Here are more coastal objects that help define North Carolina

Shrimpers and other watermen are known for wearing white rubber boots. This style of footwear has come to be revered along the North Carolina coastline as “Sneads Ferry Sneakers.”

They won’t help you run faster or jump higher. Rather, Sneads Ferry Sneakers keep you from slipping and sliding on a wet boat deck. 

They’re white and not black for a reason as well – so as not to leave scuff marks.

Now, the white rubber boots are “extra special,” because they are listed among the 50 objects that “define North Carolina,” according to editors of Our State magazine. The article appears in the September issue.

 

Contributing writer Jason Frye said the boots were invented in 1927 in Normandy, France. As told by the Le Chameau company archivist:

“On a rain-soaked day” in the village of Cherbourg on the northwestern tip of Normandy along the English Channel, bootmaker Claude Chamot listened to the frustrations of farmers, hunters and fishermen. “Their boots were neither comfortable nor durable. Determined to change that, he set out to craft…a boot capable of withstanding the rigors of land and sea, without compromising on comfort.”

“Chamot fashioned his first prototypes from natural rubber. He handed them to those who knew the elements best. The response was immediate – comfort, resilience, performance. Word spread. By harnessing the innovation of vulcanization, Chamot refined his boots, earning a reputation that soon extended beyond Normandy. Customers from across France made the journey to be fitted for their own bespoke pair.”

 

The term “Sneads Ferry Sneakers” was branded and copyrighted in 1992 by Sherry Thurston, a local artist in Sneads Ferry in Onslow County, N.C. 

She had a batch of T-shirts with an image of the white boots printed up to sell at the annual Sneads Ferry Shrimp Festival.

 

Farther up the North Carolina coast, at Kill Devil Hills in Dare County, Our State staff writer Rebecca Woltz tells about the significance of another historical “object” – one that pays tribute to our “First in Flight” fellows – Wilbur and Orville Wright.

  

It’s an original wooden propellor from one of their early aircraft that is displayed along with other artifacts at the Wright Brothers National Memorial, which is visited annually by nearly 400,000 people.

 

 

Back in the early 1900s, off-duty surfmen from the U.S. Life-Saving Service stations at Kitty Hawk (shown above) and Kill Devil Hills (shown below) were more than willing to assist. 

On days when the wind was strong and steady, the Wrights hoisted a red flag made from a bedsheet to signal that they could use some help carrying their flying machine up the dunes.

Local historian “Keeper James” Charlet, says: “There is a gene in every lifesaver to want to help.” Hence, the surfmen provided an essential service to “solving the problem of flight. They were the world’s first ground crew.”

 

One of the surfmen was John T. Daniels, who snapped the iconic photograph of the first flight at Kill Devil Hills on Dec. 17, 1903. The aircraft stayed aloft for 12 seconds and traveled 120 feet.

 

Orville set the expensive, boxy camera on a tripod, positioned it and prepared the 7x5-inch glass-plate negative. He then instructed Daniels to squeeze the camera’s shutter release bulb once the craft was airborne.

 

Orville climbed aboard the flyer and started the engine – a four-cylinder model that delivered more than 12 horsepower. The flyer set off along the launch track as Wilbur ran along side, steadying the right wing before takeoff.

Daniels triggered the shutter as instructed, capturing Orville’s ascent at precisely the right moment…“forever immortalizing one of history’s most groundbreaking technological achievements,” commented historian Bryan Patterson of Wake Forest, N.C.