The end of a fish story

A coastal industry disappears

BEAUFORT -- The southwest breezes blowing over this historic seaport no longer carry the thick, mealy odor from the fish factory on the outskirts of town.

For some, this is a blessing. When the Beaufort Fisheries menhaden plant was running, rendering tons of fish into oil and fish meal, critics likened the stench to that of burned cat food or burning hair.

But others can only sigh about the missing scent. For them, the aroma was more hospitably compared to a strong fish stew or fish frying. They accepted the smell, much as people in inland towns have long embraced the odors from tobacco factories or paper mills.

It was the smell of money.

And it is long gone.

The Beaufort fish factory -- the last menhaden plant in the state -- shut down two years ago. The waterfront site is earmarked for an upscale residential area. New houses with tin roofs, porches and low fences are to replace chunky wooden buildings, oil tanks and smokestacks.

The menhaden industry once had dozens of boats, employed hundreds of people and pumped money into coastal communities during lean winter months. Millions of fish were boiled, pressed and dried at the company's plants in Beaufort, Morehead City and Southport.

But that all gradually disappeared as owners wrestled with government regulation of factories and fishing, economic downturns and gentrification that turned working waterfronts into playgrounds.

Menhaden, an oily, bony fish that generally isn't considered food for humans, will still be caught for bait. It also will possibly be harvested by factory ships from Omega Protein Co. in Virginia, the largest menhaden processing company on the East Coast.

"It's depressing," said William Davis of Beaufort, a former airplane pilot who spotted menhaden from the air for the fishing fleet.

He watched one day recently as workers loaded a flatbed truck with several long fishing nets that had been stored since the plant shut down. The cork-lined nets that once held hundreds of thousands of fish at one time -- that's no fish story -- were headed for a souvenir shop in Dare County. The nets will be cut into 6-foot sections and sold as decorative pieces to hang on a wall.

The last menhaden boat operated by Beaufort Fisheries, the Gregory Poole, sits idle at the factory's wooden dock awaiting its fate. The 175-foot ship, a converted Navy vessel, set a record in the early 1990s by hauling in 93 million fish in a six-month season. A sister ship, the Coastal Mariner, has already succumbed: it was sold, stripped and intentionally sunk offshore to become part of a fishing reef.

Fighting for tradition

Jule Wheatly, Beaufort Fisheries' president and general manager, didn't care to watch the dismantling of the business his family ran for more than 70 years.

"It's like watching the death of a lover," he says.

Wheatly, 56, took over in the early 1970s after graduating from The Citadel and working at a bank for a year. Outspoken and blunt, he became a fierce advocate for the industry in general and the Beaufort plant in particular.

He tangled with environmental agencies over water and air discharges from the plant that had been routine in the past but were considered pollution under modern regulations. He had a visit from a regulatory official just about every day, he says.

"Fines were a cost of doing business," Wheatly says.

He fought with coastal towns that wanted to keep menhaden boats far from beaches and with recreational fishermen who claimed that menhaden fleets took too many fish, endangering food sources for many game fish.