Category Archives: Outer Banks

Ship Timbers

The treacherous waters off of Hatteras Island are known as the Graveyard of the Atlantic. Remnants of old shipwrecks can still be seen periodically as the shifting sands reveal these artifacts. Interestingly, these ships were frequently salvaged for their timbers.

Timbers from the Loring C Ballard rest on the beach south of Salvo.

Years ago, I watched Pete Covey replacing a sill of a home built in the late 1800’s. The old sills were timbers from a shipwreck, and a piece was discarded. Back then I used a wood stove to heat my house, and when I put a chain saw to it, the sparks flew, and the saw would barely cut the wood. As it turned out, the wood was very old heart pine. I gave up cutting and had to replace the ruined chain. That wood was extremely tough.

Since Hurricane Irene, I’ve noticed a couple of other homes built incorporating the timbers savaged from wooden sailing ships.

Levene Midgett’s home was built in the 1920’s. Levene was a keeper at Chicamacomico Coast Guard Station. This building’s sill is framed with 4×16 heart pine timbers, and is in beautiful condition. It was flooded to the first floor windows during the storm, and has been raised significantly to avoid future flooding.

This massive timber supports an exterior deck.

Floor framing detail under Levene’s house.

Looking up at the main sill supported by new pressure treated lumber.

The massive beams look as good as the day they were salvaged.

There’s still a lot of work to be done so that Levene’s descendants can reoccupy the house.

Another home affected by the flooding was Elsie Hooper’s place in Salvo. I have recently learned that this building is well over 100 years old, and unfortunately is scheduled for demolition. The inside was stripped out in hopes of saving this relic, exposing parts of it history.

A beautiful heart pine timber acts as a post next to a steep narrow stairway.

A floor frame still has a hole in it for a wooden peg.

Two vertical beams (left) meet where the original building had an addition built to meet it.

The walls were braced for extra strength.

Another 4×6 ship timber of heart pine.

The yard is decorated with the bones of large whale, collected many years ago.

By next week the old homestead will be no more.



Christmas 2011

Christmas will be different this year. Some of the usual decorated buildings won’t be lit this holiday, four months after Hurricane Irene. The old Salvo Post Office sits in front of William and Edward Hooper’s house. They are among the elderly of the villages, Edward being the oldest living male at 89. For years they’ve decorated the little building, but not this year. The Hoopers were displaced from their flooded home, and will never live in the family homestead ever again.

Salvo Post Office from 2008

Another place down the road is decorated to the hilt every Christmas. Janie Hooper has lived in that Salvo house most of her 90 plus years. It too was flooded and sits vacant awaiting it’s fate, still unknown to me at this time.
Miss Janie’s House in 2003

Despite this, we have a lot to be thankful for this holiday. Irene could have been worse than it was.

Merry Christmas everyone.


Homage to C.E. Midgett

When I made the villages of Rodanthe, Waves and Salvo my home, it didn’t take long to realize that it was also home to a cast of colorful characters. Among these native residents was Clarence Midgett, better known as “C E”. His family history goes back many generations on Hatteras, and it has been documented that they were some of the original settlers coming to the island after surviving shipwrecks centuries ago.

C E’s great-grandfather and namesake, Clarence Ezekiel Midgett was a member of the early US Coast Guard. Stationed at Chicamacomico during World War One, Midgett took part in the famous Mirlo rescue of 1918.  They saved the lives of 51 sailors from a burning British tanker that had exploded offshore after running into a German mine. C E was really proud of that legacy.

C E was also fortunate to have grown up on the island when the atmosphere was much more rural than it is today. The spaces were wide open then. The island world was their “oyster”. You could hunt, fish, surf, party and even work unencumbered. There were no crowds to get in the way. I must admit that C E was probably a part of what secured me to this area. The native folks are a unique breed, generous, mostly independent and don’t require much to get by. They still are my kind of people.

In the 70’s and 80’s, C E was a part of a crowd of locals that I used to hang out with. You could always tell when C E was around. You could hear him talking and laughing louder than anyone else. Like many of the native sons, he loved to fish, either from the pier or commercially, with nets in the sound.

Most likely, you could find C E around the creek in Rodanthe. Here he works on a skiff with his cousin Bruce Midgett (right), while D B Midgett (left) looks on. Photograph was taken 1975.

C E Midgett at the Rodanthe creek as a “Marlboro Man”, 1974.
C E sits atop a catch of big bluefish in 1974.
C E Midgett also had his moments of mischief. This time he drove this Falcon station wagon off into a ravine in Nags Head, near the present day Village Golf Links. The cops came and didn’t even give him a ticket.
Bruce Midgett (left) celebrates Midgett Day with C E in 1975, on the hood of his Ranchero.
Gerald O’Neal and Richie Austin converse in the background.
C E competes in the oyster shoot at the Old Christmas celebration in 1985.

Sadly, C E passed away on October 23rd after a prolonged illness.

Rest in peace, my friend.

Barrier Island Transformation

I’ve lost track of time since Irene struck and flooded our villages more than six weeks ago.

There’s been a lot of cleaning up, and that should continue into the coming months and throughout the winter.

It’s been an emotional roller coaster, and I’ve been preoccupied with multiple tasks while trying to document life here, as I go. Of course, the newly cut inlet at Pea Island has had my curiosity the entire time.

So on Saturday, I saw the affected areas for the first time with my favorite pilot, Dwight Burrus of Hatteras. He owns and operates Burrus Flying Service, and I highly recommend his expertise in flight as well as his knowledge in local lore and history.

Here is some of what we saw the other day.

Bodie Island spit on the north side of Oregon Inlet has been split in two, while the navigation channel has been scoured to an increased depth.

The west dike at the north pond impoundment of the Pea Island refuge was breached by the storm surge.

Of course, Irene Inlet has been the talk of the town. This is one of the key spots where the pressure of the surge from Pamlico Sound was released.

HIghway 12 looking north towards the wildlife refuge impoundments and Oregon Inlet.

Looking west toward Pamlico Sound. Before the inlet was cut this coastal marsh was a prolific haven for marine life. With the flow of water in and out, it will be interesting to see how it adapts.

A quarter mile to the south of Irene Inlet is New Inlet cut in the storm of 1933. Still visible in the top of the picture are the remnants of the bridge that was never completed, as that inlet naturally filled back in.

My advice is not to buy oceanfront property at Mirlo Beach. It’s a loosing battle, for sure.

Looking north to Pea Island, the Mirlo Beach oceanfront is very unstable. The long, winding road beyond runs through the wildlife refuge.

The NC Ferry System has been the only link to the mainland for several weeks. Next to the ferry terminal on the right side of the picture is the community building that became instrumental in providing for the needy citizens of the Rodanthe, Waves and Salvo.

The National Park Service Day Use Area south of Salvo has become the landfill for all the debris collected since the storm. The Farrow family cemetery, which was damaged by the storm, is at the lower left. The road at the top of the photo is the entrance to ramp 23 beach access.

The debris piles are much larger than most of the houses in the villages.

This afternoon about 6:00 they opened the new temporary bridge, allowing visitors to enter the island once again. There was relatively little fanfare, some media coverage, and I could hear some vehicle occupants cheering as they rolled across the new bridge.

It’s going to be interesting to see how well this works out in time. What will the natural elements throw at highway 12 next….. and when?

Aftershock

Conditions around town have been improving as each day passes. The new temporary bridge at Pea Island is nearly complete, and the island may reopen as early as next Tuesday.

This is great news, however the night before last, there was a terrible mishap. We learned that Gary Midgett was killed in a tragic accident on highway 12.

Gary was Mac Midgett’s nephew, and a common sight around his family’s business,  the Island Convenience store and garage. He was an island boy, through and through. Gary was actively involved in the clean up process, driving around in his heavy equipment, and hauling off debris.

His mother, Mildred, had her house flooded in the hurricane, so he was putting up his family in his own home. So not only did his mother loose the use of her home, but in all this turmoil, she has also lost a cherished son.

I made this photograph just days after the storm. Gary was manually pumping fuel out of the underground storage tank, so that others could get gas for their vehicles and generators.

Rest in peace Gary Midgett. You will be missed by many.