and their officers and family on their way to Eastern Cape to fight the Xhosa. The Birkenhead became famous because it was the first shipwreck where the "women and children first" protocol was applied. All women and children were saved but 445 of the men, mostly soldiers, perished. Most of the horses swam ashore and were the ancestors of a feral herd that roamed the plains east of Gansbaai until late in the 20th century. More than 140 ships have been wrecked and thousands of lives lost between Danger Point and Cape Infanta, to the east of Gansbaai. In 1895, the Danger Point Lighthouse was built, providing more security for the ships in these dangerous waters. Gansbaai was founded, according to local storytellers, in 1881 after 18-year-old fisherman Johannes Cornelis Wessels walked there across the dunes from Stanford and discovered excellent fishing in the area. He settled there, and soon after other families followed suit. The settlers called it "Gansbaai" after the colony of Egyptian geese that gathered at the freshwater fountain in the present-day Gansbaai Harbor. Up until the 20th century, however, it was little more than a simple fishing village due to its isolation and lack of communication with the outside world. Gansbaai's economy received an economic boost in 1939 when a small factory was built to process sharks' livers for vitamin A and lubricant, which was in great demand during World War II. After the war, however, demand fell and the few years of prosperity were over. It was not until local school principal Johannes Barnard persuaded village fishermen to set up the first fishery cooperative in South Africa that the economy began to recover. Barnard helped the fishermen obtain capital from the Fisheries Development Corporation, deepen the harbour and establish a modern fish meal factory. It is still believed to be the primary employment generator in Gansbaai and the canning division is the largest of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere. The town became a municipality in 1963. Today, Gansbaai's economy still revolves around its fishing industry, but an increasingly large part of it now comes from tourism. It is considered the great white shark capital of the world, drawing National Geographic Society film crews and researchers from around the globe to study the wildlife. It has also become a popular whale-watching spot for the right whale. The southern right whale can be seen in large