{"id":20,"date":"2026-08-17T16:43:48","date_gmt":"2026-08-17T16:43:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/onthesebanks-benjegg.apps.cloudapps.unc.edu\/?p=20"},"modified":"2026-08-17T16:50:34","modified_gmt":"2026-08-17T16:50:34","slug":"the-harbor-still","status":"publish","type":"otb_story","link":"https:\/\/onthesebanks.unc.edu\/?otb_story=the-harbor-still","title":{"rendered":"The Harbor, Still"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>At its peak, Wanchese Harbor was the busiest port on the Eastern Seaboard. The many fish houses packed millions of pounds of seafood annually and were crowded with commercial fishing boats unloading their hauls. Today, it\u2019s a ghost of what it used to be.<\/p>\n<p>Over half of the commercial fisherman have left the business and the eight fish houses are now down to three. \u201cA lot of people that fish now that don&#039;t make much money,\u201d says Mark Vrablic, manager of Etheridge Seafood Co., \u201cThey make a living, but they can&#039;t afford to go to meetings and pay their politicians all this money.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Vrablic attributes the decline in the commercial fishing business as a result of state government regulations. \u201cIt&#039;s bad to be in an industry [where] you know the government don&#039;t like you,\u201d Vrablic says.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI still go to a lot of meetings, \u2026 and they don&#039;t even like to see me because I remember \u2026 the way of life.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Vrablic hopes to one day revive the harbor and the commercial fishing business. \u201cI feel like we&#039;re been in a war with these people for the last 40 years,\u201d \u201cThey don&#039;t want us to make it, they want us to give up, \u2026 and I&#039;m not giving up until good Lord takes me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At its peak, Wanchese Harbor was the busiest port on the Eastern Seaboard.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":42,"menu_order":8,"template":"","class_list":["post-20","otb_story","type-otb_story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/onthesebanks.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/otb_story\/20","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/onthesebanks.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/otb_story"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/onthesebanks.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/otb_story"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/onthesebanks.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/42"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/onthesebanks.unc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}