The passage describes Nantucket, an island off the coast of Massachusetts that was historically a center of the American whaling industry. It notes that Nantucket was the home port of many whaling ships, including the Essex whose story inspired Herman Melville's novel Moby Dick. The passage provides context on Nantucket's importance to Moby Dick, as the island and its whaling history were central to the novel's plot and themes.

2. Nantucket! Take out your map and look at it. See
what a real corner of the world it occupies; how
it stands there, away off shore, more lonely than
the Eddystone lighthouse.(Herman Mellville,
Moby Dick, Chap. 14)

3. Nantucket, an Island 30-miles south of Cape Cod in Massachusetts, is
historically one of the main centers of Whaling in the U.S. -- whaling
ships based in Nantucket traveled all over the world. It is also home
to the characters in Herman Melville’s novel Moby Dick--and home
port to the whaling ship Essex, on whose true story the adventures in
Moby Dick were based. The island and its whaling history form the
backbone of the novel and indeed are central symbols in the epic
journey of the Pequod in its hunt for Moby-Dick, the white whale.
Melville based the essentials of his plot upon all that he had read
about Nantucket’s whaling history, and in particular, the tale of
the Nantucket whaleship Essex. After the publication of Moby-Dick,
Melville finally visited the island, and met face-to-face with Captain
George Pollard Jr., who survived one of the most harrowing
ordeals at sea in human history.

5. Moby Dick – book
illustrations

10. The cobblestones enabled heavy, oil laden carts to move up from the
wharves without sinking in the mud.

11. The Oldest House – built in i686 by Jerry Coffin – Coffin Family
reunion

12. Jared Coffin House is a stately 1845 brick mansion in
the heart of Nantucket Town.

14. Flowery homes

17. Nantucket has over 82 miles of pristine beaches, about two miles of which
belongs to the town. The remaining beaches belong to private non-profit
organizations and landowners, who open them to the public.

21. Tower steps The first Great Point Light (also
known as Nantucket Light) was
built in 1785

22. Great Point Light

26. Top of a
lighthouse

27. Oil press

29. The sperm whale
is a marine
mammal species,
order Cetacea, a
toothed whale
(odontocete)
having the
largest brain of
any animal

38. Nantucket Daffodil Festival’

39. D
A
F
F
O
D
I
L
Festival

45. Old Baptist Church

46. A sumptuous beach house

47. The Brant Point light (1746) was the second lighthouse built in the
American Colonies, after the light in Boston.

50. Cranberry Festival

51. Natucket cranberry pie

54. A row of mansions lines Main
Street, Nantucket, reminders of
the golden age of whaling

56. The Three Bricks,
commissioned by
Joseph Starbuck
for his 3 sons
during the golden
age of whaling.

57. Buildings of the Maria Mitchell Liones Observatory - Maria Mitchell was the first
woman astronomer of America

58. Historic Maria Mitchell House
built 1790
-Typical Quaker style

59. Sankaty Head Light - built in 1850, automated in 1965, and still in operation.