Shore Line 1974

There are 235 houses, 122 condominium units, 42 apartments, and, at least, one alligator “surfacing occasionally, sunning himself on the sand” in Brock Basin. 

Photo from by Debbie Morris taken in North Carolina 
but not in Pine Knoll Shores

It’s 1974 in Pine Knoll Shores. The Shore-line newsletter has lost its hyphen and become Pine Knoll Shore Line. High spirits of being a new town and publishing a new paper are still evident, but so are the challenges of both endeavors. At no time does the paper become political or negative, but a statement at the end of the first paragraph of the January issue suggests a theme: “…many voices were heard, many viewpoints aired.”

Shore-line 1973

 Interest in the early history of Pine Knoll Shores’ monthly newspaper,  originally a newsletter—called Shore-line and, later, Shore-Line, or The Shore-Line—began in 2010 when resident Jack Goldstein donated to the town back issues he and his wife had kept from 1973 to 1985, a valuable collection with very few missing issues. It was then discovered that past editors—including Betty Carr, long-time town employee—had kept back newsletters in notebooks. Putting together what was in the notebooks with what the Goldsteins had donated provided a complete set of newsletters from 1973 to 2002, when publication temporarily ceased. 

In 2004, with the support of newly-elected Mayor Joan Lamson, Bill White revived the town’s monthly publication, converting The Shore-Line newsletter into The Shoreline newspaper. About a decade later, members of the town’s History Committee and past Shoreline editors organized a collection of back papers so the town would have a complete archive from 1973 to the present, except for brief periods when the newsletter was not published. 

Thanks to efforts of the History Committee, that archive is now easily accessible at www.ncdigital.com. “Shore-line 1973” is the first in a series of articles attempting to provide highlights from the archive.