Whaling Museum dismisses claims of bad ivory sales

NEW BEDFORD — A national animal protection organization released a report last week stating that five vendors at a New Bedford Whaling Museum event were selling undocumented elephant ivory products, claims which representatives of the museum have since denied.

The event, the Nautical Antiques Show, took place in May of this year and an investigator for the Humane Society of the United States and Humane Society International found elephant ivory-handled canes, elephant ivory pocket watches, miniature ivory dollhouse furniture, and more, according to the report. ABC News and State House News Service are among those that wrote stories about the report.

According to its website, the Humane Society was founded in 1954 and works to enact state and federal laws to improve animal welfare.

The Whaling Museum’s President and CEO Amanda McMullen said in a statement, “Recent media coverage to associate the Museum with criminal, inhumane activities is false.”

“The organizers of the Nautical Antiques Show are noted experts in the field of Scrimshaw and take detailed steps to ensure that no elephant ivory or rhinoceros horn, or ivory that does not otherwise meet federal legal requirements, is included,” McMullen said. “To our knowledge, none was presented last May.”

Scrimshaw carvings or engravings done in bone or ivory typically by mariners have a rich history in the Whaling City and McMullen stated that historical scrimshaw was present “in abundance” at the show, but that it was produced centuries ago using items like whale ivory, walrus ivory, and cetacean skeletal bone.

“Whale teeth and whale skeletal bone were strictly and solely byproducts of a commercial hunt long gone; thus, the circumstances surrounding antique scrimshaw are very different from those of elephants and rhinos, which are genuinely endangered,” McMullen said.

According to McMullen, “The Whaling Museum ardently condemns any and all actions taken to harm elephants and rhinos and other endangered species.”

Iris Ho, a senior specialist of program and policy for wildlife at Humane Society International, said they decided to look at the ivory trade in New Bedford specifically after conversations their investigator had during a statewide investigation in 2017.

“This time we wanted to focus on the New Bedford area so the investigator did not go elsewhere, but we did a statewide investigation in 2017 and the findings are very similar — it doesn’t matter if you're in New Bedford or in Boston, our investigations confirm that the trade continues to happen,” Ho said.

The documentation the investigator was looking for includes the origin and age of the ivory product, according to Ho, and none of the five vendors listed were able to produce that documentation.

“It’s difficult to distinguish illegal elephant ivory from legal ivory,” Ho acknowledged. “This gray area where ivory has no documentation provides a cover for illegal ivory to flourish .”

The Humane Society’s press release states "Without documentation, it is impossible to know whether items were imported in violation of federal law, which prohibits imports or interstate sales of ivory from recently killed elephants.”

In the last 10 years 144,000 African elephants were poached for their tusks, according to Ho, 30% of the entire population.

“These animals should not be killed and reduced to trinkets or vanity items,” Ho said.

When asked if the Whaling Museum or the vendors have been fined or disciplined because of their finding Ho said, “That we don’t know.”

According to Ho, now it’s up to the federal and state governments to step in and investigate.

“We do provide our findings to federal government as well as state agencies...we urge them to take enforcement actions when possible,” Ho said.

The reason behind this particular investigation, according to Ho, was to provide “critical information” to show policy makers that there is a thriving ivory trade in Massachusetts in order to push state legislators to pass current bills banning the sale of ivory or rhinoceros horn except under certain circumstances.

Senate Bill 496, which had a joint hearing scheduled for this past Tuesday according the state Legislature’s website, states circumstances that allow the sale include if “the seller can provide historical documentation that the item meets the federal criteria for exemption for antique articles.”

Two of the five vendors that the Humane Society listed in their report for selling ivory without proper documentation are based in SouthCoast, F&F Inc of Fall River and Sydnas Sloot Woodworking Tool and Nautical Antiques of Westport.

William Feeney, the owner of F& F Inc, said “They didn't even talk to me, they just make stuff up and say it,” in reference to the Humane Society’s report.

The report states the Fall River business was “offering for sale two elephant ivory canisters made by F & F, and elephant ivory-handled canes.”

“The canes I have are all whale’s tooth canes done in the 1800s… and the canisters were mammoth tusks,” Feeney said in response.

According to Feeney, the artifacts he has that are made from wooly mammoth and fossil walrus are all carbon dated and he has the documentation to prove it.

“Everything that we had there was all legal,” Feeney said, “All the ivory was old ivory, prehistoric.”

Feeney also said he has products made of eco-ivory, which is made from mixed polymers instead of animal products, and makes donations to different groups that protect elephants.

In response to Feeney’s statements, Ho said, “Our investigator was told that it was elephant ivory products that were offered for sale by this specific vendor” and “As we said in our findings and our press release, the investigator did ask about documentation and none of the vendors that our investigators spoke with were able to produce that.”

Ho did say that they did not reach out to the Whaling Museum with their findings and McMullen said the museum didn’t find out about them until they saw the media coverage.

“It raises concern and frankly questions the validity of their claims that they did not reach out to us to discuss their assertions,” McMullen said. “We would have been able to correct their inaccuracies immediately and would have asked for documentation and credentialing of their so called ‘experts.’”