12 miles off mainland Virginia,
in the middle of the Chesapeake Bay,
lies an island called Tangier,
and it's only reachable by boat or plane.
And that isolation has given this place
a unique character that comes through in everything,
including the way people talk.
So Captain, what's something I can say to a local,
they know I kind of know the lingo well.
- Well, we would say it ain't hot none today.
- It ain't hot none today.
- Thank you, Captain.
- You're certainly welcome.
- Alright.
(emotional music)
Turns out that actually means it is hot out today,
which might seem a little counterintuitive at first,
but in a lot of ways, so does Tangier itself.
A town of about 400 people whose
old school charm seems frozen in time,
but that's actually in a period of rapid change.
Is this you?
- [James] Yeah, this is the crab shanty.
This is my office.
- [Baratunde] No one understands Tangier
better than James Eskridge,
a lifelong resident of this island,
known to friends and relatives as Ooker.
Ooker's family has lived and
worked here since the civil war,
and today he makes a living the same way most of them did.
Catching and selling crab.
- What I'm gonna do now is I'm gonna get
a few of the soft crabs outta here,
and get them into a refrigerator.
- How do you tell that they've vaulted--
- They've got that soft crab look.
- (laughs loudly) Okay.
- [James] You wanna hold one?
- I can hold a crab, and it's okay?
- Yep, it don't bite.
It can't bite, it's soft.
Oh, support the claws.
Hold your hand out.
- Hold my hand out, there we go.
Cool.
So, not to be a rank capitalist,
Ooker, but how much money am I holding in my hand?
- That crab right there is worth
probably I would say close to $4.
- [Baratunde] Okay.
- It's seafood what keeps the ball rolling out here.
It's all about seafood.
- [Baratunde] Ever since the late 1700's,
watermen have made a good living
out of what this fertile bay offers.
The crabbing is so plentiful that Tangier bills itself
as the soft shell crab capital of the world.
- [James] I've been doing this full time since 1976,
after I graduated from high school.
Did it in the summers with my father before that.
My father was a crabber, my grandfather,
great grandfather, my oldest son's a crabber,
so we're trying to keep it in the family.
- [Baratunde] Yeah!
- [James] Yep.
- Crabbing, it turns out,
is hard work, especially when,
what's that saying again?
Ain't hardly hot, no?
(James laughs quickly)
- It ain't hot none.
- Ain't hot none. (groans loudly)
So close! (laughs quickly)
- For the time you've been here, that was pretty good.
- Couple hours, I'll get it right next time.
- [James] Yeah, yeah.
- It's clear the outdoors is deeply
connected to Ooker's sense of identity.
It's how he makes a living,
and here, being outside is what living is all about.
(slow acoustic music)
It feels like if I just stop for a second I hear birds,
I hear the water, I feel a constant breeze.
- Yeah.
- Tell me about the natural part of living here at Tangier?
- I love the work I do, the crabbing and oystering,
but it's the extras that I love also,
is the wildlife, the different bird species around here,
and then out in the water we have
dolphins and porpoise that come around,
sea turtles, terrapins,
sting rays, we have an occasional shark that will show up,
and an occasional whale just south of the island.
It's wonderful, it's a great place.
- Sounds like a job with many benefits.
- [James] Yes, it is.
- As it happens, Ooker has more than just one job.
He also serves as the town's Mayor.
How long have you been Mayor of Tangier now?
- I'm losing count now.
It's a two year term.
Nobody runs against me, so I don't have to campaign.
I think it's a lifetime position if you want to do it.
But as long as I think I'm making a difference
in helping the community, I'll do it.
- Yeah.
When he put's it that way,
it's easy to see how Ooker keeps getting re-elected,
but the job itself sounds far from simple.
What's the hardest part of being mayor here?
- Hardest part is just, like,
when you see parts of the island disappearing.
(emotional music)
- [Baratunde] You heard him right.
Tangier is literally disappearing.
Climate change is causing the sea levels here to rise,
and erosion is eating away at the shores.
Some scientists believe this whole island
might need to be abandoned in as few as 25 years.
- Some folks have said, you know,
why don't you just leave the island and start over,
but not only financially would that
be impossible with most folks,
but it's like Dorothy said in 'The Wizard Of Oz',
there's no place like home.
(laughs quickly)
- [Baratunde] Ooker is doing his best to
protect his homeland from vanishing,
petitioning the government to build
seawalls against Tangier's shores.
It's not a bad idea, but given this areas history,
it's not a guaranteed one either.
- [James] Places can disappear if you're not protected.
I mean, there was a community north of here,
the Upper Shannon, had a small schoolhouse,
a general store, couple graveyards,
and maybe 20 or so families lived there,
and it's all underwater now.
- Can you show me something in that area?
- Yeah, we'll head up there and take a look.
- Great.
Traveling across the bay,
the layers of history begin to peel away,
revealing a time when other islands
extended across the horizon.
- This area of water here is called the flats,
and this is the uppers,
where a community used to be, Shannon,
and another community out here, Aces.
- Out here?
- Yeah, off shore.
- I don't see anything? - Nothing there.
And my father in law used to tell me,
as a child he would walk from here
to that island that's still here.
This was all connected.
This was all land when he was a child--
- That's not that long ago.
- No, so it's going away in a hurry real fast.
- Okay, that raises the stakes.
(dramatic music)
Seeing that parts of this landscape
have already vanished beneath these waters is haunting.
And on the remnants of this community,
the absence of the people who once
lived here and called it home,
it's even harder.
Did you personally know people who lived up here?
- I did, I did.
There was actually an Eskridge buried up here,
and his grave was going into the water.
So I dug the grave up, what was left of it,
got the bones and put it in a box, sealed it in a box,
got the headstone,
and reburied the bones down on the main island.
I figured that's the least I could do for a family member
instead of letting it go into the bay.
- Yeah.
(emotional music)
Feels like there's stories in everything around here.
- [James] Yep, yep.
- [Baratunde] In the soil, in the water.
- Yeah, yeah.
Really gives you an understanding
of what can happen without protection.
- Is this what I think it is?
- Yep, there's some headstones here.
Some of the headstones here, been here a long time.
1912, 1913.
- [Baratunde] Yeah.
- Without helping, without protection,
this is what can happen to the main island.
Very, very disturbing,
and yeah, sad.
Chesapeake bay has provided a living
for the folks here for years and years,
and now it's the Chesapeake Bay that's
threatening to take us away from here.
- [Baratunde] Right?
- Thanks for watching!
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(music)