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Title
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Oral History Interview with Connie Mason 2026
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Description
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Connie Mason, president of the Friends of Portsmouth Island, shared her journey from East Carolina University to becoming a park ranger at Cape Lookout National Seashore in 1980. She detailed her role in creating interpretive programs and organizing oral histories. Mason highlighted the Friends of Portsmouth Island's efforts, including raising $50,000 for park projects and maintaining historical sites. She discussed the challenges posed by climate change, such as king tides flooding more of the island every year. Mason emphasized the importance of community support and the historical significance of Portsmouth Island as one of the first and one of the largest settlements on the Outer Banks.
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Contributor
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Otter.AI
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Date
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April 13, 2026.
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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History Museum of Carteret County
East Carolina University
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Subject
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Portsmouth Island
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interviewer
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Cooper McBrayer
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interviewee
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Connie Mason
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Location
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History Museum of Carteret County
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Transcription
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Cooper McBrayer 00:01
Okay. Today's date is April the 13th of 2026, this is Cooper McBrayer, ECU graduate student, interviewing Connie Mason, president of the Friends of Portsmouth Island organization. This interview is part of Cooper's capstone project. Hello, Miss Mason.
Connie Mason 00:22
Hi Cooper. Thank you for inviting me here today.
Cooper McBrayer 00:25
Of course, of course. This is my, this is my pleasure, and I'm really glad that I get to do this. This is my first real historical undertaking, I would guess.
Connie Mason 00:34
Oh, really, congratulations. I hope I don't disappoint.
Cooper McBrayer 00:38
I doubt, I doubt it. So I guess let's, let's begin with you telling me a little bit about yourself, your family, how you got to the area, all that kind of stuff.
Connie Mason 00:50
Well, I was born in in the old hospital here in Morehead, and my mother was Edna Williams Mason. And the Williams family had a big farm out at Crab Point, and so that's where I've lived almost all my life. But my father was from Stacy, North Carolina, which is in Down East, North Carolina. And I had always heard of Portsmouth from my father, because he was a hunter, and he liked to go hunting over there. But I went to East Carolina University.
Cooper McBrayer 01:24
Oh, really?
Connie Mason 01:24
Yes, I did.
Cooper McBrayer 01:25
Oh, fantastic.
Connie Mason 01:26
Yes. In fact, my freshman year, they still didn't allow freshmen to have cars on the-
Cooper McBrayer 01:32
Really?
Connie Mason 01:33
Oh yes, yes. Talk about a fit. And you couldn't have cars on campus or anywhere near. And we had to walk. We had to buy our groceries. My first year I was in Jarvis Hall, and we had to walk to Overton's, which is about three blocks away, carrying groceries. Oh, God. But anyway, I enjoyed East Carolina, and it was in, I'm glad I went to school there, after I got out of there, and I got a degree, a BS degree in Art Education, and I took a part time job with my sister in a daycare center. But I went to First Baptist Church in in Morehead, and one of the ladies there, her name is Catherine Walsh, and she came up to me one day and said, they are asking for rangers to apply at Cape Lookout, National Seashore. And it was funny, because, you know, when you're in high school, they-, you fill out all these things about, you know, what you would be good at doing. Mine was a park ranger, and at that time, Cape Lookout wasn't even a thought, you know. And so, you know, I was thinking, okay, yeah, park ranger. Okay, so anyway, but so I went and applied for this job. Now you have to understand, this is 1980 or 79, the park was hated. Yes, the park was hated because they were having to get the land of off of Shackleford and Core Banks and people, people were burning down buildings. They were threatening Rangers, you know, and so I went to, to this with wide eyes, wide open, because I knew how they felt about it, but they also wanted me to sing and talk and and paint interpretive signs for Portsmouth Island and for Cape Lookout. And so I've always said that they asked me to to be part of this interpretive team because I was a local person and they might not shoot me, is when I first came in the yard.
Cooper McBrayer 04:07
Friendly face?
Connie Mason 04:07
Yeah, yeah, and they might trust me. So anyhow, my my class of interpretive rangers in the 1980s was the last class to get four weeks of training.
Cooper McBrayer 04:28
Four weeks?
Connie Mason 04:30
Four weeks. Safety, use of the vehicles, driving the boats. I mean, you know-
Cooper McBrayer 04:38
Was that on the job, or was that-
Connie Mason 04:40
That was on the job.
Cooper McBrayer 04:41
Okay.
Connie Mason 04:41
And it was one of those things where Bruce Weber was my first supervisor, and we went through all these things, you know, and then went through these psychological tests, I guess, where you would, you know, you would test the, uh, group, if you trust the group, you'll fall back and let them catch you.
Cooper McBrayer 05:04
I gotcha.
Connie Mason 05:05
At my size. I didn't trust anybody to catch, so I wasn't good at that. But um, so anyway, I learned a lot, and in my first, in my first interpretive team was Wayne Martin, who graduated from, I think it was, Chapel Hill, with a degree in folklore. And he, years later, became the head of the North Carolina folklore in North Carolina. But it was his, you know, because I was doing music and doing programs talking about, and this is what they said to me, "Connie, we want you to talk about the culture of Carteret County in eastern North Carolina." Well, to me at that time, culture meant holding your pinky up while you sipped your tea, you know. And I, you know. But anyway, he is the one who taught me about folklore, and we're gonna look it up, you know, the brown collection and, and, and expose me to the people that he was finding in the community that did traditional music and things. And so Wayne Martin was a very good influence on me and and his wife, Margaret, was a volunteer. And they did musical programs. We did musical programs out on the waterfront in Beaufort. And we have, you know, 300 people there at night, you know, listening to our programs and, but a lot of times, I was locked away painting signs for Portsmouth and the Cape and, but I became good friends with Mr. Riddle, who was the superintendent at that time, and he saw the advantage of me being there to talk to people. And I was, I was good at my programs, you know, talking to the public about things and, and he got me at that point, there was no, there was a hiring freeze, okay, and so, but he could get me on for 180 day appointments, like being a school teacher.
Cooper McBrayer 07:38
Okay.
Connie Mason 07:39
You know, with with having the winter off, and so I would work in the the visitor center was first located on Front Street in Beaufort, and then it was moved to Harkers Island. And it was not in the building, the building that it's, that was in in the 82 is no longer there. It's called the Scott building, and we had a little Visitor Center under there. We had file cabinets and and the oral histories that other people in the park had done, and I was organizing them and organizing photographs as part of my, my job, and I was always so worried about losing the information, because we were right there at the end Harkers Island, about hurricanes, about-
Cooper McBrayer 08:35
Oh yeah.
Connie Mason 08:36
About things getting lost and things getting destroyed. So he rented me a micro, microfilm machine, and I micro filmed everything that we had at that time. It took me quite a while, but, but I got it done, and we got nine copies, I think is some went to, some went to Manteo or or Hatteras. And then some are here on Harkers Island somewhere. And I don't know if they're in Raleigh, but anyway, they're around. There's nine microfilms and they're indexed. So I felt like that was a good accomplishment that I made. Also, when I was working there, I was not permanent. I was, you know, 100 day appointment, 180 day appointments. But my the fellow that was the lowest man in the totem pole in my division, interpretive division, they sent him to oral history school, okay? And Collections Management School.
Cooper McBrayer 09:50
Okay.
Connie Mason 09:51
He hated it, so when he came back, he gave me the book and all the stuff that went with it, and I ate it up like a. You know, because, because we, because I was looking after the collection too. And so I got my training from the park service in the management of collections and oral histories. But while I was doing that, you know, I was talking to my new my next new boss was Bob Patton, who was a great guy to work for, and he wanted me to do some history interviews. Okay? And so at first, you know, I was timid about it, because I didn't know how they would accept me. You know, to talk because it's a it's a very delicate thing to talk to people about their personal lives and how they lived. And you know, what we think might be quirky is something they had to do to survive. And so one of the people that, when the visitor center for the park was in, on the Front Street in Beaufort, two ladies came by. It was Clara Salter Gaskins and and Marion Gray Babb. And they were, you know, they come in and talk to Mr. Riddle. Mr. Riddle was so good to them, you know, he made sure the flowers got there in the village every Christmas and Mother's Day and whatever. He made sure that the flowers got there. They bought the flowers and and they came. But they also had Marian Gray, had her house. She had, at that time they were doing lifetime leases, and so when she died, it would become Park Service property, but anyway, Marion, Marion was a wonderful person, and we would talk, and we would go out to lunch with Clara, and we became good friends. And it was because of that friendship with with them that I got to meet a lot of the older folks that were from Portsmouth.
Cooper McBrayer 12:30
They were some, they were kind of your gateway into there.
Connie Mason 12:32
They were actually my gateway into the personal world, you know, and, and they had done oral histories before with some of the other park people and, and I had listened to them, but, I mean, Marion even traveled with me and went to, we went to Hatteras to to interview this, this gentleman who had one of the best stories of Portsmouth about the hospital, and I'll tell it to you.
Cooper McBrayer 13:09
Okay, sounds great.
Connie Mason 13:11
The Marine Hospital had this gentleman, we'll just call him Julian. Julian was sick and dying in the hospital, and this fellow came to visit him, and he said, "Julian, is there's anything I can do for you? Please, please tell me." And he whispered, in a faint, weak voice, "When I die, I want you to carve seven Ds in my casket." Well, a fellow said, "What in the world? Why? What?" He says, "Carve 7 Ds in my casket." He said, "Okay, I'll do that for you, Julian, but what does it stand for?" He says, "Dear Devil, Do Decently Damn Doctor Dudley." And Dr. Dudley was the doctor taken care of, and he was a very good doctor, and said they said that his, that the legend was that he got his, his his medical license from Montgomery Ward. But anyway, but he told that story, and that's one of my favorite stories of Portsmouth, but it's because Marion knew him and knew where he lived. And you know, we got to do that. And so it was. It was great. We tried to go beyond Carteret County, you know people who moved away and, and like Miss Mary Dixon was the last school marm, you know, at Portsmouth, and she was living in South Carolina or Georgia. I can't remember which now, but I got to go down there and talk to her.
Cooper McBrayer 14:56
I've actually listened to those, at least a few of those interviews.
Connie Mason 15:00
Yeah, and she, she was, she was a pistol. And so I felt lucky that I got to meet her. And so we tried to go and get the full picture that we could possibly do. So I worked at Cape Lookout from 1980 to 88 and in 1988 because of my park service training and collections management, the collections manager at the North Carolina Maritime Museum was leaving, and he recommended me for the job. So I got that job, and I stayed there 18 years with the North Carolina Maritime Museum. And the only reason why I left it was they were opening up a new division of people in the Division of Travel and Tourism called Maritime History Officers, and they were going to be stationed in different places along the coast. And I was the maritime history officer for the mid coastal counties, and so I was supposed to do a lot of traveling and talking to people, and I did, and I enjoyed that quite a bit, but unfortunately, it was when the budget and finances of the state of North Carolina went to a recession, and eventually they closed down the whole division, and that's when I decided, because when, when you, when that happens to you, they will offer you another job, but if you don't take it, you lose your retirement and your health benefits. Everything is gone.
Cooper McBrayer 16:57
Goodness.
Connie Mason 16:58
That's right. So I had put in 18 years. So I retired early, because I was, because my mother was, wasn't, was not well and, and I live beside her, and so I did not want to move, I, you know, so that's what I did. And I retired, and I got a job. I got several jobs. My mother would say, "Connie can't keep a job." But anyway, I worked at the, at Cherry Point, at the library for three or four years, and then Core Sound Waterfowl Museum on Harkers Island had two or three grants, and so I worked those grants. I was their archivist, and I worked in their archives and helped them with some of their museum documents, like museum collections, policies and stuff like that, and which was a joy to do, because I, I, I love the museum, and I love what it stands for. And, but after, you know, then they started getting into, you know, more computer things. And, you know, they had to get an expert in that know how to get things online and stuff like that. And so my, my time was, was cut short because I, you know, I didn't have that expertise, not that I didn't want it, but it's hard to teach old dogs new tricks. So anyway, I went from there to, I was- became the children's librarian at the Webbs Library in Morehead and and then left, left there again because of Covid.
Cooper McBrayer 18:57
Oh, okay.
Connie Mason 18:58
And then they had another grant at, Core Sound Museum. Even though the museum was closed, I could come to work because I was in a little room, you know, by myself.
Cooper McBrayer 19:10
Yeah, nice.
Connie Mason 19:10
And I could work through Covid. And that was a blessing to tell you. And, and then after, after that was up. I, I didn't want to quit going down to Harkers Island, because that's the most wonderful ride, especially everybody's going the opposite way to Cherry Point. When I'm going down to Harkers Island, and you know, I would pass some over 300 cars coming, coming from Down East to go to Cherry Point and Beaufort and so. But let's see, I skipped over the starting of Friends of Portsmouth Island. I had just gotten my job at the Maritime Museum, and we were real concerned about what was happening on Portsmouth. And Jack Goodwin, who made this library what it is, he worked at the Smithsonian for years and years and years. It was Jack Goodwin, Frances Eubanks, who was a, her family was from Portsmouth. Karen Amspacher, who is the director of the Core Museum now, and myself, we wanted to get a friends group together, because you needed that. It was a political thing, you know, pressure and getting, getting people together to make sure things get done.
Cooper McBrayer 20:54
Being able to organize people together?
Connie Mason 20:56
That's right. So at the time, it was under the umbrella of the Core- of this museum, and Kay, can't remember her last name. Now, Kay didn't care. She, she said, "If you want to do it, yeah, go ahead." And Jack was on the board of directors at that time, and so he helped convince Kay that we could do it separately and, and so with Frances, we wanted Frances to be the director of this group because she had family ties to Portsmouth, but she didn't want to because she didn't know what we were getting into, you know, but she was also an accountant, and so I kind of default, got the job of President and at that time and but she did the getting the nonprofit status for us. She did all the bookkeeping for that which, you know, I wouldn't want to do, my both my parents were bookkeepers, but I didn't want any part of that, and so she got that done. And we started, I, I wrote, I named the first newsletter, Doctor's Creek Journal. I made the logo for the institution, the church. And I wrote the first one. And I was gathering, you know, as the editor for the first, first, it was Doctor's Creek Journal. And was doing it at night on my own, and taking the pictures for it. And, I mean, you know, it was kind of a one man band kind of thing. And but then, you know, it grew and grew and grew and more and more people got, you know, interested in and I gotten into other things. And so it was in good hands. There was people from Ocracoke like Ellen Marie Cloud and Chester Lynn and Rudy Austin and, and many, many people who, you know, cared for the village and, and so it was in good hands, but, you know, so I kept in touch, and I was still a member. I was a lifetime member, but um, I just found out today I was on my Facebook page that in the 40s, they were going to do detonations of A-bombs off of Portsmouth.
Cooper McBrayer 23:47
Right out there in the Atlantic?
Connie Mason 23:49
Right out there in the Atlantic. And they were going to, to really just completely, this was before Hatteras was a park, and they named a senator that made it not happen, and it went to the Pacific, you know. But can you imagine what that would have done? I mean, the whole tourism industry would be gone from here, you know? I don't, I don't know.
Cooper McBrayer 24:15
Gone, probably would have needed to be pretty, a pretty extensive cleanup operation to get it anywhere back, local ecosystem damage.
Connie Mason 24:24
Oh, it was, it was going to be horrible. And the the aquarium has put out a brochure about it. So you might want to get a hold of them and get a hold of that brochure, because they had posted it. I had seen it, you know, and that, that was, that was news to me. I had never heard that, and I don't think any, any of the people I ever interviewed didn't know about that. Now, they knew about World War Two and how, you know, they would watch the boats burn off the coast and everything. And I. Uh, so that wasn't new to them, but, um, that was new to me. I mean, I was shocked. I was shocked. We didn't think that.
Cooper McBrayer 25:10
That's a-
Connie Mason 25:11
And it was called Operation Nutmeg. Operation Nutmeg, so I don't know what what that meant nutmeg, except it was gonna kill us. But um, so anyway, the Park Service actually, in the 1980s they were the first ones having Homecoming. Homecoming was a park service event, and it became too expensive for them to run, and so that's when the, we thought that would be one of our main events would be Portsmouth Homecoming, and it really took off, and people loved it, and it is really a religious experience. I mean, people just coming together and talking about family. And of course, there's not a lot of original members now, but the families of the ancestors of these people are so proud that their ancestors came from Portsmouth. And so one of the things that we're doing this, what we were going to do this year, it'll probably, probably be done next Homecoming was one of the homes was going to be used as a family center, and we were going, and Sally Williford was in charge of collecting the information of the families and getting them written down. And they were big sheets of metal so that they wouldn't rust or become damaged by humidity. And they were all going to hang around this inside this house, there'll be a family center, and there was going to be a shelf under each plaque, and it would have books and other other readings, you know, that you might want to look up, and that type of thing. So it was going to be a very interesting project. And, and, and the Friends of Portsmouth paid for at least 15 of those right now, but there'll be more to come. I'm sure. Could I bother you for some water?
Cooper McBrayer 27:49
Oh, yeah, of course. Course, have some, mine, if you don't mind.
Connie Mason 27:54
Oh, I don't, but I don't want to give you.
Cooper McBrayer 27:56
I'm gonna wash that anyways, I've been using that. I've been using that one for a minute.
Connie Mason 28:02
Thank you.
Cooper McBrayer 28:02
Of course.
Connie Mason 28:07
So with the, with the park, they spent, they have spent millions of dollars, you know. But climate change, which you're not you can't even say that phrase in the Park Service. No, they have it's illegal. Climate change is illegal to say anything about it. But climate change has hurt Portsmouth more than anything the, and with king tides, we had to move our our traditional place of having Homecoming in front of the church, because it was a low lying place, and we had to move it up closer to the Lifesaving Station where there's higher ground, because it was just too wet, just too wet, and, and these king tides that we've been having, it cuts off. You know, there's the Haulover Dock, which is the main dock into Portsmouth for the public. Well, the dock got hurt in one of the hurricanes, Dorian.
Cooper McBrayer 29:25
Dorian hurt it?
Connie Mason 29:27
Tore it up. I mean, you know, it was sinking, and this that the other and and the former superintendent had told me they had gotten, they went from a wooden dock to a Hog Slat dock, which is cement with rebarb in it. And he told me, he told me, he said, "This is going to have to be replaced in a couple years because the salt has gotten to the rebar, and it is rusting." So, so, but it wasn't supposed to be anywhere close to now that it was going to have problems. So anyway, after Dorian, the, and then with the political climate that they weren't allowed to hire people, the seasonal people, it was hurting. You know, the people that would come and work out at the Cape and at Portsmouth were very limited and limited in funds and with, with the short time we had, you know, we were very concerned, because we did not think, I mean, we did not want to be responsible for these old people getting on a dock and falling down and getting hurt.
Cooper McBrayer 30:54
Yeah, recipe for the disaster.
Connie Mason 30:55
Yeah, recipe for disaster. And we didn't know if it could be fixed. Okay. Well, I just learned last week that an engineer went out there and they did do something to the dock, and that it was safe. Now, okay, so that was one thing that was cleared away. But, you know, the 24th of April was Homecoming, so we had already canceled it because there were no modes of transportation on the island. There were no gators available, and we used gators to get from the dock, take all the things that people were bringing, the food, you know, because it was a covered dish, and and older people and chairs and things, and we used gators to move people and to move things around. And it's, it's too long a walk for most people. And so they reassured me the Park did, "We've ordered new gators." But they haven't come yet. We could not take a chance.
Cooper McBrayer 32:04
Yeah.
Connie Mason 32:06
And we had a deadline that we had to cancel the order for the chairs and the tables and the tent. So we we did all that and the board of directors. I mean, I mean, it was like, suicidal. We didn't want to do it. But, you know, because there are older people Cooper, who, you know, who came and told me, they said, "This was going to probably be my last homecoming." And I'm going, "I'm so sorry." So anyway, we're going to try and do a spring spring meeting in May in Ocracoke. My hope is that if they really want to go over to see Portsmouth, maybe they can get, you know, get Donald, who runs the ferry over there to take them. And I don't know if they'll be able to get out or not, or walk around or anything, but they can do that themselves, under their own liability. But we will have a meeting and, and, and have a covered dish over there on Ocracoke and I'm supposed to do that tomorrow. I'm supposed to go look.
Cooper McBrayer 33:20
Gotcha.
Connie Mason 33:20
See what we can. We can figure out. But, um, so I lead the singing in a, you know, every Homecoming we have singing in the church, hymn singing and is really a wonderful religious and special experience, because, I mean, we, Chester from Ocracoke has through the years before he got so handicapped with moving around. He would put a Christmas tree in there. He would decorate. Now, Gregory Gilgo has has taken up the cause he every Christmas he puts, you might have seen it in our state magazine.
Cooper McBrayer 34:17
Think I might have.
Connie Mason 34:18
He, you know, he makes sure that the graves and the houses get wreaths and, and everything. So, I mean, we've got some great people who really care about the village and, and, and, and the park. There are people like he's retired now, but Dave From, he cut the grass in, in Portsmouth, and he made sure everything was tidy and everything was good and, and so there was a lot of people who, who helped resurrect Portsmouth, I guess is a good way to say it. And so. Uh, question number two!
Cooper McBrayer 35:03
Well, that was, that was fantastic. That answered quite a few.
Connie Mason 35:06
Okay, good.
Cooper McBrayer 35:08
So in your time working with the Friends of Portsmouth Island with the National Park Service, are there any individuals or groups who you think have been your greatest helpers to kind of keep the history alive?
Connie Mason 35:26
Yes, and I'm trying to think some of the superintendents have been excellent. Like to name two, Bob Vogel and, and Jeff West, who just retired, they were princes among men, and they really helped the communities fall in love with the park again, you know, to see what it is really all about. And those two gentlemen, they had, they had the respect of the regional offices and things. And so that helped us a lot. And East Carolina University has been helpful. And the state, they use Portsmouth for research into different things. And so they've held workshops for us to to to talk about monies and what might happen in the future with devastating things like flooding and houses and things, and what we think we could save in the future, and what, what's going to happen, you know, and so all the universities, Duke and, and everybody, they have been very, very supportive of what's going on in Portsmouth. And anytime we've, we've asked for help, they've not given it.
Cooper McBrayer 37:01
So Gotcha. Great, great. That's great to hear that there's still quite a, quite a few organizations that are willing to put the care forward.
Connie Mason 37:11
Absolutely.
Cooper McBrayer 37:13
So you've been part of keeping the history of Portsmouth alive for quite a while in various different capacities. Do you see your work being taken kind of, your, what you've been doing, the type of things you've been doing, being taken up by anybody new who's coming in? Or have you been noticing more, more people of the younger generation wanting to get into this history and wanting to kind of dive into it?
Connie Mason 37:46
There, there, well, there's you.
Cooper McBrayer 37:48
Well, yeah.
Connie Mason 37:51
And I cannot remember her name, but there's a lady who's working in the slave, working with the slavery information, and, and she is, I cannot remember her name. Oh my gosh, it's been so long since I've seen her. But anyway, she's working a lot in, in the slave trade and, and Portsmouth as one of the places to drop off slaves. And let's see. You know, a lot of the not elementary school teachers, but the intermediate teachers, they try to get their students into what their history is, you know. And because they were like me, you know, what is culture? Is it holding your finger up a glass of cup of tea? But finding out how what makes us special in the world and, and that happens everywhere. I mean, you know, culture is everywhere. And, I think that helps our worldview, it helps our politics, it helps our outlook on life, and it also helps us treasure what we have. And of course, we are documenting right now, a lot of changes with climate change and the ghost forests and rising sea level and the states of preservation. You know that some of the houses at Portsmouth now are just shells. They had to do that because the, the floors, you know, if the water came up to the window sills, you know, all they could do is keep the you know, take the floors out, let it flood, and then keep the shell, so that the historic scene would stay the same. Now, something that Jeff West was doing, he had a company come in, and they were doing, is it LIDAR?
Cooper McBrayer 40:10
I think, yes, LIDAR. I think.
Connie Mason 40:12
They were doing LIDAR of all the buildings and stuff as they stood now, and we're going to make a three dimensional tour. And I don't know where that stands now, because he's not the director now, and things have changed since then, so, but we're always trying to think of ways to keep in touch with what Portsmouth was and is, you know, I've been working on a book for like, 15 years now, and other people write a book, and they get it done, and it puts, and somebody says, "Well, don't, don't you hate that?" I said, "No," every book about Portsmouth is different, and it's good, and it keeps it in the public eye, and, that's what I love about it. And so everybody who wants to write a book about Portsmouth, please have at it, because that's what keeps it alive. And we had, we had the preservation people come and give a talk at our September meeting. And that was very good. And they were talking about ways of preserving the buildings and things like that. And and our our membership got really excited about, they said, "We want to, we want to take classes. We want to help," you know, because we do have David Brown, my vice president, is so good with getting work groups up and, and work teams up, and they'll go over and, and do things that the Park Service doesn't have time for, you know, but under their supervision. So, so that's another way that the Friends of Portsmouth helps. Two years ago, we gave the Park Service $50,000 yeah, and to help with the work. So-
Cooper McBrayer 42:20
Was that, like, fundraising type of thing you did? Or did you-
Connie Mason 42:24
Yeah, we, it was from our membership dues and fundraising and and donations, you know, and, and we gave them $50,000 free and clear. And so that's what we're trying to do, is support them in their efforts, and hopefully, and hopefully they are supporting us in our efforts. You know, with the allowing us to go in there and do some work and under supervision and that type of thing. And I, they were trying so hard to, to get it so we could have Homecoming this year. I mean, Catherine Cushinberry, who is the temporary director at this point, she, she was doing everything in her power. But there's some things you just couldn't, you know, like finances. You just couldn't, you just couldn't say we're going to get these when you know and but she did tell me week before last that the Haulover is fixed, so I might even go over there tomorrow, I don't know. But they also told me that these king tides, you know you can, you're supposed to be able to walk from Haulover to the visitor center, the Salter Dixon house, and then go into the heart of the village. From there that, that between the Haulover and the visitor center, chest high water.
Cooper McBrayer 44:02
Goodness.
Connie Mason 44:04
Chest high water. You could even wear chest waders and get through there.
Cooper McBrayer 44:09
And that's a newer development?
Connie Mason 44:11
Yes, a newer development. Newer, newer, newer. And I was just shocked. But you know, so there's a lot going on. So the directors are really a good people, good group of people. And it's surprising a lot of people on the board of directors are not from here.
Cooper McBrayer 44:39
Really?
Connie Mason 44:40
You know, they got ancestors who lived here, and they're living in Virginia now, and Maine and Massachusetts and, and all over the country. And that, that's helpful, too, you know, to keep to spread it out and, and I'm hoping, if we can get a place to have a meeting in May in, in Ocracoke, you know, we usually get a good speaker to come in. I'm hoping to get a speaker from the Outer Banks History Center in Manteo to come down. That would be the easiest thing for them is to come down and come speak to us about what they have. And you know that kind of thing just to, because a lot of people are doing their ancestry work. If you go online, have you been online and seen the Friends of Portsmouth Island website?
Cooper McBrayer 45:37
I have actually, you're okay, so in with my, my capstone project is going to be kind of public domain website, and part of it is, I have a page that's talking about the Friends of Portsmouth, and it's lot of information that you guys have on your website, and I link you all that through. So I've, I've looked through the website a little bit.
Connie Mason 46:02
Oh, and then the other thing that we do, and try to get a young people involved, is a scholarship. We have a scholarship for $1,000 for for anybody who's starting college. And that's pretty good, and that comes from donations. And we've got, we've got our $1,000 for this year's, but you know, we always have to keep telling people to donate, to donate to the, its called the Richard Meisner scholarship program. Richard was a former president of, he worked for the park, and then he became former president of the Friends of Portsmouth, and was there. And he was good friends with Lee Dominic, who was Marion's sister, Marian Gray's sister. She was a Babb and so he was real joint at the hip with, with them and going over to Portsmouth and, and Jesse Lee, she, she spent her last birthday over on Portsmouth. They had a birthday party for her over there on Portsmouth, and when she came home, she went to get her hair done, and was in a car wreck and kept killed. I mean that, you know, and I did an oral history tape with Frances about the party, about her last birthday party, and I thought that was important to get that perspective. But anyway, next question!
Cooper McBrayer 47:55
Well, I've only got a couple of more here, because we've, you've been doing a great job of predicting what I was going to ask and going ahead and getting to it. So how, if you could talk to the, you know, imagine this is a message that we're putting out on the news. If you could ask the, if you could tell the public, "Hey, here's how we can help keep Portsmouth alive. Here's how, what you can do, what the average person can do to help. Here's programs that we're offering. Here's what you can do to try and keep a local history point from disappearing." What would you-
Connie Mason 48:36
I think joining the Friends group so they can get the newsletter, so they can find out what's happening, to find out, and we tell what needs we have in there.
Cooper McBrayer 48:53
Gotcha.
Connie Mason 48:58
And volunteers. I mean, Ed, no, Emily and Tom, Sumi are volunteers that they go over there and greet the people that come visit. And they haven't been able to stay over there, because where they stay, is the, what is called the summer kitchen, and it was run on solar power, with air conditioner and, you know, because you got to get out of mosquitoes somehow.
Cooper McBrayer 49:33
Yeah.
Connie Mason 49:34
And they keep an eye on everything. And so they're, they'll be coming, I think, in June. But we just got the, just got the summer kitchen back online, because the Park Service couldn't get anybody to work on and they wouldn't let us do anything. So I don't know what that what the deal was, but. We can't let that happen anymore. But, um, if people like to go over to Ocracoke, then going to, I mean, that's the next step back in time is to go back to Portsmouth and, and read up on that and, and it's the last village, except for Cape Lookout Village, which they're working on that now, they're trying to make it so that they can, you can rent one of the homes and stay-
Cooper McBrayer 50:41
Really?
Connie Mason 50:42
-in Cape Lookout. And that, at one time, might have been a way that Portsmouth could do, but now, with the king tides and the difficulties that are up there now it's, I don't think that's very likely, but you know, and Dorian cut off a lot of the visitors that we did have that were on the, on that, they were on North Core Banks, but there was a deep ditch cut through, all the way through the island, and you couldn't get a vehicle through, you know. And we've got the, the Portsmouth Island Fishing Group, and they're always supportive, you know. But now that they can't get to the island, to the village. You know, they kind of feel left out, but they're very important to us. Because going out to Cape Lookout, I mean, going out to Portsmouth and going across the flats to the ocean, you know that and Ocracoke beach are the two places that the most Scotch Bonnet shells can be found, and that's the state shell.
Cooper McBrayer 52:08
Oh, yeah.
Connie Mason 52:09
So you know that's important. Our our seashell clubs like to go over there for that reason. And fishing is great. Hunting is great, clamming is good. Henry Piggott, we sold copies of his clam chowder recipe, you know, and I've had clam chowder over on Portsmouth. You don't put milk in it. It's just no, no milk. It's just clam juice, clam juice and taters and onions.
Cooper McBrayer 53:03
That works out well?
Connie Mason 53:04
Oh yes, yes. And so anyway. And one of the other things is, you know, the Emma Dixon, she had a fig recipe. There were lots of figs over on Ocracoke and on Portsmouth. And they would, they would make fig, fig preserves and, and, I mean, it's great stuff. I mean, there's a lot about Portsmouth, and you won't believe it until you read it all, but, but, and there were some great people, I have to mention, Dorothy Byron Bedwell, whose family was from the middle part of the state, but they had a summer place, and they spent all summers, you know, growing up on Portsmouth, and they had a horse named Dan, and she wrote the book, Portsmouth Island with a Soul. Yeah, you need to read that.
Cooper McBrayer 54:16
Gotcha.
Connie Mason 54:17
And she was, she was a lovely lady and, and just loved Portsmouth and, and she got to the point where she couldn't make Homecoming because it's a rough ride going across the inlet in a boat, if it's, if it's not slick deck cam, but she stayed in Ocracoke and my friend Karen Amspacher and I went over to her, to her hotel room and sang hymns. All you know, for a couple hours, she had a great time. We had a great time. But another older person. Dot Salter, which is David. I have liked-
Cooper McBrayer 55:09
Quinn? David Quinn?
Connie Mason 55:12
David Quinn, his grandmother, miss. Dot Salter, she wanted to come so bad. Chester Lynn hired a helicopter, and they helicopted her to the Homecoming.
Cooper McBrayer 55:28
Really?
Connie Mason 55:29
Yes, yes. And in fact, we were talking about doing that for Chester this year and for David to re-enact, you know, the coming of the helicopter with Dot on it, because, you know, there was a, a grass strip there for airplanes, for the hunters that came in and the fishermen who came in. I actually landed on that grass strip when, when we were at our introduction to the park. And, you know, we got to go everywhere you know, to see everything you know. And, and Cape Lookout shared an airplane with Cape Hatteras, and his name was Sonny, and we've got, we got warned before we got on the plane that Sonny liked to see who he could make lose their cookies, you know. But anyway, we landed on a grass strip, you know, at Portsmouth, and walked around. And then Bruce Weber got a helicopter, but one of those bubble type helicopters. We could only ride him and one other person in the team, and I got the outside with no door, and he was taking pictures, you know, but we got to buzz the lighthouse. I mean, I will never forget that. And watching the horses on Shackleford, you know, run and, I mean, you know, and then going down the beach in a four wheel drive vehicle, you know, and seeing the loons, you know, up on the beach. And people think they're dying or, you know, but they can't walk, they can only fly, and so they have to wait for the tide again. But anyway, it was just a marvelous time in my life. And I, you know, and Portsmouth is part of that, and those people of Portsmouth and is what made it special. They were family, you know. And I think I got a quote here from, from Marion. Here somewhere. No, it's from Jesse Lee, her sister. "When I say home, I mean Portsmouth. I wish I could go back every day." She, and, and that was home.
Cooper McBrayer 58:02
Yeah, that's something I know, I kind of picked up when I was listening to some of your old oral history work. Is a lot of them still thought, a lot of people you talk to have still had that sentiment that-
Connie Mason 58:14
Oh yeah.
Cooper McBrayer 58:15
You know that's, that's, that's the home that's-
Connie Mason 58:19
That's the old home place. Yeah. And there were things that, you know, like Marion was a little, she was a little ticked off about, you know, when the reporters would say, would call Portsmouth a "ghost town," she says, "I'm not dead," you know. And then when she died, you know, I was thinking, "Marion, I am not going to let them call it a ghost town." And it wasn't abandoned as much as it, we, they just had to, you know, get a life for their families. Because when they closed the school, you know, young families had to go somewhere where they get an education for their children, and that's one of the big things that happened. But also I see what was the other thing that Mary and Gray hated. I'll think about it.
Cooper McBrayer 59:29
So the last question I've got for you is, if you could choose one thing, one major piece of information, that you could make sure that everybody in Carteret County would learn about in Portsmouth, about Portsmouth, and the schools would remember that there's one thing that you could have people remember about the island, about its people, about its history. Can you name one thing? Just one.
Connie Mason 59:58
Well, just, just, just for the purposes of history, it was the largest settlement on the Outer Banks, the first and largest settlement on the Outer Banks.
Cooper McBrayer 1:00:12
Got it. Yeah, I know I've done a bit in my research, I've come across that, that's been the major consensus is that every, is that after it was first founded in the North, by the North Carolina well, by, the village was chartered with the North Carolina Assembly in 1753?
Connie Mason 1:00:33
Yep.
Cooper McBrayer 1:00:33
And after, actually, after that, it kind of exploded relatively quickly, by 1770 it was, you know, major port, and it wasn't until really, the Civil War that that population front started to decline.
Connie Mason 1:00:50
And it was the opening of the Hatteras Inlet.
Cooper McBrayer 1:00:53
That's what-
Connie Mason 1:00:54
Because, you know, you had to pay to get it lightered, you know, in Ocracoke, but the Hatters was deep enough that you didn't have to lighter, you know, you could go right, right into Edenton or Washington, you know, without too much expense. And that was a big thing for, for Portsmouth. But, yeah, it, it holds a place in North Carolina history and, and if anything, that's what I would say that it was, and the first building that was built as a hospital was there at the Marine Hospital. In the state other buildings were procured as a hospital, but this was the only, or the first, building in the state of North Carolina built as a hospital.
Cooper McBrayer 1:01:57
Purpose built?
Connie Mason 1:01:58
Purpose built to be a hospital was the Marine Hospital. So that's another, another first for for Portsmouth. I did some work on the Captain Sea Graves, and one of them was a Green. His last name was Green. And I did some some work, but I think he was kin to Nathaniel Green. So, you know, I wish I could still work on that. But anyway, and there were all kinds of forts and things that were out there that people just don't knowabout anymore.
Cooper McBrayer 1:02:41
I just, I'm working through a book by James Edward Wright, White?
Connie Mason 1:02:46
what? Yeah, White.
Cooper McBrayer 1:02:49
That he's got with a bunch of different photographs from history, from the history of Portsmouth, from Cape Lookout. And I think some he took himself, and that's something I learned going through that is, oh, there was a fort built out there during the during the French and Indian War. And you can still on it, if the tides low, you can still find the gabions, the, they were barrels full of sand. They used as kind of like blockage for the artillery pieces.
Connie Mason 1:03:17
Right.
Cooper McBrayer 1:03:17
You can still find, when the tides low where the fort used to be, there's, you can still see them popping up out of the, out of the sand.
Connie Mason 1:03:27
And this isn't Portsmouth, but it all happened to Browns Island too. You know, during the war, there was a cannon, one cannon, and they had one cannonball. And it was, they would, you know, the straights, the water, body of water, the straights connecting Core Sound and Beaufort used to be the main highway to get to, okay? And they had one cannon. There was a team of men there, and every once in a while they would shoot the cannon over to Marshallburg the cannonball, and then they have to row after it to find it and then bring it back. Okay? And then the story goes is that they fired a gun and it came, and they went looking for it. They couldn't find it. And this one little boy was was laughing. He says, "I know where your cannonball is." And apparently one of the women who lived it on Marshallburg took it and threw it down her well, because she was sick of the cannons being shot. But anyway, they found that. But there's still some of those same sunken barrels over there on Brown's Island. But anyway, I digress. So what do you think? Or have we run out of time?
Cooper McBrayer 1:04:51
I think that we are good on calling it there. Thank you again for this interview.
Connie Mason 1:04:55
You're certainly welcome.
Cooper McBrayer 1:04:56
Miss Mason.
Connie Mason 1:04:57
No. Call me Connie.
Cooper McBrayer 1:04:59
Connie. Gotcha, I think I forgot to mention so I'll mention it now. This interview was conducted at the History Museum of Carteret County in Morehead City. Thank you again. Connie.
Connie Mason 1:05:12
Yes, thank you Cooper. And I look forward to hearing your culmination of your work.
Cooper McBrayer 1:05:19
Thank you. Thank you.
Connie Mason 1:05:20
I think that's going to be another resource for Portsmouth.
Cooper McBrayer 1:05:23
Here's hoping.
Connie Mason 1:05:25
I know it will be.
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Duration
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1 hour, 5 minutes, 25 seconds