THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, November 22, 1995 TAG: 9511210151
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Coastal Journal
SOURCE: Mary Reid Barrow
LENGTH: Medium: 100 lines
Harold and Mattie Capps were part of a happy crowd of almost 1,000 people who were on hand when North Carolina Gov. Terry Sanford ``welcomed'' Knotts Island to North Carolina.
The date was Sept. 4, 1962, and the crowd had gathered at the tip of Knotts Island on the shores of Currituck Sound to celebrate the inauguration of ferry service between Knotts Island and the Currituck County mainland.
The event was significant not only because it provided the only direct link between Knotts Island and its own state, but also because Knotts Island school children could now take the ferry to school. In the past, the high school students had to take a 100 mile round trip by bus up through Virginia Beach and back down into North Carolina via Pungo Ferry Road and Blackwater.
Knotts Island resident Capps was seated along with other distinguished guests. He had a reason to smile. He was a Currituck County commissioner at the time and had played a role in persuading Sanford that if nothing else, the school children needed that ferry.
Capps' wife, Mattie, was probably more tired than smiling. She was in charge of the fried blue fish lunch that was served to the huge crowd by the Currituck County home demonstration clubs that day. Folks ate picnic-style out on the lawn by the new ferry docks. She still has records from the feast that accounted for items like 450 pounds of bluefish fillets for $237 and 45 pounds of sugar for ice tea for $5.50.
Harold and Mattie Capps watched as eighth-grader Marion Irving christened the new ferry, The Knotts Island, and broke a small champagne bottle on the bow. After lunch, the 25 students, who would be riding the ferry every school day, got a practice run. They took the first ferry ride along with the governor and other guests across Currituck Sound to the mainland.
The children, who were attending Knapp High School on the mainland, got off to a very good start that year. The very next day, the school year began and the ferry shortened their long ride by about a half-hour each way.
Time was when Knotts Island was such a part of Virginia that Capps went to school at the old Creeds High School in Virginia Beach. Their daughter began her high school career in Virginia Beach also, at Princess Anne High School. The next year, the city discontinued bus service to Knotts Island because there weren't enough students to make the trip worthwhile.
The solution was to bus the Knotts Island children, Capps' daughter among them, to school in North Carolina. That meant a long 50-mile ride to the Currituck mainland.
The inauguration of the new ferry service was certainly not the only thing Harold Capps had participated in officially during his many years as a county commissioner, but it probably was the biggest. The throng even rivaled the popular May Day festivities at the Knotts Island Fire Department, Capps said.
Capps served as commissioner for one year in 1943 after being appointed during the war years to fill a vacant seat. He later ran for and won a commissioner's seat every two years from 1957 to 1977 and then again from 1981 to 1984.
When he wasn't conducting county business, Capps made his living farming. Years ago, most Knotts Islanders made their living by farming, hunting, fishing or trapping, Capps explained. Everybody had dairy cows and raised hogs, too. And they didn't have to buy their tea either because they drank yaupon tea from the leaves of the yaupon holly.
``We didn't even know about the Depression around here,'' Capps said. ``We didn't have any money, but we always had something to eat.''
A lot has changed at last as far as hunting and fishing are concerned. Currituck Sound, like Virginia's Back Bay, has lost its plentiful population of waterfowl and tasty bass.
Capps, a hunter all his life, spent some time in the 1980s as a hunting guide and as time went on there were fewer and fewer ducks.
``I didn't see a duck the last day of the season,'' he said, ``and I said, `I'm not hunting anymore.' ''
And he didn't.
Capps' family has been a contributing part of Knotts Island for several generations. One grandfather was instrumental in getting the Knotts Island causeway paved with oyster shells and his other grandfather gave land to both the Baptist and Methodist churches on Knotts Island.
The century-old Capp family cemetery and family home still stand near Harold and Mattie's modern one-story home on South End Road. They are almost within sight of the ferry terminal that was one of Harold Capps' contributions to Knotts Island.
P.S.: KIDS, MAKE A SCARECROW at 2 p.m. Saturday at the Francis Land House. Bring your own clothes. Straw for stuffing will be provided. The cost is $1 per child and children must be accompanied by an adult who will be admitted free. Call 431-4000.
GARDEN OF LIGHTS, the holiday display at Norfolk Botanical Garden, opens at 5:30 p.m. this evening and runs through Jan. 1. Admission is $7 per car Monday through Thursday and $9 Friday through Sunday. To find out more, call 441-5830. MEMO: What unusual nature have you seen this week? And what do you know about
Tidewater traditions and lore? Call me on INFOLINE, 640-5555. Enter
category 2290. Or, send a computer message to my Internet address:
mbarrow(AT)infi.net.
ILLUSTRATION: Photo by MARY REID BARROW
Harold and Mattie Capps recall the day ferry service from Knotts
Island to Currituck County was inaugurated.
by CNB