What is the whaling wall?

The whaling wall is a long, salt-encrusted alley sided by weathered, barnacle-ridden wood, hidden on the island of Nantucket, in Massachusetts. Sailors, their descendants, and general fans of whale-hunting come to the whaling wall to commemorate the heyday of their trade. At the wall, they tuck mementos into gaps in the stone. These include miniature harpoons, hemp ropes, and gold doubloons. The whaling wall is especially frequented on August 1st, the birthday of Herman Melville, author of the book Moby Dick.

For more than two centuries, ships would sail from Nantucket to hunt whales. This trade dwindled and eventually ended in the 1920s. This loss was a painful blow to the whale-hunting community. To commiserate over their experience, the whaling wall was constructed as a place to remember the "good old days" of stabbing giant mammals to death and draining oil from their heads to make perfume.

The whaling wall is especially popular with the orthodox whaling community, recognized by their authentic whalebone peg legs and an insistence on using only two-flue harpoons. This group often comes into conflict with the local government, which is run by pirates. Despite a fondness for eye patches and sailboats, modern pirates are considered frauds and imposters by orthodox whalers. Traditionalists also deeply resent restrictions on access to the seafaring relics stored just above the whaling wall.

Outsiders have compared the situation at the whaling wall to that of the formerly-named Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. The comparisons were summarized in a poem, which goes as follows:

There once was a wall in Nantucket,
Whi

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