With the aim to explore Durban’s hidden treasures and share the stories that make up the city’s history, BESETdurban creates exclusive tours around the city to forgotten places and in this case, forbidden areas.

Established in 1908, the whaling station at the foot of the south pier was started by Norwegians – the leaders in the whaling industry at the time who pioneered a more efficient way of catching and processing whales.

A highlight of the tour was to have the former factory manager of the whaling station, Peter Froude share his memories and anecdotes about the once massively successful industry.

Froude said the whaling station was a huge set up and extremely profitable in the 1950’s.

“Union Whaling was probably one of the biggest and most sophisticated whaling stations in the world. The factory was about a kilometre long and employed well over 1000 people on its heyday,” said Froude, who was one of nine chemists working there.

Froude said the entire whale was processed at the station, nothing went to waste.

“About 26 products were made using various parts of the whales: blubber was turned into oil and used in soap, margarine and even cooking fat; sperm oil (from sperm whales) was used in lubricants for machinery, in candles and pharmaceuticals; bone and protein meal went into animal feed and the good meat was frozen.

“In Japan, whale meat is still very popular and extremely expensive.”

Another rather disgusting but incredibly lucrative byproduct of whaling was Ambergis.

“Sometimes sperm whales have this intestinal blockage made up of bits like squid beaks which they secrete after a while.

“This Ambergis is worth a fortune and is used in high-end perfumes as it helps to make the fragrance last longer.”

While whaling was a roaring business, it did start slowing down in the 1970’s.

“There were various issues that led to the shut down of the station, one being that the residents were upset about the smell.

“The main reason, however, was the international condemnation of whaling, as the world had woken up to the fact that whales were being depleted,” said Froude.

Watch BESETdurban’s Facebook live video below to hear Peter Froude tell the tale of the end of the whaling station.

https://www.facebook.com/besetdurban/videos/2041455639416721/

The abandoned area will soon be brought back to life with plans to build a demo desalination plant, funded by the Japanese government.

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