The Great Stink of 1882
When Makah schoolgirls in Neah Bay proved to their matron that rotting whale blubber smelled better than imported Limburger cheese.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The following from Neah Bay is good and shows that the Makah Indian girls are excellent judges of perfumes: On Easter Sunday last, Capt. Willoughby, the Indian agent, gave 'a treat,' and among the luxuries was some powerful old Limburger cheese, which scented the whole house with one of those odors peculiar to itself. Recently the Indians found a 'blasted' whale outside Cape Flattery and eat off quantities of the stinking blubber, which they carried to Neah Bay. When they thought it sufficiently ripe, a lot of it was sent to the school children by their parents. The agency home was filled with the stench. Mrs. Willoughby, the matron, lectured the girls about eating such abominable food. After she had ceased, there was a profound silence for a minute or two, and then one of the girls said in slow and measured cadence: 'It doesn't smell as bad as that cheese.' They thought that old rotten Limburger cheese smelled worse than rotten whale blubber, and there are many white persons who will agree with them.
“They thought that old rotten Limburger cheese smelled worse than rotten whale blubber, and there are many white persons who will agree with them.”
Cultural clashes over 'stinky' traditional foods have long been a flashpoint of colonial misunderstanding in the Pacific Northwest. While the 1882 report relies on the casual racism of its era, the quick-witted retort of the Makah girls serves as a reminder that the perceived 'refinement' of European palates was—and remains—a matter of geography, not objective fact.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.