‘Indefatigable tourism promoter’ Aycock Brown was a treasure

Aycock Brown’s introduction to Dare County, N.C., occurred in 1948, when the Roanoke Island Historical Association asked him to be in charge of publicity for “The Lost Colony,” the outdoor symphonic drama about the lives of the first settlers who came from Europe in 1587.

 

Asked to help revive slumping attendance figures, Aycock Brown “tapped into the spirit of the community.” One of his publicity photos featured the Elizabeth City High School band performing a concert on stage at the theater.

 

Another idea was to create a cameo role in the production for J. Fred Muggs, the chimpanzee who worked regularly with Dave Garroway on television’s “Today Show.” Monkeys might have been aboard the Elizabeth II with the colonists, Aycock reasoned. “The Lost Colony” director vetoed that suggestion.

 

“OK, then how about chorus girls from Las Vegas? That would make a heck of a promotion,” Aycock Brown reportedly countered. The answer was a louder “no.”

Aycock Brown settled on having a “celebrity” make a guest appearance in each production. Indeed, that sparked new interest and boosted attendance.

Aycock Brown had the connections to make it happen. He befriended the local Western Union telegraph office operator. When a prominent visitor sent a telegram, the Western Union man notified Aycock that “someone important” was in town. Aycock would hunt down the person…and get him or her into costume.

Eventually, Aycock Brown opted to hitch his publicity wagon to a cast member from “The Lost Colony” who showed great acting potential. He was Andy Griffith, who performed in the production from 1947-53 and advanced to play the lead role of Sir Walter Raleigh with gusto.

 

Aycock Brown would later portray the whole village of Manteo as “Mayberry on the Coast,” depicting the community as a “sister city” to Griffith’s hometown of Mount Airy in Surry County.

Aycock Brown was hired in 1952 as Dare County’s first tourism bureau chief. He was paid a handsome annual salary of $10,000 to get free publicity for Dare County.

 

Back then, community leaders reckoned that they would have to shell out about the same amount of cash for a full-page advertisement in a national magazine.

It proved to be a prudent investment to go with Aycock Brown. He was described as “an indefatigable promoter” by Wynne C. Dough, former curator of the Outer Banks History Center.

In 1995, Lorraine Eaton of The Virginian-Pilot newspaper wrote: “For nearly three decades, Aycock Brown cruised Dare County wide-eyed as a lemur, a straw hat on his head, an outrageous shirt on his back and at least three cameras slung around his neck. He knew everyone, and he was everywhere all the time. His impact was incredible.”

 

“When someone reeled in a record blue marlin, Aycock Brown was on the dock to greet the proud angler,” Eaton wrote.

Brown photographed members of the Cape Hatteras Anglers Club so often that they awarded him an honorary embroidered patch, noted Rebecca Bengal, a correspondent for Our State magazine.

 

Hugh Morton of Grandfather Mountain near Linville, N.C., an acclaimed photographer and promoter in his own right, labeled Aycock Brown as the “Barker of the Banks,” because no one worked harder, turning out so many stories and photos. More importantly, no one had more success in getting “stuff published.”

Morton said Aycock made each editor feel that “Aycock was an extra staff member on the Outer Banks, looking after the editor’s interests.” They valued “the incessant flow of words and pictures that would otherwise not be coming from any other source on the coast,” Morton added.

Aycock often made three trips a day to the post office. He would often hand stamp envelopes: “News Rush!”

Inside could be articles and photos of Outer Banks shipwrecks, storms, tree skeletons, driftwood, shells, visitors frolicking on the beach, nature scenes, dune buggy races, giant fish fries, pirate jamborees, swimsuit fashion shows, dolphins, waterfowl, sea turtles, majorettes on Jockey’s Ridge, hang gliders, spectacular sunrises…and more big fish.

 

Perhaps Aycock Brown’s most famous news photograph was inspired by the Apollo 11 moon landing on July 20, 1969. Brown’s tourism office was hosting an event that evening at the Wright Brothers National Memorial at Kill Devil Hills.

 

There was a huge crowd, so no one noticed Aycock slip away. With a transistor radio in hand, he walked out to a spot where he could see a rising crescent moon appear over the lighted monument. When astronaut Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, Aycock snapped the classic photograph…for his editors.

 

Morton commented in 1976: “No person will ever know how much in actual dollar value Aycock Brown has added to the tax books of Dare and other coastal counties, but it is up in the millions.”

By 2022, travel and tourism expenditures in Dare County reached $1.974 billion, ranked fourth among the state’s 100 counties, trailing only Mecklenburg, Wake and Buncombe. Nice job, Aycock.