Leadership Carteret Weekly Wrap-Up: Morehead City Day

on February 10, 2025

At nearly 10,000 residents, Morehead City is the largest municipality in Carteret and is generally considered the county’s central commercial area. It’s home to a busy port, the county hospital, the local newspaper, and the only Walmart Supercenter–a serious measure of community size by rural standards.

Morehead City Day started at First Methodist Church with a delicious breakfast and an inspirational message from Pastor Powell Osteen. We then segued into an exploration of downtown organizations.

Morehead is widely known for two major sea-life-centric events, the NC Seafood Festival and the Big Rock Blue Marlin Tournament. Together, they bring tens of thousands of people–and their pocketbooks–to the area each year. Both organizations give back to our community in a myriad ways, including charitable giving to other local nonprofits.

*Tommy Bennett, Big Rock Blue Marlin Tournament board member and chair of the Charitable Giving Committee speaks to the class about the tournament’s 66-year history.*

Olympus Dive Center taught us about the economic and ecological impacts that diving has on our area. We may not have rainbow colored coral reefs off our coast, but this area is widely known in the diving world for its shipwrecks, including the remnants of a World War 2 German U-Boat.

Back on dry land, Carteret Community Theatre told us about their programming and 6-year journey of recovery after Hurricane Florence destroyed their performance center. The organization is thriving again, and reconstruction of their downtown space has begun thanks to generous funding from donors.

Next up, a bit of town history. Shannon Adams (Big Rock Sports), historian and 5th generation Promise Lander, gave a walking tour of his ancestral neighborhood, the Promise Land, which sits just west of Downtown Morehead Proper along Bogue Sound. This small fishing community formed by necessity after the Hurricane of 1899 wiped out much of Diamond City on Shackleford Banks, the Promise Landers’ original home.

*Promise Land descendent Shannon Adams tells the class about some of the more unique features of the neighborhood, like its public alleyways that provide water access to all.*

By the time we finished exploring the Promise Land, we’d worked up an appetite. Off we headed to Hope Mission of Coastal Carolina‘s soup kitchen, where two of our own classmates and Hope Mission staff, Rebecca Sotirkys and Heather Lamp, gave us a tour of the facility. Hope Mission is in the midst of a big push to expand its nutrition, temporary housing, and addiction recovery services. They expect to break ground on a new housing facility in the near future.

While there, we picked up lunch to go (meatloaf and mashed potatoes) and headed to Morehead City Hall. After lunch, the class heard from City Manager Chris Turner and staff while enjoying homemade chocolate chip cookies from city Public Information Officer and Leadership Carteret Class of 2018 graduate, Anna Smith.

*Glenn Lamp talks to the group about Meals on Wheels during our tour of Hope Mission’s soup kitchen.*

After a crash course in municipal management, we headed to the Morehead City Police Department, where several of us were “booked,” mugshots and all.

The day wrapped up over at the historic Train Depot with a talk from Downtown Morehead City, Inc., the nonprofit that manages Morehead City’s downtown Main Street program and promotes visitation to the area. Though we were technically done with our day, the class was invited to attend the first optional class social at The Club at The Webb where several of us took the time to get to know each other better.

Special Thanks

A big thank you to community partners Hope Mission of Coastal Carolina and First Methodist Church for providing meals for the class; to Shannon Adams for sharing his immense knowledge of local history; our speakers; and our facilitators: Alan Leary (RE/MAX Ocean Properties), Christina Fulcher (Mary Cheatham King Real Estate) and Beverly Snowden.

Next up is Newport Day!