It has been six months (actually seven) since I found the Newport log entry of February 11, 1895 had had been removed from the official museum transcription published on the authorized, guaranteed error-free platform, complained about it, and received the usual response, i.e. rather than deal with the situation, a way was found to simply misdirect, assign blame without talking to me, conducting its own undefined “forensic investigation, only to receive a letter from an attorney informing me that,

“As a volunteer of the Museum, you have been informed of the Museum’s Volunteer Code of

Conduct which is found in the Museum’s Handbook. Specifically, the Code of Conduct states that an individual’s volunteer status may be terminated if the volunteer’s actions are not supportive of the Museum or its mission. I find your posts, which you are free to make as an individual, but not as a volunteer, have cast an unwarranted shadow on the other volunteers who are involved in the

transcription project with you.”

That last part was just an invention to add gravitas as, while I spoke highly of the volunteers with all my criticism being directed toward the museum, its paid for repository platform, the promises made that there would never be any mistakes, even those being pointed out, and how this does not fall on the transcribers with whom I worked, this division was to be expected as, unable to deal with the actual issue, having a boogy-man who betrayed his peers is always a convenient “go-to”.

My casting of an unwarranted shadow will keep those upon whom the alleged shadow supposedly fell from speaking to me and only receiving a controlled and edited account of the facts.

This seems borne out by not having been contacted by any transcribers, but being greeted in a friendly manner by non-transcriber volunteers at the museum that I have run into at community events who have asked how I was doing and if I was gone only for a break or for good.

This letter was in response to my having written to the museum’s president about the erasure and receiving this reply,

“Dear Joe,

I appreciate you reaching out with regards to the transcription of the Newport log. Thanks for noting the omission. It’s important that we were made aware and I am glad we got this corrected. This work is critical. We value the importance of our primary sources and how they inform scholarship and shed light on the past.

We are here to transcribe, not edit – ever. I am certain you would agree that our shared responsibility is to presenting accurate and complete history. As you and I have discussed many times, the Museum’s archives serve as powerful tools for under told or untold truths of our community.  I see this as one of our single most important functions.

In light of this, we will be reviewing the protocols and best practice for the transcription team to ensure that all have a full understanding of the use of technology. Your own participation will be important.”

Because I was informed in a February 10 email from the museum that “we will be reviewing the protocols and best practice for the transcription team to ensure that all have a full understanding of the use of technology, I inquired,

      “What actual steps has FromthePage taken to ensure such erasure will not happen again?

• Have they and the museum begun an investigation as to any other erasures to any other document of anything that may offend this and other transcribers’ personal, religious, and/or political views?
• Has FtP or the museum taken the practical step of looking at the work done by this transcriber to ensure this person has not been doing this to other documents?
• Since the erasure was so obvious, being as it skips the entry at the bottom of the page although the original is opposite the space the entry should have occupied on the sanctioned transcript, what has FromthePage done to plug the obvious hole in their review procedure? 
• Is anything more being done than a cursory sweeping under the rug of the erasure since it does not affect the majority and comfort has been restored to those not assaulted by the erasure with the reinsertion of the erased, not omitted, Newport Entry of Feb 11, 1895?although this was not a matter of the technology. As it is going on two months since the discovery of the erasure that had been the museum’s official version of the Newport log posted for four months on FromthePage, the Quigley Institute for Non-Heterosexual Archival Archaeology is curious as to how far this has progressed.”

There has been no response to these questions.

In the meantime I had sporadically sent what I have accumulated about Gay Whalers to organizations, both GLBT and maritime related, receiving a few responses. However, at the six month mark, deciding I had given enough time for any action, I decided the reluctance of the museum to at least be civil had been tolerated enough and I went to the internet, sending the information I had out to at least a dozen recipients whose contact information I was able to find and either within hours by way of automatic notifications that it had been received, a personal response, a few of which beyond finding the information interesting, passed it on to individuals and organizations they thought might be interested, with one response containing additional information and a log entry from the Francis A. Barstow coming from the Whaling Museum and Education Center of Cold Spring Harbor on Long Island recounting an incident on that ship and how it was dealt with accompanied by the note,

“Thank you so much for taking the time to pass along these resources with us.  Finding and sharing queer stories in whaling history has been a priority for our team here at the museum.  It’s always nice to hear of others doing similar work.

We recently uncovered a reference in one of our log books to a situation similar to the one you reference on board the Newport.  Ours comes from the Francis A. Barstow, a whaling brig out of San Francisco.  I’m attaching a couple of photos in case you’re curious – one of an archivist’s note inside the front cover, and one of the page in question.  Note on the latter how the incident is recorded on a piece of scrap paper pinned in place… ready to be removed if the log keeper decides the story is better off buried perhaps? ” 

This was of interest, not only because of the added information I can pass on, but I have a ratty first edition of US Grant’s autobiography that I was given by a cousin that has a newspaper notification of its publication attached to a random page with a pin similar to the one in the attachment provided. I have thought sexual activity, unless a blatant crime like on the Phelps with the Steward Smith, was something not included in logs which were about ships business and such information that was important to the ship’s owners and investors. Sexual activity was irrelevant to this. However, there are court cases in Hawai’i dealing with sexual abuse, but that was because it was land not ship related so it appears in legal documents, trial transcripts, and newspaper articles, but few log entries.

Perhaps this is why the section of page 191 is pinned to page 77, for easy removal.

“Jan 4 Friday

One of the Boat steerers, Philip Forte, was caught in the act of sodomy with one of the crew of the foremast hands, Jim Keifer, who witnessed the act on the night of Monday Dec, 31, 1894. In consequence of this, theCaptain moved him out of the steerage and put him in the Booby Hatch.”

For clarification, a boat steerer was the harpooner who also steered the boat as the crew approached pursued  whales and were considered in a level below the captain and mates but above that of the non-boat steerer crew members. The foremast crew were the majority of the crew who did most of their work and socializing before the foremast with their berths in the bow of the ship while not being allowed past the aft mast which was an area only for the captain and mates.

Previously we had

“Monday Feb 11th

A light breeze from the W.N.W. Cloudy and misty Bar. 30.10. Ther. -4 Got a load of meat put the Steward (Scott) forward for Sodomy and Onanism of Bark Wanderer one of the men deserted but was overtaken and brought back.”

And,

Monday Jan the 30

“This day begins with light baffling wind steering NE by East 2 AM wind hauled to ENE heading N at 8 AM wind NNW & clowday at 9am lowered for a Right Whale did not strike 6PM seased Wm H Smith up to the main rigging the Captain gave him 39 lashes for indeavoring to poisen the officers by putting callomil & julep & other stuff in bread He said Wm H Smith indeavored to get the cook to poisen men Forward he also threatened to kill Washington Fletcher & Clark Orlin with a dirk & carving knife and any other that molested him he also tried to hire a Portuguese to commit sodomy for these crimes he received  the above named lashes with a 6 tailed cat put him in irons put him between deck took in sail head W”.

I sent the information I had collected along with links to the Quigley Institute for Non-Heterosexual Archival Archeology and some of my whaling related blogs on a Thursday and by the end of the day had received responses including the one that listed a few email addresses that I sent it all to the next day with the remaining emails being responded to by that Monday afternoon.

So I know the information about Gay Whalers is out there for whoever to do whatever with. There are people and organizations that expressed interest beyond the automatic reception response in passing on or looking into the topic.

Two of the tree entries are from the 1890s which is ironic.

And I know that the history is recorded and is being found.

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