A long, quiet road leads along the dunes on the central Oregon coast. Every mile or so, a sign will direct you to pull over into a small parking area — numbered 1 to 7 — where you can get out of your car and climb over the sandy hills to reach the ocean.
South Jetty Beach is a quiet place. Even on busy days you’ll find far more birds than people. Go on a cloudy weekday in the offseason and you might not see another soul for miles.
Things were different on Nov. 12, 1970. On that day, a day that will apparently live in Oregon’s collective memory for generations, this lonely stretch of sand was suddenly filled with commotion.
You surely know the story by the now.
A 45-foot sperm whale had washed up onshore and locals weren’t quite sure what to do with it. Their resulting decision, to detonate the carcass with eight tons of dynamite, blasted South Jetty Beach into the annals of history.
Exploding Whale Day, as it is now known, has become one of Oregon’s kookiest celebrations. The revelry takes place each year throughout Florence, the nearby town that is now home to an Exploding Whale Memorial Park and two days of festivities to mark the occasion.
This year’s Exploding Whale Memorial Celebration, which takes place Saturday and Sunday, will include film screenings, live music, museum exhibits and more.
The main event is Sunday at Bridgeport Market in Old Town Florence, where representatives from the American Cetacean Society will be on hand, marine-focused artisans will sell their goods, and Portland-based band The Exploding Whales will provide entertainment. Paul Linnman, the newscaster who made the now-legendary newscast of the explosion, will be on hand for autographs.
Attendees, who are encouraged to dress in whale attire, can also contribute to a community memorial art installation honoring the whale. A toast is scheduled for 3:45 p.m.
No festivities are planned for South Jetty Beach, the site of the explosion itself.
The big sperm whale washed up about a mile south of the South Jetty itself. That’s what they say. There’s no marker on the beach to note the spot. Even if there was one, it wouldn’t last long — the ocean has a way of devouring here.
If you want to find the place where they blew up the whale, you have to drive all the way out to the end of Sand Dunes Road. South Jetty Beach #6, just across the road from the crab dock, is marked on Google Maps as “Whale Memorial Day Use” — even though South Jetty Beach #5, just a half mile up the road, should get you closer to the spot.
It would be surprising if nobody showed up at the beach to mark the occasion this week. Some people will surely make a pilgrimage, arriving in either somber reverence or wide-eyed curiosity.
When you walk over the dunes to the beach, you will not find live music, artisans or costumed masses. You will (probably) not see an enormous, beached sperm whale. The invasive scotch broom flowers, bright yellow and abundant, will not even be in bloom. Instead, you will see little more than a quiet, wind-swept beach that stretches on for miles.
You may see vultures circling above, gulls flocking on the beach or crows pecking at the sand. They are always there. Their endless search for carrion is one small reminder of the ecosystem at play, the delicate recycling of flesh into food that was once disrupted — needlessly and gloriously — with the explosion that Oregon can’t seem to forget.
Standing there on the sands of South Jetty Beach, you may find it hard to imagine that sudden moment of violence and gruesome destruction. Today, like every day except that one crazy day, this is little more than a place of quiet beauty.
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