Harkers Island, North Carolina

Harkers Island is a census-designated place (CDP) in Carteret County, North Carolina, United States. The population of Harkers Island was 1,525 at the 2000 census. Harkers Island is unincorporated and receives most public services, including law enforcement and public education, from Carteret County. A membership cooperative provides the island with electric and water services. Major industries on the island include fishing, boat building, tourism, and waterfowl decoy carving.

Once named Craney Island, Harkers Island was occupied by Native Americans of the Coree tribe when the first European explorers arrived in the sixteenth century. Ownership of Harkers Island was first claimed by Farnifold Green, a native of North Carolina, in the early eighteenth century. Ebenezer Harker purchased the island in 1730, settled there with his family, and built a plantation and boat yard. The island became known as Harkers Island soon after his death. A large immigration of islanders fleeing the hurricane-ravaged Outer Banks in 1899 dramatically increased the island population, which largely depended on fishing and boat building.

Separated from the mainland for centuries, many Harkers Island residents speak a distinct dialect of English.

History

Before the arrival of European explorers and settlers, Harkers Island was inhabited by Native Americans of the Coree tribe, who spoke a language similar to that of the much more numerous Tuscarora. According to legend, one of the two Native Americans who accompanied the Philip Amadas and Arthur Barlowe expedition back to England in 1548 was a Coree from Harkers Island. The nearby Core Sound and Core Banks are named after the Coree.

The first European to own the island was Farnifold Green, who acquired title to the land from the colonial government in the very early years of the eighteenth century, when it was known as Craney Island. On June 25, 1709, Green sold the island to William Brice, who on the very same day sold it to Thomas Sparrow for £10. Sparrow soon sold the island to Thomas Pollock, who would be Governor of North Carolina from 1712 to 1714. Pollock did not take up residence on the island, but leased it to settlers. The 1720 lease to a Captain Stone was £3 a year. Thomas Pollock's son George inherited the island upon his father's death in 1721.

Settlement of Ebenezer Harker

George Pollock sold Craney Island to Ebenezer Harker in 1730 for £400. Harker had immigrated to Massachusetts from England on a ship that set sail from Wales. Living in Boston, Harker had been involved in the whaling trade, and became familiar with the North Carolina coast during this time. After purchasing the island, Harker took up residence there with his family and began building a small plantation and boat yard. Harker sold half of the island to his nephew John Stevens of Onslow County, North Carolina on March 8, 1733 for £300, with many restrictions on its agricultural use. Prohibited from farming or ranching the land for profit, Stevens eventually sold his half of the island back to his uncle on June 9, 1737 for just £180.

The Harker plantation and boat building facility grew to support an extended family and at least six African slaves. Ebenezer would be the last sole landowner of the island. In 1752, he deeded approximately 10 acres (40,500 m²) of the island to his daughter Hepsobeth and her husband Nathan Yeomans. On his death in 1765, his sons Zachariah, James, and Ebenezer were willed a third each of the remainder of the island. Zachariah was deeded the western third of the island, James the eastern third, and Ebenezer the central third. The will referred to Craney Island; the name Harkers Island was only adopted after Ebenezer's death.

Zachariah Harker developed a saltworks on his third of Harkers Island in 1776. In the following years, Zachariah and his brothers became supporters of the American Revolution. Harkers Island was involved in the Battle of Beaufort. Revolutionaries used warehouse facilities on Harkers Island to store provisions sought by British troops who had seized the nearby county seat of Beaufort. Thirteen men guarding the stores on Harkers Island repulsed British troops in a brief battle on April 6, 1782. Ebenezer, James, and Zachariah Harker died in 1803, 1814, and 1824, respectively.

Harkers Island remained sparsely populated until the latter part of the nineteenth century. The island saw no direct military conflict in the United States Civil War; however, Union warships anchored near the island to control access to Bogue Sound and Core Sound during the Battle of Fort Macon. The beseiged Confederate garrison at Fort Macon surrendered on April 26, 1862. Harkers Island and the surrounding area remained under Union control for the duration of the war. The few, if any, descendants of the Harker slaves still living on the island likely left soon after emancipation. The vast majority of slaves in the coastal societies of Carteret County either emmigrated to other parts of the state, or moved into separate communities, such as Davis Ridge, the North River community, and Craven Corner.

In 1864, the first school on the island was established when Miss Jenny Bell came to Harkers Island from Boston, sponsored by the Northern Methodist Episcopal Church. A fish oil factory was built on the island in 1865 and remained operational until 1873. A small milling facility was built on the west end of the island in 1870 by Louie Larson, an immigrant from Norway, but it closed before the turn of the century. Most island residents continued to earn a subsistence living from boat building or fishing.

The Hurricane of 1899

Harkers Island saw an influx of new residents after hurricanes in 1896 and 1899 devastated the communities established on the nearby Core Banks and Shackleford Banks. Mostly fishermen and whalers, the people of the Outer Banks began openly debating the merits of moving after the Hurricane of 1896. Although some moved to more sheltered locations on the coast, most remained until 1899 when disaster struck again. The 700 person town of Diamond City was completely abandoned after the Hurricane of 1899 devastated the community on August 17. Many families used boats to move what was left of their houses, plank by plank, from the Outer Banks to Harkers Island where they could rebuild. In the five years between 1895 and 1900, the population of Harkers Island expanded fourfold from just 13 families to over 1,000 residents.

Elders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints targeted Harkers Island for recruitment efforts after the hurricanes. Many of the refugees from Diamond City, uprooted physically and emotionally by the devastating hurricanes, converted to the Latter Day Saints, and soon outnumbered the members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, which had been founded on the island in 1875. A national wave of anti-Mormon sentiment was sparked by the Smoot Hearings in 1904, fueling fears that Mormons secretly continued to practice polygamy. The relationship between the Mormons on Harkers Island and their neighbors deteriorated. Rocks and oyster shells were hurled through the windows of the Mormon church and at least one gunshot was fired into the church. In 1906, the church was burnt to the ground, and Mormon religious services would not resume on Harkers Island until 1909. A new Mormon church was built on the island in the 1930s.

With the influx of new residents from the Outer Banks, a post office was opened in 1904. The first public road to extend the length of the island, Island Drive, was built in 1926 when a footpath was widened and paved with oyster shells. The road connected to the mainland by a ferry service until the first wooden bridge was built in 1941. Electrification came to the island only in 1939. Harkers Island Rural Electric Authority was the first electrical cooperative in the United States to supply power to members through a submarine cable system. Telephone service arrived in 1948, and Wachovia opened the island's first bank in 1972.

Geography

Location of Harkers Island, North Carolina

Harkers Island is located at 34°41′40″N 76°33′19″W (34.694503, -76.555383)Template:GR. According to the United States Census Bureau, the CDP has a total area of 10.0 km² (3.8 mi²). 6.6 km² (2.5 mi²) of it is land and 3.4 km² (1.3 mi²) of it (33.77%) is water. At its highest point, the island is 6 feet (2 m) above mean sea level.

Harkers Island is protected from the Atlantic Ocean by the barrier islands of the Shackleford Banks to the south and the Core Banks to the east. The body of water directly south of the island is Back Sound. To the east is Core Sound, to the north is The Straits, and to the northeast is the mouth of the North River. The Straits are shallow but naviagble by those with local experience. There are two small bays on the north side of the island, Westmouth Bay and Eastmouth Bay. North of Eastmouth Bay is Browns Island, which is accessible only by boat. Harkers Island Road, designated as County Road 1335, connects the island to the mainland by a steel bridge known as Harkers Island Bridge.

Government and Services

Harkers Island is unincorporated and receives most public services, including law enforcement and public education, from Carteret County. Law enforcement on the island is provided by the Carteret County Sherrifs Department. The only public school on the island, Harkers Island Elementary, educates students from kindergarten through eighth grade, and is operated by Carteret County Public Schools. There are no hospitals on Harkers Island. The local newspaper is the Carteret County News-Times, published in Morehead City. Electric service and drinking water are both provided by the Harkers Island Electric Membership Corporation, a cooperative operating as both a Rural Electrical Authority and the manager of the water system for the Harkers Island Sanitary District since 1969.

Economy

Major indutries on the island include fishing, boatbuilding, tourism, and (more recently) waterfowl decoy carving. In 2003, the United States Census Bureau reported 33 business establishments on Harkers Island employing 169 people. A majority of the business fall into either Retail and Food Services (13) or Construction, Manufacturing, and Warehousing (11). The businesses in the latter category are almost entirely associated with boat building, boat repair, and boat storage. Many island residents are self-employed in the fishing trade. A relatively large percentage of island residents are over the age of 65 and/or retired.

Tourism on Harkers Island is becoming a more important part of the local economy. The United States National Park Service operates the Cape Lookout National Seashore Visitors Center on Harkers Island. Ferry service from Harkers Island is one of the principal means of tourist access to Cape Lookout and the Shackleford Banks. The Core Sound Waterfowl Museum is another major tourist attraction, as are private boating and fishing tours of the sounds. Despite growth in the tourist trades, Harkers Island continues to have some the least developed tourist facilities on the Crystal Coast.

Demographics

As of the censusTemplate:GR of 2000, there were 1,525 people, 661 households, and 497 families residing in the CDP. The population density was 230.9/km² (598.4/mi²). There were 1,109 housing units at an average density of 167.9/km² (435.2/mi²). The racial makeup of the CDP was 98.56% White, 0.33% Native American, 0.20% Asian, 0.07% from other races, and 0.85% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.13% of the population.

There were 661 households out of which 21.6% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 67.9% were married couples living together, 5.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 24.7% were non-families. 21.3% of all households were made up of individuals and 9.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.30 and the average family size was 2.65.

In the CDP the population was spread out with 15.3% under the age of 18, 6.2% from 18 to 24, 21.6% from 25 to 44, 35.1% from 45 to 64, and 21.8% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 49 years. For every 100 females there were 94.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 95.6 males.

The median income for a household in the CDP was $33,125, and the median income for a family was $35,492. Males had a median income of $37,375 versus $18,913 for females. The per capita income for the CDP was $19,790. About 13.6% of families and 15.5% of the population were below the poverty line, including 18.8% of those under age 18 and 19.1% of those age 65 or over.

Local Dialect

With a long history of physical and economic remoteness from mainland North Carolina, residents of Harkers Island and other Outer Banks islands have developed a distinct dialect which can be traced back to Old Elizabethan English. "High Tide" spoken in Harkers Island English might sound like "Hoi Toide". As many as 500 islanders on Harkers Island are directly descended from the Harkers Island and Outer Banks settlers that developed this distinct dialect. Linguists from North Carolina State University, East Carolina University, and other academic institutions continue to conduct research on the island dialect.

Religion

In 2006, Harkers Island has at least seven Christian churches. Established churches and religious organizations on Harkers Island include the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Grace Holiness Parsonage, Harkers Island Pentecostal Holiness Church, Harkers Island United Methodist Church, Huggins Memorial Baptist Church Parsonage, the Lighthouse Chapel (non-denominational), and the Refuge Fellowship Church (non-denominational). There are no non-Christian religious organizations with established facilities or regular programs of worship on Harkers Island.

References

Cited References

General References

• Hancock, Joel G. (1998). Strengthened by the Storm: The Coming of the Mormons to Harkers Island, N.C., 1897-1909. Campbell & Campbell, December, 1998.
• Prioli, Carmine and Martin, Edwin (1998). Hope for a Good Season: The Ca'e Bankers of Harkers Island. John F. Blair Publisher, July , 1998.

External links

• Core Sound Decoy Carvers Guild