An Island Out of Time (2019)

[Music] in the spring of 1987 I made the best move of my life to marshy little Smith Island in the very middle of Chesapeake Bay and moved my family back to the mainland after three years but your heart never leaves a place like that [Music] Smith Islands got the same problems as other low-lying places around the bay some landscapes I knew there 30 years ago or beneath the waves now the aftermath of the nor'easter gives a glimpse of what the island could look like every day later in this century ground washed away by erosion rising seas but the more imminent for it is not the disappearance of land the disappearance of the culture and the people who have defined it for centuries since I left the islands populations fallen from nearly 500 to under 200 about 40 remain full-time where I lived in Tyler ttan an island within an island connected only by water to the other villages of Newell Rhodes point when a community like Tyler tonneaus in people it's obvious every family counts what the Marshall family really counts on both sides they hark back to the beginnings of Smith Island Mary ADA's and Evans from the capital city of you'll where her family name predominates her dad Elmer was a prominent Waterman captain of a skipjack that was a cry to the island fleet dredging oysters under sail all over the maryland chesapeake [Music] and it was so pretty when the dredge boats would sail in on a Friday evening and the Creek was just full of dredge boats and now there's none white grew up in Durham point the old-timey name for Tyler tan we're about half the names are Marshall but before that he tell me about his people coming from shanks is an island who talked about almost like it was another country in fact its remnants lie just several hundred yards south and west is where he's living now erosion is terrible if I had a picture of last year where I crabbed over on the Bayside way you wouldn't believe how much that's a really way it's disturbing it really is Dan shanks is where my great-great grandparents used to live used to be trees the van was probably a mile to a mile and a half eight because they had three trees and all kinds of shade trees and trees some of the likes a home now Schank says has become so eroded and shifted around Dwight used to say if he's dad Russell who died in the 1970s were to come back he'd be lost down there now Oh dad he was character I used to follow him in the summertime when we were out of school with crab that's with a dip net that dips crabs off the bottom married and Dwight met on the old island star that ferried Island high schoolers to the mainland where they boarded Monday through Friday Island kids still ferry to Chris field daily now on a modern catamaran a few younger ones go to Yule elementary school on the captain Jason school boat had just come here and let off two kids after they graduate I don't think it's done in the horn no babies you know to feed the next generation I mean it's it married enjoyed through fond of hops held on weekends annual when we decided to get married she said well you got to ask dad I said she and so I did and he came out the bedroom and he was talking on telephone and it was at his drawer so he's hat foot up on the chair talking somebody said camera like Mari daughter said yeah go ahead take a lot off me I started picking claws when I was 11 years old I'd get up with my dad at 3 o'clock I swore up Dino I was a married man that I never would have to pick another crowd but that didn't happen either we stayed together from then on yes youth by the love of Malloy white was the consummate bae Waterman others had bigger faster boats and fished more gear but no one was more skilled at maximizing a living from the BAE's bounty he'd talk about how to be a top Waterman you got to drive yourself and he'd always had you need a wife who's that way to marry back she worked as hard as I did it made a difference Dwight and I have always worked together side by side typical day for me would it be get up at 2:00 and 2:30 in the morning pick a bushel craps stop at quarter to 7:00 and go to the bait put your meat on there come in put in a tub of clothes make your beds line up what you're going to have for your evening meal then go down to Shannon cut bait five traits of soft crabs and wrap them come up if it was cool enough you cut the grass get your supper we need her evening meal by three o'clock and it four o'clock you were back eight picking again and by seven o'clock you were done had your shower and ready to go to bed by 8 o'clock when I moved down here that was over 200 people down here big families isn't not any children much anymore so now we're down to 42 people you wonder what and world's happen I had four children and they need the one live here on the island I'm proud of their accomplishments but at the same time it's sad because that's why our population well they want more they wanted a paid vacation and they wanted retirement and so you don't have it when you work for yourself on water I got paid my own health benefit of course I'm on Medicare now when I was grabbed we had Blue Cross and Blue Shield which is quite expensive my mom doesn't understand that if you take a week off from work it's okay but there is such thing as a vacation and you can get paid for it Maria that's the story all your own she was getting ready to go to high school she said my just one thing you can take this to the bank I'm not picking crabs and I'm not standing here making cakes and cooking like you do I smell what do you want to do young lady she said I want to wear high heels I'm working two City and care a briefcase in my hand I don't necessarily remember saying that but I guess I met my goal she went in Washington College and got a good job in DC and that's where she met Brooks her husband when I was living in Tyler time in the 80s I'd have bet you that two of the marshals kids Kevin and Jamie were going to be lifelong Waterman they probably thought so too then I truly thought I'd take to Smith Island on Tarleton especially till I doubt it I just wished that I could make enough money where it was easier for me to have my living on the island I might leave the water indirectly but as far as the water leaving me no that's running through my veins I have a complete fabrication shop building and it were from full boats as you can see fuel tanks t-tops arches rails anything's got to do with both with not many kids coming up not many young couples it's gonna be really hard to maintain that Island I don't know how I place will survive I wanted a crab and I wanted to pursue our our our family history and legacy but also one server country so I enlisted in the Marine Corps when I was 17 and I was thinking about making a career of it but the water kept calling me back I said I gotta go I want to go home I want to go home come home and went crabbing then I didn't have any insurances and Warren I really couldn't afford them got a job while I was home at the prison he was trying to work to prison and trying to work here on the water and one anything going over all dressed in his uniform he fell asleep and runned his boat directly into the lighthouse Boyd in Crisfield and why he wasn't killed was because of our prayers I believe the Angels was right around he was going full-throttle he worked to the prison for a few years and they didn't like that and then he went into state police at 43 years old with all my military service and everything that I've had at the prison estate I will be retiring this November first tiring to a marshal doesn't mean the same thing as it means to most of us Jamie may be leaving the State Police he's a special agent for the Coast Guard Reserve a resource officer for the local school and he has his new store marshal marine he opened up our business called Marshalls marine in Crisfield it's a boat place love boats love being on the water I probably will go crabbing again one day to teach my boys on how to do it I tell you I believe I grew up in the best of times on the water I mean we had freedoms to work and to do things that we can't do now and quite frankly you can make a good living if you've worked at it right now they have to spend anywhere from seventy to a hundred thousand dollars to get ready for a crab but if you don't already have your rig and back there then we started out with a skiff to work their way up to another scraping boat then from a scraping boat up to what they called a Ryan stern you worked your way up it was a lot of work but it was it was fun it's nothing buddy going out and catching crabs or Auster's it's like finding money on the bottom and I don't really see it coming back you're not gonna have anybody just come there move out and buy a whole rig of pots think a crab pot now rigged up about forty forty-five dollars cost too much it's costing much money the last generation of Waterman are the generation after me it's the younger people just after me which are most of them are in their fifties you know I see it I mean I don't know nobody after them that's interesting when I was a kid he kept your house nice yard nice he went to church in a suit and watermen over home were prominent people they were well respected and looked up upon when you're a kid in high school and even in grade school dad what do you want to be when you grow up I'm gonna be a crab Potter I'm gonna be a Waterman I'm gonna be a scraper or I'm gonna be a Tonga or no oystermen that's what you would say because you'd see these big strong men with these big hard hands and you wouldn't be a man Dwight was more than a harvester he was a student of markets owning seafood buyers after a long day on the water even hopping a truck from the crisp field to check out places like New York's Fulton fish market he installed a freezer to hold his catch an extended already long work days running his own seafood sales routes on the mainland all to free himself from depending on the daily market set by middlemen but it wasn't all work for years Dwight the 36 foot miss Marshall were famous bay wide for dominating the boat docking contest so beloved of water I don't even know how many I have won but I never did have hydraulic steering when I was in the contest he's come a long way that kind of stuff they're so quick now that I couldn't go up against him Kevin followed in his father's footsteps maybe I should say wait until his knees gave out a couple of years ago jamie is still going strong [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] the crowd was just going nuts I was like I could not contain this excitement that's it Jamie ought not act like gas there's nobody Tangier boat docks no more nobody Smith Iowa nobody in Crisfield no Waterman and stuff around home and people don't want to do it I'm like the only one left [Music] [Applause] [Music] on top of everything else they did marry ADA and joy ran a store after they sold it there came a point where Tyler Tintin no story I remember huddling in a water was cold shanty drinking bad coffee that winter pretty grim time that was when Duke their oldest son a successful insurance agent on the mainland began commuting back on weekends to run a new little market he and his brother Kevin bill could have made more profitable investments but it was his way of giving back to a place he always felt bad he had to leave it wasn't to get rich that was for sure but it was to help the community that helped me [Music] one of the things that happened there he wanted a good crab cake so he said you need to tweak this and tweak it and keep working on it till you get it like we want so Duke and Dwight were tasters I would mix it up and cook it nope I seen that I'd mix up another batch of cookie know if it's not it so this one day in particular I mixed up this bag do whatever you've done don't change it I said Lord don't even know what I've put in here they said well you've got to go back and retrack it because this is perfect it's delicious that crab cake not only helps the store because they're known for their crab cakes but it's turned into a business for me it's like every whichaway I turn I ship crab cakes all over the United States ever work our biggest secret of that crab cake is Smith out and crab meat which you know again employs people from around here that's they picked the crab and make the make money from that and certainly the Waterman catch it and all but also it just gives it a better flavor she's also known you know as the cake lady and she didn't invent the Smith Island cake if somebody said but she helped make it famous [Music] [Music] so one day I was here and the phone rang and it was Torres I'm called this was ten years ago and they said Mary ADA would we would love for you to go to Annapolis and represent us getting the Smith Island cake the state dessert and the reason I'm telling you this I didn't have a dream in the world that the Lord would open up a new chapter in my life because that's exactly what happened from the day that became the dessert and went public in the paper my life took a whole new change my phone started ringing for cakes they'd call me cuz they wanted to talk to me I think they'd like to hear my brew it's also change Smith Islands life because I think it put Smith Island on the map I really do we've been eight here inhabited since the 1600s but all of a sudden everybody wants to come see where this cake is where it is located who the people are then you have to kind of work with this quick if you don't it will set up on you Duke along with other Islanders has been trying to rethink the islands future few weeks ago I went to a symposium in Michigan called working waterfront they talked about shorelines erosion they talked about the populations why do people live on islands how do you attract people how do you make a living off of islands ecotourism so when we think our struggle is just unique to us it's not we talked about the projects that Smith Island has the living shorelines which is an outstanding project they just spent almost 20 million dollars with a new jetty system for roads point people say why do you need a new jetty system why are you spending money on an island that's sinking we don't believe in it that we're sinking where we were eroding and this is definitely a fix to that look at poplar Island which is nearing 700 million dollars for a bunch of birds and when you ask for a few million for Smith Island it seems like it's pulling teeth it's a struggle the island here doesn't have a police force what governs our island is our church Smith Island has three churches all Methodist but only one pastor Everett Landon an island native and former Waterman commutes by boat to Tyler to serve it dwindling congregation [Music] [Applause] white ice always believed in tithing one time in particular was a diver sitting on our table I knew more no more money though and I took it and I put it in the collection table weren't gonna do me much good God on that load you can really tell the difference when people are crabbing and they've had a good week that money will go up it'll come back to you after war don't bless us weren't illipe of trouble put it out plate he supplies the crabs and oysters fish in everything he does a pretty good job of it I say I don't think nobody's ever really gone hungry right there people were asked me why I refer to the Smith on as the rock it's a place of stability something that's not moved and if you use the biblical part of it the wise man built his house upon the rock not the sands so I like to think that Smith Island has been the mainstay of the rock for many people in many generations if thou is semi-retarded more SEMO I think than the Torah I had quadruple bypass that I had double knee replacement and they throwed me for a loop and I do a little crabbing do a little crab pot and I have some restaurants I deal with and that seems to help me and of course Mara she's she's got a business of her own are to the older you get you wonder if you're doing right to live here or not if you're on the mainland ecolab don't seem beater to you rush you to the hospital here it's not that easy it could mean death because you can't get him her and time I think I would have stayed on the island more if there had been a bridge or I mean I know you can take the boat but it's kind of hard to call into a boss and be like you know it's too windy it's too foggy you can't make it in today the bay foundation has just weak Bay Foundation has two facilities here in Tarleton and they do what they call a taint or and the little children come to our door knock and they'll ask us a couple questions I'll say do you have teeth do you have computer we have iPads iPods are Yaya we got anything that the mainland has except in a highway and I wish we would sometime have a highway to get to Crisfield when it's 140 miles and you have a diver's pointment I've never forget where I come from and it's always there and if I have opportunity to do something to bring Smith Islanders back I'll do it we can hope the island has another chapter left maybe more in retirees and vacationers than in following the water business as they say out here when I go back home to Smith Island like who's that oh you know who that is anymore visitors come in they want to be part of Smith autumn from from the Smith Island that I came from but unfortunately it's not there anymore seems like a lot of the houses are now people who who don't live here they're people who've come fell in love with the island have basically a summer home or just a getaway home their family has been here since 1608 and my parents are the caretakers and sometimes I wonder are they the last caretakers of that land I truly don't believe they'll move that's what they've worked her whole life for we got a beautiful home right there on the water most people in the world who love the water would would have killed for that sunset why would you want to leave that we have thought several times about moving but to really go out turn that key on the door for the last time I [Music] can't talk about it because I get all filled up chesapeake writer gilbert byron called Waterman greatest poets who never wrote a line their lives essayed upon a fluid environment inscribed in the seagrass meadows where they sawed crabs on the shallow bars where they tonged oysters in the close-knit villages so vulnerable to flood and storm someday waves may overlap all physical evidence that the poetry ever existed lamenting the future shouldn't crowd out celebration if the Marshalls and their island are in the last chapters they leave in a flourish of chocolate cake and succulent crab Denis no bitter taste there they have endured long and well against all odds no more than a drop in the ocean of time and space on planet Earth of my how it did Sparkle how it shot I don't know what the future holds but as long as that mate won't stay here this is honey [Music]

Channel: Chesapeake Bay Journal

Views: 79,187

Rating: 4.8806629 out of 5

Keywords: Smith Island, Chesapeake, Sea level

Id: yAqM4Y5RIEk

Length: 25min 2sec (1502 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 25 2019