Happy New Year

      Uncle Jack is happy to report that both he and Mrs. U. J. are alive and well and enjoying a lengthy sojourn in South Nags Head in spite of the fact that it is too cold to leave the house.  They have been here for almost a week but still haven't set foot on the beach where icy winds take all the fun of walking.  A warming trend is predicted for the weekend (it could get up to 50F) but until then they will stay inside by the fireplace and catch up on their reading.
      They did get to Manteo Monday and visited Manteo Booksellers where Uncle Jack was delighted to discover that Steve had a copy of a book that he has been wanting to read ever since he first heard about it, namely Simon Winchester's "Atlantic" which, as you might expect, is about the Atlantic Ocean which has played such a major role in the history of the Outer Banks. He has greatly enjoyed every Simon Winchester book he has ever read and this one promises to be no exception.  It's a doorstop of a book so it will keep him enjoyably and profitably occupied for a long time no matter which way the temperature goes.

                                                    Recent sunset in Bawlmer.


Anyway Uncle Jack will be back with some beach pictures in a few days if the temp goes up, the wind goes down and the sun continues to shine.  In the meantime a belated Happy New Year to all members of the tiny band of diehard readers who check in from time to time to seek proof that he is still alive.  He appreciates your efforts and hopes to continue to appear in this space from time to time when the spirit moves.

Progress continues on the Johns Hopkins library addition.  Concrete walls and support beams were poured last week.  Working outside like this in freezing temperatures can't be much fun but they're getting her done in spite of the cold.

Glorious Fall on the Outer Banks

    Uncle Jack has always thought that October was prime time on the Outer Banks and his recent two-week sojourn in Nags Head did nothing to change his mind.  The last two weeks were about as perfect weatherwise as one could hope for in these troubled meteorological times and he and Mrs. U.J. enjoyed almost every minute of their stay, the exception being their disappointment in the hushpuppies at Darrell's which didn't seem to be quite as delectable as he remembered them. (They will try again on their next visit---a hushpuppy is a terrible thing to waste). Baltimore has its charms (they wouldn't call it Charm City otherwise) but there's no place he would rather be in the month of October than the Outer Banks of North Carolina.
    While they mostly hung around home and walked on the beach they did make a few excursions and took a few pictures, a few samples of which you will find below.  Click on the pictures to make them larger if you wish.

South Nags Head on Dwellable

      The Currituck Lighthouse-Whalehead Club area has metamorphosed into a major (and lovely) tourist attraction since the last time we visited a few years ago.  The Wildlife Museum was closed on the Sunday we were there but the entire outdoor complex is visually pleasing and the late-October crowd was thin enough to allow visitors to enjoy it.  Deer no longer wander the lighthouse grounds but it's probably just as well, both for them and their tormenters.  The keepers' houses, one of which is shown above,  have been lovingly restored and the landscaping around  them is a treat for the eyes.

It was a great day to climb to the observation deck from which a great view of the rampant over-development of the northern Outer Banks may be had.  Uncle Jack's acute acrophobia saved him from that prospect but he later saw an aerial photograph by Eve Turek at Yellowhouse Gallery that covers the same ground.  Unbelievable.

An oasis of peace and quiet at the foot of the lighthouse.  That's the old keeper's house, now a gift shop, almost hidden in the lush vegetation.

We saw this woman swimming on our first beachwalk in Sonag. She was only one of many intrepid swimmers as it turned out.

Jennette's Pier is coming along nicely.  The wind generators have been operating just long enough to produce the first complaints from nearby residents about how much noise they make when spinning at full speed.  Sigh.

Two new structures have appeared at the base of the pier.  The one on the left will be a bath house for users of the public beach and the other is a pumphouse for pushing wastewater across the street to a new disposal plant out in back of Sam and Omie's somewhere.  There is a very impressive website about the Jennette's Pier project if you want to learn more. Google Jennette's Pier.

The condemned row of derelict houses fronting what used to be Seagull Drive remain in place.  You could perhaps call them the Unpainted Aristocracy if the name were not already taken.

                              This "planter" might turn up on Craig's List one day.

The beach in South Nags Head was extremely wide during our entire visit.  A great time to try to sell oceanfront property to the unwary.

What could be more fun than a trip to Ocracoke on a gorgeous fall day when you don't have to wait in line for the ferry for two hours?

A great place to sit in the sun for a couple of hours.  The docks on Silver Lake never seem to change very much.

The venerable Island Inn was sold at a foreclosure auction the day before our visit but Uncle Jack doesn't know who bought it or for how much.  Many island residents fear that it may be torn down.

                        From a distance Bodie Island lighthouse looks a bit fuzzy these days.

Up close you can see the scaffolding required for the two-year preservation project now underway.  Your tax dollars at work in a worthy cause.

The gigantic wind-blown dune that nearly engulfed the old lifesaving station at Oregon Inlet a year ago has been removed and the building extensively refurbished.  It belongs to the North Carolina Aquariums now but Uncle Jack is not sure what they have in mind for it.

Uncle Jack never did manage to get up early enough to take a picture of the sunrise but he thought this sunset over Sonag was rather pretty.

When the Outer Banks was Utopia.

     On a recent trip to his former home on the Outer Banks of North Carolina Uncle Jack retrieved from his garage a  box of old papers that he hadn't looked at for many years.  It turned out to be a collection of odd printed material that he has never been able to throw away and after sorting through it he has decided that he will just have to hang on to it a bit longer.  One of the gems in this strange assortment of stuff was an excerpt from a novel entitled "Roanoke: or Where is Utopia" by C.H. Wiley, published in Sartain's Union Magazine of Literature and Art, Vol. 4 No. 3, March 1849.  
     Calvin Henderson Wiley, the author, was born in Guilford County, N.C. in 1819 and graduated from the University of N.C. in 1840.  He was editor of the Oxford, S.C. Mercury for a few years, served in the N.C. legislature, and was a licensed Presbyterian minister. He was the author of several books in addition to Roanoke. He remained a bachelor until the age of  43 but made up for lost time by fathering seven children.
     Where he got his information about the denizens of the Outer Banks nearly two centuries ago is a mystery to Uncle Jack but if he is correct they were a remarkable group indeed. Some of their salient characteristics have survived through the generations and are quite noticeable in more than a few of today's "Bankers" as you will see.  There is food for thought in this piece, and not just in the section on wife-swapping. 


                                                                  Chapter II


                                                      The Arabs of North Carolina


     The sand bar which stretches along the coast of North Carolina separates the ocean from a succession of sounds, the largest and most beautiful of which are those well known by the names of Albermarle, Pamlico and Currituck.  East of these inland seas is the bar, a waste and barren region, in some places bleak and wild as the deserts of Africa, and strangely in keeping with the majesty of that mighty deep whose awful grandeur is enhanced by the silence and desolation that reign along its borders.
     Even here, in this dreary, naked and sterile region, are the haunts and homes of men, a race who have never been classified by science, and who, though sometimes called Arabs, belong neither to the savage nor civilized state of society.  They are generally a motley collection of idle, roving, harmless creatures, leading an easy, indolent life, free alike from the cruel, murderous and plundering propensities of barbarians and the more christian vices of polished communities.  In the curious and beautiful little lakes of clear fresh water that gleam like mirrors in their arid and wild domain, myriads of fish abound; wild ducks, wild geese, and other sea fowls in countless thousands cover the waters, and on these, which are easily taken, they chiefly live.
     In former times, however, they had another source of subsistence;  a source from which they drew their main supplies of money, goods and groceries. They followed the occupation of wreckers; a business whose prosperity was attested by the long dark line of keels, hulks and dismantled vessels that covered the shore. It would seem that this fraternity would have found sufficient employment in the unavoidable casualties of the winds ad waves on this disastrous and melancholy coast; but population and competition increased, and the cunning of man was sometimes employed to add to the natural horrors of the dreaded region.
     The public were not concerned in these wicked tricks, and rude as it was, it would not have countenanced them; but those who used them were secret in their operations, and as it happens in all communities, would often be respected for wealth which they had obtained by disreputable means.  Thefts, of course, were common, and stranded cargoes rapidly diminished from the time they were landed on the beach, till the time of sale; still the crews were always saved and treated with a kindness and attention that often attached them to the Bankers.
     Neither their goods nor their wives were held altogether in common by those people, but while they were profusely generous  and hospitable, they entertained peculiar notions upon the subject of matrimony and the virtues it inculcates.  Polygamy was not allowed, but in its stead there was a prevalent custom much more convenient to the Bankers and better suited to the changing tastes of men.  The women were treated kindly as equals, but every man was considered as having the right to sell or swap his wife whenever he chose, and in this business there was a constant and lively trade.
     Modern improvements, arts and wants have found their way among the Bankers; and it is not to be supposed that the description herein given would at present suit them.  There was a time, however, a period not remote, when unfettered by the fluctuations of trade, the rise and fall of dynasties and the irregularity of the seasons, they led a careless, indolent and happy life, strangers alike to the sweltering hosts of summer and the snows of winter.  Without fear of pride, malice or ambition, abundantly and easily supplied with food and caring little for clothing, their existence had many charms for them and would not be without its attractions in the view of a certain class of philosophers and philanthropists.  Some of these had cast their eyes upon this country in former times, and from them it received the appellation of Utopia; a name which perhaps it merited as well as did the the famous island of Sir Thomas More.


Editor's note:  And then they built the bridge.