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# Florence
- URL: https://werd.io/florence/
- Published: 2024-07-04T13:51:37.000Z
- Updated: 2025-06-14T19:27:25.000Z
- Author: Ben Werdmuller
- Tags: #Import 2025-06-11 21:47, Asides

![Sunset in Florence](https://old.werd.io/file/6686a8d87c147f718706c1c2/thumb.jpg)

I’ve spent the week in Florence, Oregon, a lovely little town on the coast. It’s a bit windy and a little cold, but as I’m fond of saying, I lived in Scotland for a decade. I can take it.

Frank Herbert came to the town in 1957 [to write about the dunes overtaking it](https://www.opb.org/article/2021/10/23/florence-oregon-movies-dune-frank-herbert-science-fiction-novels/). The piece was never published, but it gave him an idea [for a novel](https://bookshop.org/a/7949/9780441172719).

In 1970, a whale washed ashore here, and the Oregon State Highway Division decided to use dynamite to dislodge it. [The ensuing events were not quite as planned.](https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/florence%5Fwhale%5Fexplosion/) If you’ve never seen it, [the video is legendary](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uD5sPgV61bw).

Did you know that Dune and the exploding whale beach were the same place? Well, now you do.