The Straits border Marshallberg’s southern shore, while Core Sound runs along its east side, separating Core Banks from the mainland and providing important fishing grounds for Marshallberg and neighboring communities. To support this fishing fleet, boatbuilding became a longstanding tradition in Marshallberg, where M.W. Willis and Sons once employed boatbuilders from across Down East to meet demand for finely crafted vessels, including the well-known Albatross fleet of Hatteras built in the Core Sound style. The Straits was the most used waterway in colonial maritime commerce, helping make Straits and Gloucester the two oldest settlements in Carteret County, while Marshallberg was settled later in 1800. Marshallberg’s history has remained closely tied to the commercial fishing industry of Down East, and today Marshallberg Harbor is home port for an active fleet of shrimpers and fishermen. One of Marshallberg’s most notable natives, Captain Fred Gillikin, played an important role in the history of the United States Coast Guard when, 48 days after its establishment on January 28, 1915, the three-masted schooner Sylvia C. Hall wrecked about 10 miles off Cape Lookout Shoals on March 17, 1915. Gillikin, then the lighthouse station keeper, launched his surfboat with his crew through cold, turbulent, 20-foot-high seas and rescued the schooner’s crew, carrying out the very first rescue operation of the newly formed United States Coast Guard. Like many Down East communities, Marshallberg also had a theater where young people gathered on weekends, arriving by boat or by ox and cart to enjoy films at the Lyric Theater.