Background
In 1950, my Grandfather, John R. Barnes, decided nothing would do but that he and my Grandmother build a beach house for their own recreation and for entertaining friends and business associates. One of his best friends was John Stedman in Lumberton, NC who was CEO of the Scottish Bank headquartered there. Mr. Stedman had already built a beach house and was adamant that my Grandfather build on the same beach where his house was located. Apparently my Grandfather was not moving quickly enough for Mr. Stedman so one day after hearing of some lots becoming available Mr. Stedman purchased two ocean front lots and simply debited my Grandfathers account without even checking to see if he wanted them. Thus began the 57 year life span of the house at Long Beach that has been a source of so much pleasure for my family.
After learning that he was now the proud owner of two ocean front lots at a cost of $700, my Grandfather set about designing and building the house. It was completed in the spring of 1951 and they enjoyed with friends their first few summers in their new house. In October 1954, Hurricane Hazel blew through and essentially wiped the entire beach clean. It left five houses standing on the beach and neither my Grandfather's nor Mr. Stedman's house survived. By this time they had become addicted to the charms of a beach house though and immediately decided to rebuild.
After Hurricane Hazel, the upper portion of the 2 story house was located about two miles from its original location and moved back up to the second row (about 1 block west of the original site) and turned into a rental cottage. It still stands there today though my Grandmother insisted it be sold after having to clean up after one season's rental tenants. After rebuilding the main house on the original site, it became a summer refuge for friends and family from all over the state and was empty very rarely during the summer time. Even when guests were not included in my grandparents plans, there was a constant flow of people to and from the house just visiting and having a drink or two.
This continued until my Grandfather's death in 1971. Eventually, my Grandmother gave this house to my mother and it became my family's summer home. From the time I was but an infant I spent summers there and there are too many memories associated with that house for me to even begin to relate to you here.
The Problems Begin
From the time the house was built in 1951, there were indications that the sea was inching closer year by year. This was not a great concern to anyone as the oceans movement was so incredibly slow it would have taken about 150 years for it to become a threat to the house, however; in the early 1960's this was all to change dramatically.
In the early 1960's the Army Corps of Engineers decided that the Cape Fear river which had served Wilmington, NC as a port for over 150 years was not deep enough for the newer larger vessels that needed access to Wilmington. They began what was to become a 30 year dredging project that would simply ruin Long Beach and the surrounding beaches as well.
The Corps would dredge the mouth of the Cape Fear River every so often and take the removed sand from this dredging activity and haul it 10 miles out to sea for disposal. What they failed to consider was where the sand that was constantly filling their dredge back in was coming from. The sand to fill the holes they were digging was being brought back to the Cape Fear from Long Beach and surrounding beaches by ocean currents. Logic dictates that this type of activity cannot continue indefinitely without severe consequences. Unfortunately, our house was located at the epicenter of the erosion caused by this dredging.
By 1973, high tide at our house had moved to within 50 feet of the house. When the house was built there was a 200 foot long walkway which barely reached the highest tides experienced there. In a period of just 15 years of dredging by the Corps, they had managed to take over 150 feet of sand from in front of our house. My Uncle was the first to realize and come up with a solution to this problem and he set about building a wooden bulkhead which would become the ancestor of the one that protected the house for almost 20 years.
Over the last twenty years, the house would have been taken many, many times without that wall in place. It was made illegal to build these walls in 1977, and repairs to it became a nightmare of red tape with the federal government as well as local authorities. We knew this was our only salvation however so we jumped through hoops, begged, groveled, and threatened for over twenty years to maintain what we had left of the house.
By 1999, the beach had eroded to the point where the house had become a
peninsula. We could fish off the deck at high tide and the high water
mark was well past the entire house. One contractor doing work for us on
the house remarked that he felt as though the house should have a throttle and
a helm as this was truly the impression given at high tide. We were only
spared constant daily flooding by the bulkhead my uncle had so judiciously
installed in the 70's.