Whale story similar to 1907 one

Last Updated on Tuesday, 31 January 2012 16:07 Written by Opinion Wednesday, 01 February 2012 00:00

To the editor:

The 62-foot-long, dead, adult male fin whale, which was stranded at Ocean City on Jan. 23 had apparently been killed by a collision with a ship.

As reported in the March 2, 1907 issue of The New York Times, it seems that a similar incident occurred “fifteen miles off Ocean City” when the “auxiliary fishing smack Goldie Budd” hit an obstruction the day before. Capt. Hyland Parker saw “a huge creature that was not unlike a whale lashing the sea into fury.” In addition, it had a “monster head, resembling that of a horse” which was “spouting blood as the creature drew away from the sloop.” The beast “was at least seventy-five feet long and probably ten feet in diameter.”

The paper quoted the captain as saying, “I never took much stock in sea serpents, but I have met sea captains who described to me just such creatures as that we struck this afternoon.”

Evidently, the Goldie Budd did hit an enormous sea creature, which resembled a whale, simply because it apparently was a whale, perhaps even a fin whale, albeit one who also happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Don Nigroni

Glenolden, Pa.