Mailboat was the glue that bound island communities

Before the North Carolina state ferries, there was the mailboat. 

She would dutifully carry letters, parcels and people to and from the village of Atlantic in Carteret County to hard-to-get-to places such as Cedar Island, Hog Island, Portsmouth and Ocracoke.

One of the most famous mailboats to make the run was named Aleta. She was built in Atlantic in 1923 by master boatbuilder Ambrose Fulcher for owner Capt. Howard Nelson. He chose to name the boat in honor of his sister, Aleta Mae Nelson.

Aleta was a 42-foot vessel with a 40-horsepower engine. Her initial route was from Morehead City to Atlantic and back again.

When the road between Morehead City and Atlantic was built in the 1930s, the focus of the mailboat turned toward serving remote communities beyond Atlantic. Aleta began running the Atlantic-Ocracoke mail route in 1938.

Capt. Wilbur Nelson sold the mailboat to a pair of O’cokers in 1944, Capt. Elmo Fulcher and Capt. George O’Neal.

In 1948, The (Raleigh) News & Observer ran an article about the Aleta. Capt. George told the reporter that in addition to the regular mail, parcels and packages, he gladly transported as many as 60 passengers, because that was the number of life jackets he carried onboard.

In 1949, the Caterpillar Tractor Co. learned that the boat’s original Caterpillar engine from 1923 was still chugging along. The company sent representatives to Ocracoke to take pictures and see for themselves.

They published an article about Aleta in the Caterpillar company magazine, noting that “the diesel engine had 36,000 hours with just one overhaul – a record for the Cat Marine D4400.”

When asked how he had kept it working all those years, Capt. Elmo replied: “She’s my baby and I work on her every day, wake her up every morning and tuck her in every night.”

Aleta never had to be towed by the Coast Guard, Capt. George boasted, but on several occasions, Aleta was seen towing Coast Guard watercraft.

Villagers gathered for the daily arrival of the mailboat in Ocracoke, waiting for the mail to be sorted and distributed…and to see who was coming into town.

In 1952, the mailboat contract passed to Capt. Ansley O’Neal of Ocracoke. His boat was named Dolphin.

Aleta remained with Capt. Elmo Fulcher; she became a commercial fishing vessel, harvesting shrimp from Pamlico Sound.

“Never a day went by but what my father left the supper table and went directly to Aleta to wash her down, paint, mend net or tinker with the engine,” recollected Ellen Marie Fulcher Cloud. 

“My mother would smile…and say, ‘He’s got to go tell her goodnight.’”

Capt. Elmo tended to Aleta right up until he died in 1979 at age 67. Over time, the vessel deteriorated and was laid to rest in Carteret County near the convergence of the South River and the Pamlico River to form an artificial reef. 

A model of Aleta, built by George Guthrie Jackson of Ocracoke, is on display at the Ocracoke Preservation Society’s Museum.

Mailboat service into Ocracoke was discontinued in 1964, when the mail began being trucked to Hatteras and shuttled over to Ocracoke, the only community in ZIP Code 27960.

Today, the 3,000-square-foot Ocracoke Post Office building, located at 1122 Irvin Garrish Highway, has 1,256 lock boxes to serve nearly 1,000 postal patrons – year-round residents and businesses as well as numerous summer visitors.

Ocracoke has no mail carriers or home delivery, so the post office continues to be a center for community activity and information. Hours are 9 a.m.-1 p.m. and 3-5 p.m. Monday-Friday and 10 a.m.-1 p.m. on Saturday.