On December 9, 1905, Keeper Van Buren Etheridge of the Nags Head LifeSaving Station received a telephone call from the Kitty Hawk station keeper, alerting him they had just completed a rescue involving a steamer that had been towing a barge before running aground. The barge was now adrift and currents were moving it towards the [...]
On December 9, 1905, the south patrolman from the Kitty Hawk LifeSaving Station discovered a steamer perilously close to the beach. He was near the end of his three mile route so he turned to hurry back towards the station. After being notified of the case, Keeper Avery B. L. Tillett requested assistance from the Kill [...]
1874 Chicamacomico Life-Saving Station. Photo by Brad Hanson. The 150th anniversary of the U.S. Life-Saving Service in North Carolina has presented an opportunity for the Chicamacomico Life-Saving Station in Rodanthe to launch a big endeavor that has been in the works for years – a restoration of the original 1874 station. The Chicamacomico Historic Site [...]
On December 3, 1903, a surfman from the Currituck Beach LifeSaving Station (formerly known as Jones Hill) spotted a vessel stranded about 500 yards northeast of the station. Keeper W. F. Parker immediately reported the discovery by wire to the Department before leading the crew out to the beach. The Lyle Gun was quickly set in [...]
On October 8, 1903, a small sailboat named the Leon Bruce capsized about a mile and a half south of the Caffey’s Inlet LifeSaving Station. The sailboat belonged to Keeper Thaddeus Snow and the rest of the crew at the station and was actually heading to the station itself before being caught in a squall. The [...]
On February 25, 1900, a small schooner was caught in a heavy gale and stranded about two miles north of the Oregon Inlet LifeSaving Station as they were trying to find harbor in the inlet from the storm. The surfmen launched the surfboat but could not pull to the side of the schooner due to the [...]
150th Anniversary Commemoration Saturday October 12 The Way it was Done Back Then 9:00 AM Flag Raising with Piper Ryan Leigh and Bonnie Pugh Somers (Descendant of Benjamin Pugh-Keeper of the 1874 Station) 9:00 AM Chicamacomico open for Tours 9:30 D. Christian Thompson will give a porch talk about research and restoration of the 1874 Station [...]
On April 24, 1899, two fishermen found themselves in a bind as they were attempting to come to shore. The small dory overturned in the breaks and trapped one man underneath as the tide began to pull him and the dory out to sea. Keeper Jesse W. Ward from the Jones Hill LifeSaving Station just happened [...]
In the early morning hours of August 10, 1898, a surfman on patrol from the Little Kinnakeet LifeSaving Station found a stranded schooner about three fourths of a mile north of the station. He immediately burned a Coston signal indicating help was on the way and hurried back to the station to report the case to [...]
On April 26, 1898, Surfman E. S. Midgett from the Chicamacomico LifeSaving Station spotted a schooner about eight miles off shore and watched as she slowly made her way towards the shoreline before anchoring about four miles northeast of the station. She had obvious damage with both her foremast damaged and her main topmast missing and [...]
