Frazier Peele

Several days ago I posted a photo of Frazier Peele's mid-1950s wooden ferry. Shortly afterwards I located today's picture in a box of papers and documents. I copied it from an original photo that I found in the Ocracoke Preservation Society's collection.

This is Frazier at the tiller of his earlier ferry, a wooden boat with planks nailed across the gunwales to serve as a vehicle deck.

(Click on photo and follow directions on the right to view a larger, better quality image.)

Some of our readers may have heard me share the story of crossing Hatteras Inlet with my parents in 1950. I was just six years old, and the entire experience made quite an impression! Even though I remembered two skiffs lashed together, and no railing (I see now that there was only one boat, and there were very basic low railings on the sides), I know there was no ramp. Two sturdy planks were simply spaced the proper distance apart, and the driver slowly and cautiously maneuvered his vehicle onto the tiny deck.

Our latest Ocracoke Newsletter is a 1921 letter written by a former slave, Harrison Williams, to Ocracoke native, Martha Ann Howard Wahab. You can read it here: http://www.villagecraftsmen.com/news112113.htm.