Show of Support at Shrimp Shack

“Each man knew if it were him lost out there, the community would have his back.”
(pg. 321, Last Light over Carolina)

That line in my fictional tale of a shrimp captain’s ordeal out at sea came to life this week, as our own coastal community rallied to help a local shrimping family.

The Mount Pleasant watering hole Buddy Roe’s Shrimp Shack on Ben Sawyer Boulevard transformed into a command post. The emergency mission— to help the longtime shrimping family of Warren “Bubba” Rector.

The Anna Grace, Captain Rector’s shrimp boat, sank to the ocean floor earlier this month, taking with it the family’s main source of income. With insurance unaffordable for the Rectors, their sunken vessel is said to be a $150,000 loss. That price could easily be the death of a generations-old way of life for the Rectors, and would be for many local shrimpers. They struggle every season to make ends meet in an industry competing with cheap overseas shrimp prices among other things.

On Sunday, hundreds of residents responded to the mayday call in the form of a fundraiser at Buddy Roe’s. With money in hand, the crowd paid for plates of local-caught shrimp, cups of cold brew while participating in a raffles and auctions. All of this in effort to help the Rector family rebuild the business they lost out at sea.

I couldn’t attend the event because I was out of town. But my assistant, Angela, and her husband joined the charitable crowd and had the pleasure of meeting Pam and Bubba Rector, who described Sunday’s turnout as “phenomenal.”

Another shrimping veteran, who was touched by the turnout, said to Angela that it appears the community still deeply believes in their local shrimpers. And I think that is true. While I don’t know how much money was raised that afternoon at the shrimp shack, I hope the community response gives all of our shrimping families renewed hope that people around here still want their local shrimp.

What can you do? You can support shrimpers by buying only Wild American Shrimp. For more information, visit: www.wildamericanshrimp.com.

Friends Don't Let Friends Eat Imported Shrimp

Spotted on shirts and bumper stickers throughout the Lowcountry, is the common phrase, “Friends don’t let friends eat imported shrimp.” It’s a mission statement that hardly a crustacean-loving soul seems to be against. Yet, as the number of those bumper stickers swell on the backside of vehicles, our American shrimping industry is quickly vanishing; a real problem conveyed my latest novel, Last Light over Carolina.

The protagonist Bud Morrison thought to himself while on his family shrimp boat, "One thing he knew for sure, though, was that sitting on board the Miss Ann that day with the best damn captain on the southeastern sea and the boast's belly full of booty, the men had felt proud. They were the hunters returning with their kill. Thousands of little critters were nestled on ice. Back then, they'd felt like kings of their world. And for a shining moment, they were."

If we choose to live out the slogan "friends don't let friends eat imported shrimp," our simple actions could help in the fight to save the livelihoods of shrimpers families by living out the bumper sticker message.

So what can you do? Read more at: www.wildamericanshrimp.com