The Larsen Room

This room is full of whaling artifacts and photographs. On the floor is mounted a harpoon fitted with an explosive head. To the middle is a group of harpoon heads of differing types, most of them with "flattened" tops. The pointed one on the left was made illegal as it tended to pass right through the whale before exploding. The mushroom tops on the others prevented this by slowing the head down on contact, making it more humane.

This photograph, by Nigel Bonner, of a fin whale being flensed, is one of many on display in the museum covering over fifty years of whaling. The photographs are available as postcards at the museum or King Edward Point Post Office.