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Ocracoke in the Fifties
Half a century after the publication of The Lonely Doll, Dare Wright's only book for adults is a tribute to her favorite place, Ocracoke, North Carolina.
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112 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 2006
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 25, 2013
Love her photos and her nostalgic but not sappy nor sentimental view of Ocracoke. If you know the Outer Banks and remember its simple pleasures, this is a sweet little book.
February 22, 2025
It’s a tribute, a time capsule, a testament to the timelessness of Ocracoke, “a place of sea and sky, of drifting sand and crying gulls, a slim sandbar in the Atlantic where centuries of isolation have created a special quality of life.” Ocracoke was “a barefoot island…There was no need to put on a pair of shoes from the moment you arrived until you reluctantly left…The way to absorb the island’s atmosphere was to walk with the sand hot under your feet…You might be scorched by the sun or soaked by the rain, but it was always worth the trip.”
“Ocracoke is not for people looking for entertainment or nightlife, but…you can fill a bucket with crabs [by day and] go floundering by night in the shallow water of the sound, a lantern in one hand and a rough spear in the other.” The running tide and small fish swish against your legs while seabirds flash “white against a black velvet sky.” Horses also roam “not so much wild as free, their only restraint the picket fences built not to keep the horses in but to keep them out of…gardens, and garbage cans.”
The sea makes daily offerings to the beach, and the sand was freed for the wind to seize. “Its fifteen narrow miles of sand flats and shifting dunes seem pinned to the earth by its lighthouse.” The lighthouse is no longer needed to guide ships as it was in the past, but its preservation continues to shed light on a distinctive wild landscape rich in history and in memory of all the vessels it has kept from disaster.
Blackbeard was one of the island’s most notorious inhabitants and is credited to christening Ocracoke with its name. On the eve of his last battle, he is rumored to have cried, "Oh, crow, cock!" to beckon the dawn and high tide and allow him to maneuver his ship to freedom. But the island’s original name was Wokoken after the Woecon tribe. There were many spellings through the years-Woococon, Wococok, Ocock, Ocacoc, and others. All gave way to Ocracoke.
Ocracoke in the Fifties is Dare Wright’s experience of the island “partly as it is, partly as it was, entirely as it appeared to me.” In her only book for adults, Wright’s collage of photos and text pay homage to an island and a culture, poised between the tides of historical tradition and inevitable change.
“Ocracoke is not for people looking for entertainment or nightlife, but…you can fill a bucket with crabs [by day and] go floundering by night in the shallow water of the sound, a lantern in one hand and a rough spear in the other.” The running tide and small fish swish against your legs while seabirds flash “white against a black velvet sky.” Horses also roam “not so much wild as free, their only restraint the picket fences built not to keep the horses in but to keep them out of…gardens, and garbage cans.”
The sea makes daily offerings to the beach, and the sand was freed for the wind to seize. “Its fifteen narrow miles of sand flats and shifting dunes seem pinned to the earth by its lighthouse.” The lighthouse is no longer needed to guide ships as it was in the past, but its preservation continues to shed light on a distinctive wild landscape rich in history and in memory of all the vessels it has kept from disaster.
Blackbeard was one of the island’s most notorious inhabitants and is credited to christening Ocracoke with its name. On the eve of his last battle, he is rumored to have cried, "Oh, crow, cock!" to beckon the dawn and high tide and allow him to maneuver his ship to freedom. But the island’s original name was Wokoken after the Woecon tribe. There were many spellings through the years-Woococon, Wococok, Ocock, Ocacoc, and others. All gave way to Ocracoke.
Ocracoke in the Fifties is Dare Wright’s experience of the island “partly as it is, partly as it was, entirely as it appeared to me.” In her only book for adults, Wright’s collage of photos and text pay homage to an island and a culture, poised between the tides of historical tradition and inevitable change.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews