New Bedford is a city in Massachusetts, on the north eastern coast of the United States. It is located on the Acushnet River, and 51 miles south of Boston, The temperatures range from 20 degrees in the winter to 85 degrees in the summer and the annual precipitation, including rain and snow, averages 50 inches. New Bedford officially became a city in 1847.

By the 1800s, New Bedford was a community of immigrants from all over the world and those people from Portugal, Azores, Cape Verde and Madeira came to work in the whaling industry. Also crucial to the whaling industry was the African-American community with people like Paul Cuffe, a whaling captain, and Lewis Temple, a blacksmith who invented the toggle iron. Whaling brought hundreds of ships to the seaport of New Bedford. It was a profitable business, and this was the New England port where both preparations and returns took place. Called "The Whaling City," New Bedford is well known as the most important whaling port in the world.

Whaling songs sung by the crew during their leisure time in the forecastle were known as fo'c'sle songs. Click the