A DYING INDUSTRY 319 



store. He was then set counting tiny rods of whalebone, such 

 as hatters used to insert between the brim and the crown of 

 hats, and for two years he counted rods and studied the knack 

 of cutting and scraping the bone. When Wilham Forster sold 

 the business to A. J. Vetter, young Messman continued at his 

 employment, working six full days a week with no vacation, 

 until twenty-four years later he himself bought out Vetter, 

 stock, shop, fittings, and all — that is, he bought the stock; all 

 the rest, goodwill included, was thrown in. On the day when he 

 retired he had worked in the same shop and at the same table 

 for fifty-six years. 



When Mr. Messman began at the foot of the business ladder, 

 the trade in whalebone was thriving and important. When he 

 was at the height of his career he employed twenty-five cutters 

 and thought nothing of handling, in a year, 30,000 pounds of 

 bone. He fought the Pacific Steam Whaling Company when 

 it tried to establish a monopoly, for he refused to sell out, found 

 a market in Europe for the by-product — the part of the slab of 

 baleen where the bone begins to split, which can be cut into 

 only short lengths — and sold every ounce of the hitherto worth- 

 less stuff to firms that manufactured military hats, turned the 

 ground floor of his building into a restaurant, and so kept his 

 business afloat until his rivals became deeply involved in difficul- 

 ties of their own. 



Over his street door, when in 1920 he gave up his shop, there 

 hung a big sign, "Whalebone," in white letters on black; above 

 it hung a faded sign which once bore the name of A. J. Vetter, 

 and above that a sign, even more battered, which stands as a 

 monument to the days of that older merchant, William Forster. 



The price of whalebone dropped suddenly and the very year 

 that it brought $4.50, the price of $1.85 is quoted. There was 

 a period of recovery and even of high prices in the next decade; 

 but it never reached those sublime heights again and in the final 

 issue of the Shipping List in 1914 was the following paragraph: 



"We are unable to quote any sales. At the beginning of 

 the year it was reported that a small quantity of Arctic had 

 been sold for export but particulars could not be learned. There 



