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Ocracokers
North Carolina's Ocracoke island has produced a remarkably cohesive community of islanders. For more than two centuries, these Ocracokers lived in relative isolation, enjoying the beauty and battling the destructive forces of the Atlantic. In the past two decades, tourists discovered this "unique fishing village by the sea," and the tiny island was forever altered. Alarmed at the dramatic changes in the island's character over the past generation, Alton Ballance set out to capture the story of Ocracoke and its people from the unique perspective of a native.
Ballance accompanies the people of Ocracoke on their everyday activities--fishing, hunting, boating--all the time recording their stories about events and people that have shaped the island's history. They have lived through hurricanes, and they remember their ancestors talking of the shipwrecks and daring rescues that occurred off the treacherous coast. During the many years when no doctor resided on the island, Ocracokers delivered each other's babies and attended to their own illnesses, sometimes with local cures.
When Ballance was growing up on Ocracoke in the 1960s and 1970s, the number of year-round residents hovered around 500. Now Ocracoke is a major tourist attraction visited by hundreds of thousands of people each year. As tourism has flourished, the island has become less isolated, and Ballance discusses the consequences of this development for both islander and visitor. The modernization that accompanies tourism has provided many benefits for the island, among them better health care and schooling and more jobs. Nonetheless, the Ocracoke of old is rapidly disappearing. This book is a tribute to that Ocracoke and her people.
Ballance accompanies the people of Ocracoke on their everyday activities--fishing, hunting, boating--all the time recording their stories about events and people that have shaped the island's history. They have lived through hurricanes, and they remember their ancestors talking of the shipwrecks and daring rescues that occurred off the treacherous coast. During the many years when no doctor resided on the island, Ocracokers delivered each other's babies and attended to their own illnesses, sometimes with local cures.
When Ballance was growing up on Ocracoke in the 1960s and 1970s, the number of year-round residents hovered around 500. Now Ocracoke is a major tourist attraction visited by hundreds of thousands of people each year. As tourism has flourished, the island has become less isolated, and Ballance discusses the consequences of this development for both islander and visitor. The modernization that accompanies tourism has provided many benefits for the island, among them better health care and schooling and more jobs. Nonetheless, the Ocracoke of old is rapidly disappearing. This book is a tribute to that Ocracoke and her people.
- GenresNonfiction
Hardcover
First published August 1, 1989
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August 2, 2021
Ocracoke Island is truly a unique place, even in the context of the North Carolina Outer Banks of which it is a part. It is more isolated than other Outer Banks islands – to this day, travelers must board a ferryboat to reach the island – and for much of its history, Ocracoke was home only to fishermen, lighthouse keepers, “wreckers” who sought to salvage valuables from offshore shipwrecks, and the occasional pirate. Nowadays, however, Ocracoke is home to a sizable tourism industry that sometimes seems to endanger the very qualities of peace and isolation that draw tourists to the island – and Alton Ballance captures well all those aspects of Ocracoke life in his 1989 book Ocracokers.
Author Ballance, an Ocracoke native, left the island to study at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After returning home to his island, he taught at Ocracoke’s one school; later, he became a commissioner for Hyde County, the remote coastal county in which Ocracoke is located. Accordingly, he can consider his island and its history from the point of view of native son, university scholar, and public servant/community leader. This multiplicity of perspective contributes to Ocracokers’ success.
Ballance’s appreciation for the peaceful, bucolic qualities of Ocracoke life come forth in his evocation of the joys of mullet fishing with Uriah and Sullivan Garrish, two Ocracokers who went out mulleting for more than 60 years. Ballance had fished with them from the age of ten, helping to pick out fish that had gotten caught in the mesh nets that mulleters use.
After finishing his studies at UNC-Chapel Hill, Ballance returned home to Ocracoke and learned that “no one else would go with them and I felt they were a little discouraged. The thought of a summer without Uriah and Sullivan mulleting didn’t seem right; they were a regular part of the season. And so, right out of college, I launched into a wonderful year of fishing with them, learning about the art of mulleting” (p. 51). This decision on young Ballance’s part shows his knowledge of and respect for old Ocracoke ways – a way of thinking that seems to have been strengthened, not weakened, by his time away at college on the mainland.
Wisely, Ballance frequently lets his informants speak for themselves, as in a chapter focusing upon the Bryants – at the time of the book’s publication in 1989, the only African-American family on the island. Mildred Bryant tells Ballance that, when all of Ocracoke’s African-American population left the island after the Civil War, her grandmother and grandfather, Winnie and Harkus Blount, were the only African Americans who moved from the mainland to Ocracoke. The picture that Mildred Bryant provides for Ballance of the family’s life on Ocracoke is largely a favorable one:
“You see, in them days everybody was just alike. Nobody had anything, so one person would give to the other if they needed something, and they would help each other with this or that. I’ve heard tell that when different ones around would kill a cow or pig, they’d usually let other people know about it and let them have some. My grandma used to have cattle, sheep, and pigs herself and would walk clear down toward the beach where people let their cattle and stuff go to check on them.” (pp. 102-03)
For regular visitors to Ocracoke, the chapter on “World War II at Ocracoke” is likely to be of particular interest – for one of the sites of lasting fascination for Ocracoke visitors is the island’s tiny British Cemetery, where four British sailors from the anti-submarine trawler H.M.T. Bedfordshire are buried. The sailors are casualties of the Battle of the Atlantic, as their ship was torpedoed by the German submarine U-558 on May 11, 1942, and their bodies eventually washed ashore on Ocracoke. To see this tiny memorial to British valor on a remote North Carolina island – a corner of a foreign field that is forever England – is a moving thing:
Throughout the years, various individuals and organizations, both military and civilian, have cared for the British Cemetery. In recent years, officials of the British government have attended an annual memorial service on May 11, the date the Bedfordshire was sunk. New tombstones have also been acquired, replacing the old crosses that originally marked the graves. (p. 199)
Ballance’s first-hand experience of Ocracoke life informs the book well, as in a chapter on the changing life of Ocracoke’s one school. With the transition from an old and amenities-light 1917 school building to a newer one, constructed in 1970, came other changes to the life of the island’s schoolchildren:
With the increase in tourism, our students are not only being exposed to other life-styles but they are also traveling more. “The isolation factor has changed,” observed Karen Lovejoy, who came to the school in 1978 as its first exceptional education teacher. “It’s not so strange to leave and go places anymore. More students are traveling on their own. We even have high school students who have spent time studying in France, Germany, and the Netherlands.” (p. 153)
Indeed, profound change has come to a once-isolated island where, for many years, life moved slowly, to the rhythms of maritime work and Christian worship. Over the course of the 20th century, the presence of the National Park Service became more pronounced, and tourism became ever more central to the island’s economy. The question of how Ocracoke can maintain a thriving tourism presence, while preserving those qualities of Ocracoke life that bring tourists to Ocracoke in the first place, remains an open one.
Ballance closes Ocracokers by returning to a story of going out to fish for mullet. In doing so, he carries on the heritage of Sullivan and Uriah Garrish, who died in 1987 and 1988 respectively, and leaves the reader with a reminder of Ocracoke’s unique history as a quiet fishing village.
Reading Ocracokers brought back many happy memories of enjoying the oyster sandwich at Howard’s Pub (first restaurant on the right as you drive into town), or experiencing pirate tourism at the Teach’s Hole museum and gift shop, or shelling on the wide empty beaches, or enjoying the beautiful views of the stark white lighthouse and the Silver Lake harbor at the center of Ocracoke Village. If you’ve been to Ocracoke, then perhaps it affects you the same way.
One of many fine regional works published at Chapel Hill by the University of North Carolina Press, Ocracokers captures well the many endearing factors that make Ocracoke Island a favorite destination for so many visitors every year.
Author Ballance, an Ocracoke native, left the island to study at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After returning home to his island, he taught at Ocracoke’s one school; later, he became a commissioner for Hyde County, the remote coastal county in which Ocracoke is located. Accordingly, he can consider his island and its history from the point of view of native son, university scholar, and public servant/community leader. This multiplicity of perspective contributes to Ocracokers’ success.
Ballance’s appreciation for the peaceful, bucolic qualities of Ocracoke life come forth in his evocation of the joys of mullet fishing with Uriah and Sullivan Garrish, two Ocracokers who went out mulleting for more than 60 years. Ballance had fished with them from the age of ten, helping to pick out fish that had gotten caught in the mesh nets that mulleters use.
After finishing his studies at UNC-Chapel Hill, Ballance returned home to Ocracoke and learned that “no one else would go with them and I felt they were a little discouraged. The thought of a summer without Uriah and Sullivan mulleting didn’t seem right; they were a regular part of the season. And so, right out of college, I launched into a wonderful year of fishing with them, learning about the art of mulleting” (p. 51). This decision on young Ballance’s part shows his knowledge of and respect for old Ocracoke ways – a way of thinking that seems to have been strengthened, not weakened, by his time away at college on the mainland.
Wisely, Ballance frequently lets his informants speak for themselves, as in a chapter focusing upon the Bryants – at the time of the book’s publication in 1989, the only African-American family on the island. Mildred Bryant tells Ballance that, when all of Ocracoke’s African-American population left the island after the Civil War, her grandmother and grandfather, Winnie and Harkus Blount, were the only African Americans who moved from the mainland to Ocracoke. The picture that Mildred Bryant provides for Ballance of the family’s life on Ocracoke is largely a favorable one:
“You see, in them days everybody was just alike. Nobody had anything, so one person would give to the other if they needed something, and they would help each other with this or that. I’ve heard tell that when different ones around would kill a cow or pig, they’d usually let other people know about it and let them have some. My grandma used to have cattle, sheep, and pigs herself and would walk clear down toward the beach where people let their cattle and stuff go to check on them.” (pp. 102-03)
For regular visitors to Ocracoke, the chapter on “World War II at Ocracoke” is likely to be of particular interest – for one of the sites of lasting fascination for Ocracoke visitors is the island’s tiny British Cemetery, where four British sailors from the anti-submarine trawler H.M.T. Bedfordshire are buried. The sailors are casualties of the Battle of the Atlantic, as their ship was torpedoed by the German submarine U-558 on May 11, 1942, and their bodies eventually washed ashore on Ocracoke. To see this tiny memorial to British valor on a remote North Carolina island – a corner of a foreign field that is forever England – is a moving thing:
Throughout the years, various individuals and organizations, both military and civilian, have cared for the British Cemetery. In recent years, officials of the British government have attended an annual memorial service on May 11, the date the Bedfordshire was sunk. New tombstones have also been acquired, replacing the old crosses that originally marked the graves. (p. 199)
Ballance’s first-hand experience of Ocracoke life informs the book well, as in a chapter on the changing life of Ocracoke’s one school. With the transition from an old and amenities-light 1917 school building to a newer one, constructed in 1970, came other changes to the life of the island’s schoolchildren:
With the increase in tourism, our students are not only being exposed to other life-styles but they are also traveling more. “The isolation factor has changed,” observed Karen Lovejoy, who came to the school in 1978 as its first exceptional education teacher. “It’s not so strange to leave and go places anymore. More students are traveling on their own. We even have high school students who have spent time studying in France, Germany, and the Netherlands.” (p. 153)
Indeed, profound change has come to a once-isolated island where, for many years, life moved slowly, to the rhythms of maritime work and Christian worship. Over the course of the 20th century, the presence of the National Park Service became more pronounced, and tourism became ever more central to the island’s economy. The question of how Ocracoke can maintain a thriving tourism presence, while preserving those qualities of Ocracoke life that bring tourists to Ocracoke in the first place, remains an open one.
Ballance closes Ocracokers by returning to a story of going out to fish for mullet. In doing so, he carries on the heritage of Sullivan and Uriah Garrish, who died in 1987 and 1988 respectively, and leaves the reader with a reminder of Ocracoke’s unique history as a quiet fishing village.
Reading Ocracokers brought back many happy memories of enjoying the oyster sandwich at Howard’s Pub (first restaurant on the right as you drive into town), or experiencing pirate tourism at the Teach’s Hole museum and gift shop, or shelling on the wide empty beaches, or enjoying the beautiful views of the stark white lighthouse and the Silver Lake harbor at the center of Ocracoke Village. If you’ve been to Ocracoke, then perhaps it affects you the same way.
One of many fine regional works published at Chapel Hill by the University of North Carolina Press, Ocracokers captures well the many endearing factors that make Ocracoke Island a favorite destination for so many visitors every year.
October 4, 2023
Ocracokers by Alton Ballance (University of North Carolina Press 1989) (975.6).
Ocracoke Island is one of the most remote and harder-to-reach places on North Carolina's Outer Banks. The Outer Banks are the series of barrier islands which line much of North Carolina's coastal region. It's not far from Cape Hatteras and from Kill Devil Hills where in 1903 a couple of tourists from Ohio named Wilbur and Orville made the first powered flight from atop a massive sand dune.
One hundred years ago, this area was seldom visited by outsiders, but it has now become prime territory for summer beachgoing vacationers. Alton Ballance is a native of Ocracoke; he wrote this volume to preserve his memories of growing up in an isolated community where the residents had to depend on each other in times of difficulty.
My entire extended family is from this area, and I love it like only a prodigal son can. Author Alton Ballance has included two chapters that were of particular interest to me: a chapter about mulleting, or mullet fishing with nets from small skiffs which is more like a rodeo than a type of fishing, and a chapter about duck hunting from inshore and offshore blinds.
I can almost smell the fish frying and taste the oysters straight from the brine!
My rating: 7.25/10, finished 6/1/16.
[RE-READ and REVIEW UPDATED 10/4/2023] I re-read this to refresh my memory of the author's chapters on fishing for jumping mullet in nets (locally known as "striking for mullet") and waterfowl hunting from offshore blinds. The author brought back lots of good memories from my younger days.
Immediately upon graduating from college in 1980, I moved to the North Carolina coastal barrier islands in this part of the world into a small fishing community. I was taken in by the locals and treated like one of their own. They opened the door to allow me to join in a number of communal summertime activities, and “striking for mullet" is just about the most fun saltwater sport I've ever experienced.
Picture a pair of boats encircling a school of eighteen-inch-long fish in a net corral in three or four feet of water against the side of an offshore sandbar. Now jump into the corral (along with several other fishermen/women) into waist-deep water to frantically try to grab the trapped fish from the net before they escape. Be careful though, because there is often an unseen stingray or a shark trapped inside the murky and watery pen as well. Trying to grab hold of the mullet as they hit the net wall looks to an observer like “The Three Stooges Almost Drown.”
It’s a lot more fun than it sounds. It will sure get your adrenaline pumping!
I purchased a new PB copy in 2016 for my personal library.
My rating: 7.25/10, finished re-reading 10/4/23 (3875).
PPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP
July 8, 2016
My family has vacationed in Ocracoke--an island in North Carolina's Outer Banks--a couple of times. I was fascinated with the island's unique history and purchased this book on our last trip. The author is a local Ocracoker, so this book truly has an insider's perspective on the island. While published in 1989 (so not exactly recent), it has a lot of interesting insight into the daily lives of Ocracokers and how the island has developed over its long history.
What struck me the most as I was reading was how much this tiny island really has changed; not just from century to century, but also from decade to decade. Of course changes in the physical environment--the marshes, sand dunes, etc.--have remained a concern over the years. However, the island has seen a lot of change in businesses and real estate as well. To this day, Ocracoke has an unspoiled charm marked by a complete lack of chain hotels, fast-food giants, and other businesses that are increasingly common in tourist destinations. But the island has still seen a lot come and go--a WWII navy base, a clam factory, even early tourist hotels dating back to the end of the 19th century. It's amazing that even as Ocracoke today is possibly the closest you'll ever get to seeing how life was in the "old" Outer Banks, the island has still experienced its share of change over the years.
So, overall, this was a great local history read. Sometimes it's nice to learn more about the area you live in (or, in this case, occasionally vacation in). This book definitely informed me on Ocracoke's history and gave me a fresh perspective on the island.
What struck me the most as I was reading was how much this tiny island really has changed; not just from century to century, but also from decade to decade. Of course changes in the physical environment--the marshes, sand dunes, etc.--have remained a concern over the years. However, the island has seen a lot of change in businesses and real estate as well. To this day, Ocracoke has an unspoiled charm marked by a complete lack of chain hotels, fast-food giants, and other businesses that are increasingly common in tourist destinations. But the island has still seen a lot come and go--a WWII navy base, a clam factory, even early tourist hotels dating back to the end of the 19th century. It's amazing that even as Ocracoke today is possibly the closest you'll ever get to seeing how life was in the "old" Outer Banks, the island has still experienced its share of change over the years.
So, overall, this was a great local history read. Sometimes it's nice to learn more about the area you live in (or, in this case, occasionally vacation in). This book definitely informed me on Ocracoke's history and gave me a fresh perspective on the island.
June 15, 2020
An account that blends memoir, history, folklore, and culture seamlessly.
Ballance's text elegantly paints the history of North Carolina's Ocracoke Island and its' inhabitants on the eve of great demographic and economic changes to the island in the 1980s. A teacher by trade; Ballance serves at the oral history chronicler at the forefront of the story. His experiences, anecdotes of childhood, and adulthood configure the narrative's shaping of the island.
The material of the book covers topics as varied as shipwreck, piracy, war, medicine, education, and commerce. Though a conventional challenge, the author weaves together the story with incredible care. The book carries a reflective awareness of Ocracoke's unique culture. The book steps up as not just an artifact but full preservation of that cultural moment. I highly recommend this book for any potential patrons of the island or for any readers of personally effective non-fiction.
Ballance's text elegantly paints the history of North Carolina's Ocracoke Island and its' inhabitants on the eve of great demographic and economic changes to the island in the 1980s. A teacher by trade; Ballance serves at the oral history chronicler at the forefront of the story. His experiences, anecdotes of childhood, and adulthood configure the narrative's shaping of the island.
The material of the book covers topics as varied as shipwreck, piracy, war, medicine, education, and commerce. Though a conventional challenge, the author weaves together the story with incredible care. The book carries a reflective awareness of Ocracoke's unique culture. The book steps up as not just an artifact but full preservation of that cultural moment. I highly recommend this book for any potential patrons of the island or for any readers of personally effective non-fiction.
October 17, 2020
The writing style is a little dated (especially the somewhat offputting use of "dialect" when recounting conversations with the few black residents), but still written with verve and genuine affection.
March 12, 2019
I didn't expect much from this, but it turned out to be a great read, not just about Ocracoke, but about the way people live, or used to live, in small, out of the way, communities.
May 6, 2019
Great history of Ocracoke Island as told by an Ocracoker. Special to have a copy autographed by the author.
December 29, 2016
I enjoyed reading this book and learning about the history of the island and the people.
January 28, 2012
Ocracoke Island is defined in large part by its isolation, and Alton Ballance in Ocracokers describes well how that isolation has shaped the society that has developed on that very small island at the south end of North Carolina's Outer Banks. An Ocracoke native who left the island to study at Chapel Hill, returned to teach at the Ocracoke School, and eventually served as a Hyde County commissioner, Ballance can look at Ocracoke's history and society from the perspectives of native-born citizen, university scholar, and community leader. Standout chapters, to my mind, include Ballance's discussion of World War II, a time when Nazi Germany's U-boat campaign against American maritime commerce came terrifyingly close to Ocracoke's quiet shores, and his treatment of how the development of the tourist industry has affected Ocracoke life. Even better, however, is his elegiac homage to two elderly mullet fishermen whose story frames the book. Highly recommended for anyone with an interest in the history of Ocracoke, or for anyone who appreciates the beauty of the Outer Banks of North Carolina.
May 22, 2012
The well-told story of the island I'd want to be stranded on. Small, isolated communities have their own breed of fascinating stories nurtured by eccentric folks who choose not to be a part of the mainstream culture, and are so much better off as a result. This book is a true gem of that literature written by a Pulitzer-prize caliber author.
October 29, 2015
Interesting historical perspective of the history of my family's favorite vacation spot. Could use an update. It was published in the late 1980's. Still fun to correlate the spots we have been to with its history.
March 13, 2010
Great book about coastal North Carolina!
June 27, 2012
Some good history and anecdotes. Though I still don't know when the Ballances arrived on the Outer Banks.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews