Flappers & Fiction

To the modern eye, attacking a massive Bowhead whale from a fragile skin kiak seems like madness, yet for the Eskimo of the Arctic coast, it was simply survival. This fascinating account chronicles the ingenuity of the northern hunt, describing the use of inflated sealskin floats to tire the leviathan and the heart-stopping “gauntlet” run within icy inlets. It captures the raw courage required to face the “Prince of Bone-bearing Whales” up close, revealing how native expertise eventually schooled the “civilized” whalers of New Bedford in the art of navigating the deadly ice-packs.

The Eskimo builder stands at his center, extends his arm and snow-knife as a radius, and draws a circle on the drift. From that simple gesture rises a spiraling dome of snow blocks, each one leaning further inward until a single horizontal key-block locks the whole structure tight, like half an eggshell on its rim. This author watched this process hundreds of times across a winter of Arctic travel, and it never once ceased to be astonishing.