Bill Troxler
Recordings
Tales of Chincoteague
Thom Nolan and I have been performing for Road Scholars programs for nearly two decades. During a typical year we’ll do thirty to forty, 90-minute shows. We perform a mix of traditional Celtic music, a few covers and a lot of original songs. Most of those original songs have historical foundations in events that have happened over the centuries in our region – Chincoteague Bay and Chesapeake Bay.
Tales of Chincoteague answers the call to make our original songs available in recorded form.
Each song on the recording has an interesting backstory. Follow the link in the title of each song to read about the origins of the music and see some images of events behind the songs.
Killoch Shoal Light
This song celebrates the professional achievements of one of the first African-American lighthouse keepers, William Major Parker. He served as keeper of the Killoch Shoal light from 1886 until his death in 1912.
Listen to a sample of the track:
Find a New Tomorrow
Chincoteague Bay and the Atlantic Ocean along the coast of Assateague are home for all sorts of marine life. One regular visitor is the most dangerous shark in American waters: the bull shark.
This song tells the story of a waterman’s encounter with a bull shark.
Listen to a sample of the track:
Lady Katie
The skipjack Lady Katie was built in 1955 in Wingate, Maryland by the famous builder of wooden ships along the Chesapeake Bay, Bronza M. Parks. It was the last skipjack built for commercial service as an oyster dredging boat. Thom Nolan wrote this song to celebrate the restoration of this historic vessel. It's a charming and uplifting song. The sad part is that three years after launching the Lady Katie, Bronza Parks was murdered at his boatyard by a client - a lawyer unhappy with the progress and cost of the boat Mr. Parks was building for him.
Listen to a sample of the track:
Last Ghost of Assateague
Until the 1920s, tiny Assateague Island had a prospering, small village located at the base of the lighthouse. Approximately 130 people lived in the village. They made their living from the sea. Mostly by harvesting and selling clams and oysters. But a developer bought up most of the land on the Island and fenced off the village from the sea shore and Toms Cove. Islanders could not longer make a living. They abandoned Assateague Island a moved to Chincoteague. This song is a tribute to Roy Jones. He was the last person born on Assateague Island. Mr. Jones recently passed away at the age of 101.
Listen to a sample of the track:
Chincoteague Moon
Love triangles always make great settings for a murder ballad. Chincoteague Moon is one of those tales. A terrible murder-suicide on the Island in 1885 generated this bit of fiction.
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Hattie Dunn
This song tells the story of the sinking of Hattie W. Dunn in WWI, forty miles off the coast of Assateague Island. The aging wooden schooner was in ballast on the way to Charleston, South Carolina to pick up a load of cotton. For forty years Hattie Dunn had made this trip to bring cotton to the textile mills of New England. Hattie Dunn was built in 1884 in Maine and sunk by a German U-Boat on May 25, 1918. America was completely unprepared for entry into WWI. There were no coastal defenses in place and the US Navy was busy with war duties in Europe. Hattie Dunn was one of six, unarmed, American merchant vessels sunk in a twelve hour period by the same U-Boat. Newspapers of the time called the day "Black Sunday".
Listen to a sample of the track:
Lost to Coal
On February 12, 1983 a terrible snow storm tracked up the Atlantic coast. The storm closed all the major cities on the east coast for several days. One of the victims of the storm was the SS Marine Electric. The aging collier sank 26 miles off the coast of Assateague Island, Virginia. Thirty-one men died. The consequences of the disaster changed the US Coast Guard forever and resulted in more than seventy commercial cargo ship being decertified and demolished in scrap yards. This song tells the story of Marine Electrics final hours.
Listen to a sample of the track:
What Could Go Wrong?
Lexi Hubb, creator of The Bivalve Trail Podcast, asked me to create a sea shanty for Episode 8: Sinking of the Marine Electric. That shows tells the story of the sinking of Marine Electric. What Could Go Wrong sums up the shared attitude of the ship's owners, the US Coast Guard, and the Union about a ship that was too old to safely continue in service.
The chorus of What Could Go Wrong? Includes words and expressions that are unfamiliar to landlubbers.
Blue Peter is the nickname of the nautical signal flag that represents the letter “P”. The flag is a blue rectangle with a smaller white rectangle inside it. In the harbor when the Blue Peter is hoisted on the signal yard, it advises all other ships that the vessel will soon depart. It is also a signal to the crew to get on board ASAP.
"All hands and the cook on deck." The galley crew and the engine crew (aka the black gang because of the coal dust) were exempt from all deck duties. However, when wind and weather conspired to threaten the survival of the ship that exemption was revoked. All hands and the cook means that the situation is dire and the ship might sink unless everyone lends a hand.
Listen to a sample of the track:
