The industrial revolution is generally understood to have started somewhere around 1760, Moby Dick took place in approximately 1830, about 10 years before what some historians mark as the end of the agrarian to Industrial shift that is generally termed the Industrial revolution

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Revolution

I get sort of wishy-washy from 1830 on, because lots of people put the end of the Industrial revolution as being 1900, but 1840 is a defensible and commonly held position.

> The industrial revolution is generally understood to have started somewhere around 1760,

In Britain. Moby Dick ain't set in Britain.

That’s besides the point because most whales were killed in the XX century.