Charles Harry Whedbee – författare

Every September, on the first night of the new moon, there are those who vow they see a flaming ship sail three times past the coast of Ocracoke. No matter the direction or velocity of the wind, this fiery vessel moves swiftly toward the northeast, they say, always accompanied by an eerie wailing sound. The story of this ship is but one of the colorful legends intrinsic to the charm of North Carolina''s historic coastland. From the northern tip of the Outer Banks to the lower end of the sweeping shoreline, there are stories to be found . . . and to be told with gusto, or awe, or sometimes with horror.

Charles Harry Whedbee was an elected judge in his native Greenville, North Carolina, for thirty-plus years, but his favorite place was the Outer Banks, Nags Head in particular. Whedbee was the author of five folklore collections. He died in 1990.

For decades, the folk tales of Charles Harry Whedbee have been available wherever you care to look on the Outer Banks. Their popularity has transcended Whedbee''s loyal readership among North Carolinians and visitors from the Northeast and the Midwest.

From Blackbeard''s den at Ocracoke, to the Hills of the Seven Sisters at Nags Head, to the misty swamps of Shallote, there is hardly an inch of territory along North Carolina''s coast without a legend attached to it. Inlanders may be skeptical regarding the sometimes miraculous, often horror-filled tales that make up coastal folklore, but Outer Bankers accept the incredible as fact. But this book is more than a collection of coastal legends. It is an affectionate portrait of the people who daily pull a living out of the treacherous waters of the Atlantic . . . a tribute to the hardiness and courage that have made the Banker a rare breed . . . a breed whose true stories are, indeed, stranger than fiction.

For decades, the folk tales of Charles Harry Whedbee have been available wherever you care to look on the Outer Banks. Their popularity has transcended Whedbee''s loyal readership among North Carolinians and visitors from the Northeast and the Midwest. Charles Harry Whedbee was an elected judge in his native Greenville, North Carolina, for thirty-plus years, but his favorite place was the Outer Banks, Nags Head in particular. Whedbee was the author of five folklore collections. He died in 1990.

Whedbee''s collections of legends and folklore have become regional classics. The continuing popularity of these books stems from the author''s intimate knowledge of the places, people, and events of which he writes. He gathers the mysteries, tales, legends, and lore that have been handed down for generations on the North Carolina coast and recounts them with a sensitivity for tradition that makes him a master at what he does.

For decades, the folk tales of Charles Harry Whedbee have been available wherever you care to look on the Outer Banks. Their popularity has transcended Whedbee''s loyal readership among North Carolinians and visitors from the Northeast and the Midwest.

Charles Harry Whedbee was an elected judge in his native Greenville, North Carolina, for thirty-plus years, but his favorite place was the Outer Banks, Nags Head in particular. Whedbee was the author of five folklore collections. He died in 1990.

Nearly every time he visited the Outer Banks, the author heard a new tale or another version of an old one and gets "that itch" to write it down for everyone to enjoy. That itch produced the seventeen stories in this fourth volume. There are tales of Indians and trappers, ghosts and firebirds, sea horses and sand dollars, romance and heartache. Some of the stories tell of eerie and frightening events. Some chronicle the history of the coast and its early inhabitants. Others tease us with the promise of love and happiness, only to end in tragedy and despair. Still others explain the strange habits and appearances of local flora and fauna in ways far more intriguing than the scientists do.

For decades, the folk tales of Charles Harry Whedbee have been available wherever you care to look on the Outer Banks. Their popularity has transcended Whedbee''s loyal readership among North Carolinians and visitors from the Northeast and the Midwest. Charles Harry Whedbee was an elected judge in his native Greenville, North Carolina, for thirty-plus years, but his favorite place was the Outer Banks, Nags Head in particular. Whedbee was the author of five folklore collections. He died in 1990.

In 1963, Judge Charles Whedbee was asked to substitute on a Greenville, NC, morning show called Carolina Today while one of the program''s regulars was in the hospital. Whedbee took the opportunity to tell some of the Outer Banks stories he''d heard during his many summers at Nags Head. The station received such a volume of mail in praise of his tale-telling that he was invited to remain even after the man he was substituting for returned to the air. "He had a way of telling a story that really captured me," said one of the program''s co-hosts. "Whether he was talking about a sunset, a ghost, or a shipwreck, I was there, living every minute of it." Word traveled as far as Winston-Salem, where John F. Blair proposed to Whedbee that he compile his stories in book form. Whedbee welcomed the challenge, though his expectations for the manuscript that became Legends of the Outer Banks and Tar Heel Tidewater were modest. "I wrote it out of a love for this region and the people whom I''d known all my life," he said. "I didn''t think it would sell a hundred copies." From the very first sentence of the foreword, Whedbee stamped the collection with his inimitable style: "You are handed herewith a small pod or school of legends about various portions of that magical region known as the Outer Banks of North Carolina as well as stories from other sections of the broad bays, sounds, and estuaries that make up tidewater Tarheelia." The Lost Colony, Indians, Blackbeard, an albino porpoise that guided ships into harbor—the tales in that volume form the core of Outer Banks folklore. Whedbee liked to tell people that his stories were of three kinds: those he knew to be true, those he believed to be true, and those he fabricated. But despite much prodding, he never revealed which were which.

Legends of the Outer Banks went through three printings in 1966, its first year. Demand for Whedbee''s tales and the author''s supply of good material were such that further volumes were inevitable. The Flaming Ship of Ocracoke & Other Tales of the Outer Banks was published in 1971, Outer Banks Mysteries & Seaside Stories in 1978, Outer Banks Tales to Remember in 1985, and Blackbeard''s Cup and Stories of the Outer Banks in 1989. In 2004, the staff of John F. Blair, Publisher, collected 13 of Judge Whedbee''s finest stories for Pirates, Ghosts, and Coastal Lore. If this is your introduction to Charles Harry Whedbee, you''ll soon understand his love for the people and the history of the Outer Banks.

For decades, the folk tales of Charles Harry Whedbee have been available wherever you care to look on the Outer Banks. Their popularity has transcended Whedbee''s loyal readership among North Carolinians and visitors from the Northeast and the Midwest. Charles Harry Whedbee was an elected judge in his native Greenville, North Carolina, for thirty-plus years, but his favorite place was the Outer Banks, Nags Head in particular. Whedbee was the author of five folklore collections. He died in 1990.