As I’ve mentioned previously, I’m attending a Science Writers & Communicators of Canada (SWCC) conference in Ottawa a few weeks from now, and while looking at the program for the conference I saw SWCC offers two annual book awards to honor outstanding contributions to science writing that are 1) intended for and available to children/middle grades ages 8-12 years, and 2) intended for and available to the general public. One of the winners this year was Mark Leiren-Young for his book “The Killer Whale Who Changed the World.”
The book explains how killer whales (also known as orcas) were feared as vicious killers throughout history, but the capture of one by the Vancouver Aquarium in 1964 forever changed the way the public views this amazing species.
History: Orcas around the world
In the first century, Roman historian Pliny the Elder kicked off the bad reputation plaguing killer whales with his description of them as “loathsome, pig-eyed assassins” and warned they cannot be properly depicted “except as an enormous mass of flesh armed with savage teeth.” In 1758, the Swedish naturalist who developed taxonomy, Carolus Linnaeus, called them Orcinus orca in his book. Translated, the Latin reads “of or belonging to the kingdom of the dead,” “bringer of death,” or “devil whale.”
This was the world Samuel Burich and Joe Bauer lived in when they found themselves face-to-face with a killer whale their harpoon had failed to kill.
Capturing an orca
What led Samuel Burich and Joe Baeur to be face-to-face with a killer whale? The answer to that lies in one man: Murray Newman.
Born in Chicago in 1924, Murray Newman grew up during the Great Depression and saw his father’s hobby of fishing become a way to feed the family. From this young age he became fascinated with fish, and spent a year at the University of Chicago as a science undergrad before being drafted into the navy during World War II. |
In 1955, Newman was appointed head of the Vancouver Public Aquarium, which opened in June 1956. By 1963 the aquarium was doing so well the Vancouver city council decided to expand it, and Newman suggested the ultimate addition: a perfect model of a killer whale. But to make a perfect model required having measurements from a real-life animal, so it was decided a hunt would be sponsored to kill a killer whale to use as a model for measurements.
The media coverage as the expedition set off was intense. The idea was to set up shop at East Point on Saturna Island, and when a pod of killer whales swam close enough, harpoon one from the shore then reel them in. But as days turned into weeks with no killer whales in sight (or close enough to harpoon, anyway), people began slowly peeling off until only two were left: Samuel Burich and Joe Bauer. | Sam Burich at East Point Photo by Joe Bauer |
At first Burich thought he missed, but soon it was discovered he’d successfully hit a whale. He had somehow missed the whale’s brain and instead sent the harpoon straight through the blubber along the top of the whale’s head. When they called Newman to inform him, it was decided the killer whale would not be killed, but instead brought to live at the aquarium alive. Moby Doll was led to Vancouver by the harpoon through his blubber Photo by Don McLeod, courtesy of Terry McLeod |
The killer whale was misidentified as female and called Moby Doll, a misconception that only came to light after Moby’s death (Bauer knew from the start Moby Doll was a male, but as a lowly volunteer and not a prestigious scientist, his opinion was not given any credence).
Moby Doll first lived in a Vancouver dry dock before being transferred to a makeshift pen created by the local military base. At first, Moby refused to eat, but eventually started consuming fish, much to everyone’s relief. However, despite a supposed improvement, on October 9, 1964, Moby’s appetite again vanished, and after receiving a final belly rub from a volunteer, dropped below the water’s surface and drowned (whether this was an intentional death or not will never be known). | Aquarium volunteer Terry McLeod hand feeds Moby Doll some fish Photo by Don McLeod, courtesy of Terry McLeod |
- There are two main types of orcas: transients (mammal-eating orcas) and residents (fish-eating orcas); Moby Doll was a resident, and most orcas used in movies, like Free Willy, are as well
- Each pod of orcas has their own dialect, which calves learn from their pod mates as they grow up
- Orcas mature at roughly the same rate as humans, and orcas are one of only two species outside of humans that experience a significant postmenopausal life (even female elephants and great apes don’t live long after they’re no longer fertile)
The book draws two important conclusions in the final chapter.
There are many more things discussed in this book I didn’t have time to cover today, but I highly encourage anyone interested in learning about the history of aquarium orcas to carve out a few hours of their time to give this book a look.