2nd Annual Working Watermen’s Festival – Ocracoke Island, North Carolina, October 19, 2024

Memorable moments when streams flowed together…

By Doug Tanner

“The Back Story”

I don’t know when I first learned of Ocracoke; a fair guess is that I was in high school in the early 1960s. But I knew Lillian Wahab well before then. Lillian was a close friend and colleague of my aunt June Anderson; they taught together at Granby Junior High School in Norfolk. Aunt June and Uncle Eric lived on the Chesapeake Bay at Virginia Beach. Mom, Dad, Dorothy, and I came for 2-3 weeks every summer, and Lillian often visited while we were there. She cut a memorable figure: tall, exceptionally well-dressed, and elegant; she used a cigarette holder like Franklin Roosevelt’s. I remember hearing her say, “I love Harry Belafonte!” before I knew anything about Harry Belafonte’s music—let alone that he was Black, and Lillian’s expressive tone of affection in 1950’s Tidewater Virginia could suggest a touch of interracial scandal.

Later I learned that Lillian was from Ocracoke. She was the daughter of Stanley Wahab, a wealthy Ocracoke entrepreneur and one of the island’s most prominent citizens. Stanley Wahab and his multiple business interests – most of them impressively successful – are featured in practically every printed history of Ocracoke in the 20th century. I began to read about him when I first came to Ocracoke in the 1970s, a few years after Stanley had died. His being Lillian’s father has stimulated my interest ever since.

By the late 1990s, Kathy and I had been to Ocracoke a few times and come to appreciate several island musicians. Martin Garrish quickly became my very favorite—through his mellow voice with a touch of “hoi toide” accent, his virtuoso guitar talent, and several songs he sings from Ocracoke’s history. One of those is “Charlie Mason Pogie Boat,” written decades ago by Charles Stowe about an event told here much better than I could write: https://www.raisingthestory.com/blog/2020/3/8/a-bluebird-day-milton-styron-recalls-the-charlie-mason-menhaden-steamer

This from Smithsonian Folkways via YouTube is an original recording earlier than Martin’s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJBp7VWGsZU

“The Story”

On the Ocracoke Preservation Society grounds, behind an area where chairs for attendees listening to “porch talks” at Ocracoke’s Working Watermen’s Festival were set up, several vendors had displays of decoys and nautical collectibles. The display pictured below included a model of the Charlie Mason. I was seated nearby when Rex O’Neal, a gregarious and especially colorful O’cocker, walked up, noticed the Charlie Mason model, and began to sing the song to the vendor. I recalled the lyrics well enough to chime in on the last two verses, each of which mentions Stanley Wahab. When we finished, I told Rex that Stanley’s daughter Lillian was a friend of my favorite aunt. With typical enthusiasm and exuberance, Rex proceeded to tell me that he was given his name thanks to Stanley Wahab.

“I’m one of eleven in my family – all boys, and I was the 10th ! When I was about to be born, my dad was working as a carpenter for Stanley Wahab. Stanley asked. ‘If this one comes out another boy, what are you going to name him?’ My dad answered, ‘I don’t know; I’ve about run out of names!’ Stanley said, ‘I’m about to take a famous man, Rex Beach, fishing. If you’ll name him Rex, I’ll give you $50.’ So my name is Rex Beach O’Neal! Because of Stanley Wahab!”

(Rex Beach, I later learned from Wikipedia, was a novelist, playwright, and Olympic water polo player. He must have been an enthusiastic saltwater fisherman, too.)

As Rex spun the story, we were joined by his grandson Dallas Mason. Dallas is a sure-nuff genuine musical child prodigy—a drummer since he could pick up the sticks and more recently a guitarist under the tutelage of Martin Garrish.
https://ocracokeobserver.com/2022/07/08/young-drummer-dallas-mason-is-off-the-charts/

Rex sent Dallas to pick up the fish fry plate his granddad had paid for, took his chair in front of the audience, and picked up the microphone.

I only wish a well-placed video camera had been running as Rex regaled us with a treasure of tales about fishing a variety of nets in both the sound and the ocean, the many fish houses that once surrounded the Ocracoke harbor, and how they had disappeared “like the brogue” – then demonstrated with relish that Ocracoke brogue was alive and well in his own vocal facility. Alas, no videographer was on hand to capture the moment, but you can catch Rex and his rendition of Ocracoke’s old-time tongue in this video from Raleigh’s major TV station:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2IkA2n_bkV4

On a bright and sunny Ocracoke afternoon, with my psyche greatly needing relief from anxiety over the most consequential Presidential election in my now long lifetime, the 2nd Annual Working Watermen’s Festival had cast its nets wide and come into the dock with a boatload!