The Inaugural Hobart Whaling Conference held in Hobart in May 2019 and hosted by the Maritime
Museum of Tasmania sought to harvest the enormous amount of personal research which occurs outside
of the funded university research scholarship and academic system. In addition to contributions by
Australian whaling and sealing researchers the conference attracted papers by three British researchers
and three New Zealand researchers.

The range of topics explored whaling and sealing around Australasia and the Pacific by the British and
Colonial Whale and Seal Fisheries. And though American contributions were not sought the Conference
still managed to accommodate two papers related to American whaling – one on the American presence
in Hobart in the 1840s and 1850s and the other on US bay whaling rock art left behind in north-western
Australia in the 1840s.

In this volume you will find three papers on British Southern Whale Fishery. One on whaling to the
north of Australia around Indonesia and New Guinea; the second, based on newly uncovered logs, on
the remarkable whaling career of British whaling master, James Choyce; and the third on British south
sea whaling surgeons who’s importance as skilled observers and commentators is becoming ever more
significant.

This is followed by three Colonial (Australian and New Zealand) papers including a project to create
Track Charts for whaling voyages where no log exists; a paper on the Waiopuka Fishery based at Kaikoura
in the 1840s; and a ‘viewing’ and discussion of the ’Whangamumu Whaling Film” made in the 1930s
which sought to re-enact using original whalemen the techniques of chasing and taking humpback
whales from open boats.

Five papers on Tasmanian and Hobart whaling include a paper seeking to establish the true scale of
Tasmania whaling; an examination of the story of Tasmanian whaling presented in popular ‘histories’; a
look at the whaling and sealing interests of Tasmanian George Meredith; a paper on the activities of the
American Consul in Hobart in the 1840s and 1850s; and a paper examining Norwegian interests in the
1920s and 30s when they found Hobart a useful base for Antarctic whaling.

Sealing papers include some preliminary thoughts on three Sydney based entrepreneurs from very early
days in the Colony including John Grono and a paper on the involvement of the Australian sealer Richard
Siddins on the South Shetland Islands.

Moving back to whaling the Proceedings final papers include an in-depth examination of whaling in
Western Australia from drift to modern whaling and lastly a paper examining British whalers as collectors
of cultural and natural history artefacts and specimens.
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All in all a tremendously varied and unique set of papers on what was the first Colonial industry.