Museums

The Whalers Cabin Museum

In days gone by the building was simply called "the shack." Portuguese whalers probably never lived in the old rustic cabin but the name Whalers Cabin has stuck. Originally built by Chinese fisherman in the early 1850's the cabin overlooks Whalers Cove and Carmel Bay Whalers Cabin just as it has for over 140 years. Over the years many people have lived in the cabin. At one time in the late 1870s, when the area was a fishing village, there were over ten similar structures as part of the village. Now the cabin is the last and the oldest structure built by the Chinese on the Monterey Peninsula.

In 1983 when the last resident of the cabin moved out, California State Parks, Point Lobos Association and the docent group began plans to open the cabin to the public as a museum. In the summer of 1986 archaeologists started to dig in the cabin's floor and they found evidence of Chinese and Japanese occupancy. When the Chinese lived here the floor was hard packed earth. In later years a pine floor was added supported by granite chunks from the quarry that began operation in the late 1850's in what is now the parking lot. They also found whale vertebrae holding up the floor joists. Still later an oak floor was added on top of the old pine floor.

The cabin was raised and placed on blocks so a foundation could be poured to help stabilize the structure. The old cellutex walls and ceiling, wiring, and pipes were removed. The museum interior would have the look of walls that were papered and whitewashed. Under the direction of Point Lobos Docent Kurt Loesch, descendants of the families who lived at Point Lobos were contacted. Old photographs, artifacts and memorabilia were collected and added to the archives. The park history was researched through governments records and local newspaper archives. Working with California State Parks exhibit specialists, displays were designed around each time period.

The Whaling Station Museum

The history of shore whaling on the central coast as it took place many years ago is told in this small museum that was previously a garage next to the Whalers Cabin. Displays of collected artifacts show different sizes of harpoons and whaling tools, whale-oil barrels, a oil barrel display, a model of a shore whaling boat, diagrams of whale-oil processing, and photographs of the old Monterey Peninsula whalers. This special addition was opened in 1994.

The Carmel Bay Whaling Company was operated by a group of Portuguese seamen from 1862 until 1879. In California there were only 16 shore whaling stations between 1854 and 1900, with only about 300 men involved. Artifacts for the museum were hard to come by. With the help of the Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History and the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, items were collected and loaned for the small museum. A harpoon collection was later loaned to the museum from the National Maritime Museum. Click to download a copy of the Whalers Cabin Brochure.