The State - News from Aug. 28, 1989

A fire destroyed what was left of the last active whaling station in the United States. The station in Richmond was the western outpost of a national fleet that once numbered 750 vessels. It was a sad end for what some hoped would become a whaling museum on its site at Point San Pablo, 10 miles inside San Francisco Bay, Fire Battalion Chief James Fajardo said. The cause of the blaze was under investigation. In 1971, the federal government ordered operators to cease activities on America’s last three whaling ships stationed at the Richmond port.