科技回声

Whale oil was a huge business back then. Oil lanterns were ubiquitous in businesses and in homes. Whalers were very well paid and doing a very physical and relatively dangerous job, sort like frackers now.

I’ve always been a fan of anthropomorphic depictions of animals, and I have no idea why. The Far Side was always a favorite.Minor aside: 4/20 - ahead of its time

The sad thing it took another 100 years to whaling to truly decline; afaik whaling peaked in 1960s so the grand ball was somewhat premature.

It's like an 1860s version of the Chick-fil-A cows holding signs that say, "Eat Mor Chikin"

"The Oil Wells of Our Native Land: May They Never Secede"That's a good Civil War joke.

160+ years later and still funny

As an aside, the illustration strongly remind me of the classic illustrations in the Alice in Wonderland book (published in 1865).I wonder if it is the same artist or if it was a shared style at the time.

The cartoonist's name is not given. Does anyone know who created it?

Interestingly, the whaling industry had been similar to the way venture capital works today. Tom Nicholas talks about this in his book, "VC: An American History" [0].[0]: <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2019/10/01/today-venture-capitalists-owe-something-century-whalers/zulg0d1XpMX561OSWepcDM/story.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2019/10/01/today-ventur...</a>