A 63-year-old male visitor from out-of-state died yesterday at around 5:10 p.m. while swimming near Ocracoke Island’s Pony Pen beach access.
He was reported to have been caught in a very strong rip current while attempting to rescue another swimmer in distress, according to a press release from the Outer Banks Group of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore.
Seashore law enforcement rangers, Hyde County deputies, lifeguards, Ocracoke Emergency Medical Services and the Ocracoke Volunteer Fire Department all responded to the incident and attempted to revive the male swimmer, but the attempts were unsuccessful. The other swimmer was able to safely return to shore.
No further details were available.
“Our thoughts are with his family and friends during this difficult time,” said Seashore Superintendent David E. Hallac said in a news release.
This is the island’s first rip current-related fatality this year. Two other men died while caught in rip currents earlier this year in Frisco and Corolla.
Rip currents are strong all along the Outer Banks, including Ocracoke. Visitors are advised to read related stories about identifying rip currents here and visit the Observer’s Rip Currents pagefor more information.
Longtime N.C. Ferry Division employee Harold Thomas is the new director of this sub-agency of the N.C. Dept. of Transportation.
Thomas, along with Jed Dixon, who was interim director and resumes his former position as deputy director, and Chris Bock, District One superintendent of operations at the Hatteras terminal, was on the island Monday for the monthly Ferry Division meeting with islanders.
Monday was Thomas’s first day as director of a job he had held from 2011 to 2014 when he was demoted by former Gov. Pat McCrory to one of two deputy director positions in favor of Ed Goodwin whom McCrory had appointed director in April of 2014. Goodwin departed Jan. 31.
Thomas, of Newport, plans to visit the island on Thursday to talk to as many people as he can.
“I want to do a lot of listening,” Thomas said. “There are a lot of great ideas over here and I want to soak up some of that knowledge.”
He wants to determine how the division can improve.
“How do we meet our needs and your needs as a department?” he said.
His first focus will be customer service, he said–from the time they pull up to the dock to when they load off the boats.
He also said he will look at the shoulder season schedules knowing that Ocracoke School’s athletic teams travel to away games then and need to get back to the island, often catching the midnight ferry.
He will look at adding later runs from Cedar Island to Ocracoke in the off-season for those islanders who travel that way for doctors and other reasons so that they can return the same day. While the summer long-route Cedar Island schedule includes evening departures, the fall and winter season departures end around 4 p.m. making it virtually impossible for islanders to visit doctors in Morehead City and return the same day.
“It’s an endeavor that’s forever changing,” Thomas said about the ferry system.
Thomas has worked in the division for 25 years, having started at the bottom in 1993 in an entry-level general utility worker, then as an engineer and also as a deputy director.
“I’ve enjoyed my career in the Ferry Division,” he said.
As for other concerns, Dixon noted that since the power crisis July 27 to Aug. 4, the traffic at the Hatteras terminal has dropped considerably.
“Our April and May were the best we’ve ever had,” he said. “June was better than last year. July was about the same until the power outage.”
He noted that on the busiest days, they have been moving the cars well and thought it was due to travelers getting the message to arrive early or later in the day, not at midday.
“Even on the very busy days, we were moving (the cars),” Dixon said.
He also said they have been working on contacting bus companies that bring school children to the island in the spring for school trips about their using the upcoming passenger ferry instead of the vehicle ferries.
“Those buses can take up an entire ferry,” he said.
Harold Thomas, right, the new director of the N.C. Ferry Division, talks with islanders in the Ocracoke Community Center along with Chris Bock, center, superintendent of operations at Hatteras, and Jed Dixon, deputy Ferry Division director. Photo: C. Leinbach
As for the passenger ferry, Dixon said that Armstrong Marine Inc. in Swansboro, who received the contract to build a 98-passenger, catamaran-style boat, is still on track to deliver the new boat by the end of April or in May.
He said the Ferry Division has a supplemental work contract with HMS Global, a company that is operating a new passenger ferry service between the boroughs in New York City, to operate the passenger ferries at the outset.
Dixon said summer tours of the division’s shipyard in Manns Harbor, located on the western bank of the Croatan Sound, approximately eight miles from Manteo, have been popular for both locals and vacationers and the next four scheduled tours are full.
“They gain a better appreciation of what it takes to keep the Ferry Division going,” Dixon said.
“It’s another way to connect to the people throughout the region,” Thomas said.
‘Nesting on Beacon,’ is among the new paintings by islander Barbara Adams on view in Down Creek Gallery starting Aug. 16.
Island artist Barbara Adams will show new works from 5 to 8 p.m. Wednesday (Aug. 16) in Down Creek Gallery’s continuing Expose Yourself to Art series of receptions that are open to all.
“I enjoy capturing light and shadows which sometimes leads me to new challenges and techniques,” says Adams about her work in oils, watercolors. “With a combination or mixture of impressionism in the background, I attempt to bring out a realist image.”
She frequently adds elements such as raised surfaces and images on wooden boards and canvas, which she then coats in resin to complete the piece. She has built her own frames out of seashells and found objects.
The reception features light hors d’oeuvres, and live music for the evening will be provided by April Trueblood.
The Ocracoke Preservation Society, 49 Water Plant Rd., will host a book signing at 1 p.m. tomorrow (Tuesday, Aug. 15) for “Living at the Water’s Edge”
By Peter Vankevich
The Outer Banks Scenic Byway is in good company.
Certain roads throughout the country capture travelers’ imaginations if they are through areas that are off the beaten path and shine a light on our historical culture.
Route 66, established in 1926, is one of those. This highway, which became one of the most famous roads in the country, runs from Chicago, Ill., to Santa Monica, Calif., covering a total of 2,448 miles.
The road was used by many who migrated west, especially during the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, making it into the John Steinbeck classic, “The Grapes of Wrath.”
It was popularized by a song, composed in 1946 by American songwriter Bobby Troup and a popular television show with the same name in the 1960s.
Due to the growth of the Interstate Highway System, Route 66 fell into decline as have many others now considered back roads.
Out of this road-rave fascination came legislation in 1991 creating the National Scenic Byway for roads recognized by the U.S. Dept. of Transportation for having one or more of six “intrinsic qualities”: archaeological, cultural, historic, natural, recreational and scenic.
The Outer Banks Byway was added in 2009 and is one of these 150 byways.
From the north, it begins at N.C. 12 at Whalebone Junction just below Nags Head and heads south through Hatteras and Ocracoke islands and passes through the villages of the Down East Core Sound region. It comprises a combination of 138 road miles and 25 ferry miles.
Barbara Garrity-Blake and Karen Willis Amspacher have written a heritage guide to this byway, “Living at the Water’s Edge: A Heritage Guide to the Outer Banks Byway” (UNC Press).
The book is organized around the themes of water, land, people and change and includes historic and contemporary photographs and stories of the 21 villages along the way.
Significant throughout is the theme of adaptation to constant change for those living–to borrow Michael Parker’s novel title about Portsmouth Island–in this “watery part of the world.”
Ocracoke is part of the OBX Scenic Byway. Photo: C. Leinbach
For those interested in maritime history, one can learn how Mirlo Beach in Rodanthe got its name and read about the heroic efforts of John Allen Midgett and his six-member crew of the Chicamacomico Life Saving Station.
Ocracoke, of course, is included, and the authors veer off to take a look at Portsmouth Island, just across Ocracoke Inlet.
The village, abandoned in 1973 and now maintained by National Park Service, is an important part of the region’s history.
Aycock Brown’s photo of one of Ocracoke’s most famous citizens, Sam Jones, shows Jones at the piano entertaining friends inside the Castle, one of Ocracoke’s most iconic buildings (which Jones built). Present in the room is his beloved his horse, Ikey D. (Both are buried in the Springer’s Point cemetery).
Roy Parsons, an island musician, and Muzel Bryant, an African-American who lived on Ocracoke till her passing at age 103, are included as well as the long running mail boat, the Aleta, and the recently opened Ocracoke Community Park,which has the island’s only baseball and soccer field.
Garrity-Blake, a cultural anthropologist, and Amspacher, director of the Core Sound Waterfowl Museum and Heritage Center on Harkers Island, have succeeded in their portrayals of the past and present and include a wary eye on the future of the ever-changing Outer Banks.
For the reader, this is a wonderful primer to those who wish to take one of our nation’s roads less-traveled.
For the two authors, it must have been a pure joy to put this book together and to be able to share the rich cultural heritage with others.
On the island, the book is on sale at Books to Be Red and the Ocracoke Preservation gift shop.
Update Aug. 16, 2017: The Ocracoke Preservation Society said today that they’ve sold out of “Living at the Water’s Edge,” but will get more in about a week. You can purchase the books online at ocracokepreservation.org. OPS phone is: 252-928-7375. Books to Be Red also has them. Phone is: (252) 928-3936.
Monday, Aug. 14 Meeting with N.C. Ferry Division; Ocracoke Community Center, 1 pm Ocracoke Preservation Society Museum: museum tour, 1 pm Ocracoke Bar & Grille: Aaron and Jackie, 7 pm Deepwater Theater: Blackbeard: An (Historical/Hysterical) Account, 8 pm Gaffer’s: JP3, 9 pm
Tuesday, Aug. 15 Ocracoke Preservation Society: “Living at the Water’s Edge” book signing, 1 pm Jolly Roger: Aaron Caswell and Jackie Willis, 6 pm Ocracoke Oyster Co.: Bryan Mayer, 7 pm Ocracoke Bar & Grille: Jon Lea, 7 pm Coyote Music Den: Coyote Plus One, Kim France, 8 pm, doors open at 7:30 pm Gaffer’s: JP3, 9 pm Gaffer’s: Texas Hold ‘Em Poker, 7 pm
Wednesday, Aug. 16 Ocracoke Preservation Society: Kids Create-a-Craft: Ocracoke ponies, 1 pm Maker’s Market, Wahab House lawn, 161 Irvin Garrish Hwy., 1 to 7 pm Ocracoke Community Library: Family movie night, 6 pm Jolly Roger: Edgar Scrubbs, 6 pm Ocracoke Oyster Co.: Bryan Mayer, 6 pm Dajio Restaurant: Jon Lea, 7 pm Ocracoke Bar & Grille: Mike Norris, 7 pm Coyote Music Den: Just We Two, 8 pm, doors open at 7:30 pm Deepwater Theater: Dingbatter’s Guide to Ocracoke, 8 pm Ocracoke Oyster Co.: Karaoke, 9 pm Gaffer’s: Jayke Steele, 9 pm
Thursday, Aug. 17 Ocracoke Preservation Society: Porch talk: Ocracoke history, 1 pm Ocracoke Oyster Co.: Martin Garrish and Lou Castro, 3 pm Dajio Restaurant: Raygun Ruby, 80s music, 7 pm Ocracoke Bar & Grille: Kate McNally, 7 pm Deepwater Theater: Molasses Creek band, 8 pm Gaffer’s: Jayke Steele, 9 pm
Friday, Aug. 18 Fig Festival: Ocracoke Preservation Society, 6 to 8 pm Ocracoke Preservation Society Museum: museum tour, 1 pm Jolly Roger: Willis Gupton, 6 pm Ocracoke Oyster Co.: Kate McNally, 7 pm Ocracoke Bar & Grille: Mike Norris, 7 pm Coyote Music Den: Playing your Ocracoke Memories, Martin Garrish, 8 pm, doors open at 7:30 pm
Saturday, Aug. 19 Community Square, Fig Festival, 10 am to 11 pm Jolly Roger: Willis Gupton, 6 pm Dajio Restaurant: Kate McNally, 7 pm Community Square, Ocracoke Rockers 7 pm Ocracoke Bar & Grille: Kim France, 7 pm
Sunday, Aug. 20 Ocracoke Oyster Co.: Will Roberts, Ventura Highway, 7 pm Ocracoke Bar & Grille: Mike Norris, 7 pm Gaffer’s: Matt Irie, 9 pm
See below for information about the NPS nighttime sky appreciation event 7 to 10 p.m. Monday, Aug. 14, at the Lifeguard Beach.
By David Mickey
Since the beginning of time, the nighttime celestial vista has been a source of wonder and inspiration.
On Ocracoke, the stars are clear from horizon to horizon since the island, 23 miles off the mainland, and it is the darkest place on the East Coast, according to National Park Service (NPS) information.
And it is poised to get even darker as the NPS seeks Dark Sky Designation from the International Dark Sky Association (IDA), Tucson, Arizona. When accepted, it will be the first such designation for a national seashore.
Since 2001, the IDA has designated 13 national parks, monuments and preserves in the United States as Dark Sky Parks, although most are located in the western United States far from urban light sources where light pollution hinders visibility of the nighttime celestial vista.
In its 2016 Cape Hatteras National Seashore State of the Park Report, the Park Service classifies the night sky as “good,” which means that hundreds of thousands more stars are visible here than in urban areas.
“The Milky Way is visible from horizon to horizon, showing great detail, such as the Prancing Horse” constellation the report says.
Receiving Dark Sky designation is an involved process beginning with an inventory of all light sources in the park, initial conversion of 67 percent of those lights to dark-sky lighting, a five-year plan for 90 percent conversion and a 10-year plan for 100 percent conversion.
Applicants prepare a lightscape management and a monitoring plan to assure protection of the night sky resource. Public access and regular education programs are major requirements for designation.
The multi-year application process continues.
Stacey Sigler, acting chief of Resource Management and Science for Cape Hatteras National Seashore, said the park counted 487 Park Service light fixtures. Of those, 327 must be retrofitted for the IDA application. The Park Service has applied for Department of Interior grants to cover the cost.
Since Dark Skies criteria include partnering with neighboring agencies, public utilities and electric co-ops, on Ocracoke that means Tideland EMC.
In May, Tideland initiated a program to replace all 7,300 security lights with LED fixtures. Ocracoke’s first LED security light is installed outside the Working Watermen’s exhibit in Community Square.
“The replacements are ‘dark skies’ compliant, meaning light shines down and not up or into neighboring windows,” wrote Heidi Smith in the June “Tideland Topics” in the publication “Carolina Country.”
The Park Service is only responsible for fixtures they own, so replacing Tideland’s security lights on Park Service property, such as at the Ocracoke Campground, will enhance the park’s night sky.
LED security lights reduce electricity use and removes a potential source of mercury pollution. Mercury vapor and high-pressure sodium fixtures will be sent to a recycling facility for safe disposal. Tideland also collects CFL light bulbs that contain mercury at their Ocracoke office on Odd Fellows Road.
The NPS effort to gain Dark Sky recognition will be gradual.
“This process will likely take three to four years depending on how quickly we can get our lights retrofitted,” she said. “As we continue to work through this process, we plan to continue to offer educational opportunities to the public to celebrate our night skies.”
In 2016, the NPS celebrated its Centennial Founders Day with a special stargazing event on Hatteras. This year a similar program is planned for Ocracoke from 7 to 10 p.m. Aug. 14 at the Lifeguard Beach.
In addition, every Monday evening through Sept. 4 the NPS hosts “Ocracoke After Dark” at the Ocracoke Campground for an hour of stargazing between 8:45 and 9:45 pm. Bring blankets, beach chairs and bug spray.
Home owners and renters are encouraged to turn off outside floodlights when not needed.
The Senior Nutrition Program, which is known as Meals on Wheels, is available weekdays year-round to deliver hot, locally cooked meals to islanders aged 60 or over.
In addition to the minimum age, recipient qualifications include difficulty preparing their own nutritious meals and they do not drive.
A team of volunteers delivers the meals.
For details, call or see Elizabeth Dyer or Art Mines, 252-928-3951.
Chris Williams, owner of Chris’s Grocery in Swan Quarter and the Engelhard Red & White, is shown adding donated items to the Food Drive baskets he has set up in each store. Photo by Margie Brooks
Ocracoke’s friends and neighbors across the Pamlico Sound on mainland Hyde County have organized a mainland-wide food drive to help restock the Bread of Life Food Pantry in the Ocracoke Assembly of God Church.
The recent loss of power on Ocracoke and a mandatory evacuation of all non-residents (July 27 to Aug. 4) resulted in most Ocracoke businesses closing their doors and many residents without a job (or paycheck) for a week.
The loss of income at a time when businesses make their money for the year–and the loss of food in their own refrigerators and freezers–has been felt across the island.
During the week-long crisis, the pantry quickly depleted their food stock–serving 270 families in a two-day period.
With an eye to the possibility that the island may be further impacted this year if a hurricane or even a nor’easter storm is forecasted, Swan Quarter Volunteer Fire Department Fire Chief Jeffrey Stotesberry felt that time was of the essence in restocking the pantry.
He is being helped by local churches, businesses and residents.
“Such an event could result in similar evacuations of the island and additional loss of income for business and residents,” Stotesberry said. “We want to help the Ocracoke community prepare for their future food needs by getting those pantry shelves full again.”
Donation boxes have been set up at the following mainland locations:
–In Swan Quarter: the Hyde County Government Complex lobby Chris’s Grocery the NC Ferry Terminal the Swan Quarter VFD –In Engelhard: Spencer True Value Store and the Red and White Grocery
–In Ponzer: the Ruritan Club (front porch).
Many mainland churches will also be conducting drives within their churches and delivering items to the Swan Quarter ferry terminal for delivery to the church.
Stotesberry said other folks with a love of Hyde County but who reside elsewhere may want to help.
Monetary donations (marked “Ocracoke Food Drive”) may be mailed to the SQVFD, P.O. Box 97, Swan Quarter, NC 27885.
Please contact Stotesberry at 252-542-0901, or firechiefjeff@embarqmail.com, for more information or to help with the food drive.
Jeremy Piland, Patricia Piland, Jeanie Owens and Michael Shoemaker help unpack and organize the hundreds of packages sent by well-wishers to Ocracoke school students. Photo: C. Leinbach
To read an Ocracoke School story about a shortage of education supplies in the early 70s, click here.
By Connie Leinbach
School supplies for Ocracoke School students continued to stack up Thursday from well-wishers all over the country.
Ocracoke School fifth-grade teacher Jeanie Owens, who led the charge in obtaining help for Ocracoke students, was back in the Ocracoke School multi-purpose room for a third day of unpacking hundreds of boxes.
“We’ve delivered nine ‘post cons’ full of packages,” Ocracoke’s Postmaster Celeste Brooks, said Thursday, noting that the day’s mail had not yet been sorted. Post cons are open trolleys used to move mail around.
The packages began arriving early this week after Owens posted on Facebook several days ago that if people wanted to help the island after the power crisis that shut down the island to tourists from July 28 to Aug. 4 the island would welcome school supplies in her campaign titled “Pack a Backpack.”
Most island families work in the tourism industry, primarily between the months of April and November, with some holding two, or more jobs to meet their families’ financial needs throughout the year, Owens said in the post.
Fifth-grade teacher Jeanie Owens thanks Robin Turner for her donation of school supplies, including items from Wal-Mart in Washington, N.C., and tooth brushes from Zeno Edwards. Photo: C Leinbach
In the height of the tourist season, the power outage occurred July 27 when construction crews rebuilding the Bonner Bridge accidentally damaged the main electric transmission cables. Ocracoke and Hatteras were powered by portable generators until the cables could be repaired.
Owens and helpers Patricia Piland, Jeremy Piland, Patricia’s son, and new high school social studies teacher Michael Shoemaker unpacked the myriad gifts of classroom supplies, tissues, cleaners paper goods, new backpacks and more.
Ocracoke students will be able to “shop” for free supplies after all of the items are unpacked and sorted. That will be the afternoon of Aug. 18 and the morning of Aug. 19.
The expected school’s enrollment from kindergarten to grade 12 is 170 students, down from 188 last year.
“We want to make sure all of the students have everything they need on their supply lists,” Owens said. “Every student will get a new backpack.”
After school Principal Leslie Cole decides what the school needs, the school will check with Hatteras and Mattamuskeet schools about their needs.
“A lot of people have already donated to Hatteras based on this,” Owens said about the outpouring of support for Ocracoke.
Then as a school, they will consider how to pay this bounty forward, but for now, Owens is ecstatic, overwhelmed and amazed by the donations.
“We want everyone to know how extremely grateful we are,” she said.
As the packages come in, Owens is keeping all of the addresses from the donors and will work up a plan to send thank-you notes, which might take several weeks.
New Ocracoke School social studies teacher Michael Shoemaker joins in unpacking a multitude of gifts of school supplies from people from all over the country who love Ocracoke. Photo: C. Leinbach
The teachers helping were amazed at the gifts and noted that they will not have to purchase supplies out of their own pockets this year.
Flavia Burton, the ESL teacher, noted that every year she has taught she has spent up to $1,000 a year on supplies for her students.
Shoemaker agreed, saying in his prior school in Memphis, Tenn., he, too, purchased pencils and notebooks for his students.
“All teachers everywhere do this,” said Patricia Piland, Ocracoke’s middle school science teacher, about their footing some of the bills for school supplies, yet teachers can only take $250 off their taxes for school supplies. On Ocracoke, where classrooms are smaller, teachers have a smaller outlay.
“It’s harder when you have 30 kids,” Piland said.
“It’s part of being a teacher,” Burton added. “You either do it or you do without.”
On Tuesday, Gov. Roy Cooper launched the Governor’s School Supply Drive from Aug. 14 to Sept. 8 to help address unmet classroom needs in North Carolina public schools.
On average, teachers spend about $500 of their own money on supplies for their classrooms each year, and state funding for school supplies has been cut in half since 2008, Cooper said in a press release.
State Employees Credit Union (SECU) branches, state government offices and businesses across North Carolina will collect school supplies that teachers and students need most throughout the school year.
One of the many notes included in the packages of school supplies sent to Ocracoke in the wake of the power crisis July 27 to Aug. 4 that shut down the island to visitors. Photo: C. Leinbach
Islanders will have their chance on Saturdays to get fresh Hyde County produce starting at 10 a.m. until it’s sold out.
Ocracoke’s Postmaster Celeste Brooks started the produce stand in the Native Seafood parking lot on Irvin Garrish Highway a few weeks ago.
For sale is a variety of vegetables and fruit, including avocados and limes.
“You can’t make guacamole without limes,” Brooks said.
Working with her husband, Tony Brooks, the couple began by providing vegetables to the Variety Store and several of the restaurants.
“We started small by bringing over fresh corn, tomatoes and cantaloupes and have been expanding,” said Brooks. “Then we thought it would be a good idea to set up a veggie stand.”
Produce by Celeste will continue through the growing season as long as they can bring over good quality produce.
“Nothing sub-par,” she said. “The fun part of this is the interaction with the customers. I’m a people person.”
A 63-year-old male visitor from out-of-state died yesterday at around 5:10 p.m. while swimming near Ocracoke Island’s Pony Pen beach access.
