Nickerson’s Whale and Menhaden Oil Works was begun nearby in 1886, under Joshua Stickney Nickerson and John Rosenthal. The plant had its own whaler, the A. B. Nickerson.
By 1890, the complex was producing about 900 barrels of oil annually; in the spring from whales and in the summer and fall from menhaden, a kind of herring also known as alewife. The plant produced fertilizer made of fish scraps and whale meat, and poultry feed made of whale meat and bone.
