[piano intro] [upbeat music] - [Heather] The North Carolina coast encompasses beauty, history, and fun.

- Don't move again until the music starts to playing.

- [Heather] Join us as we explore some of our most treasured people, places, and coastal traditions.

- [Shawn] It was just this great mixture of old school and new school.

- [Heather] The coast is calling, and it's all on My Home.

[upbeat music] All across the state, we're uncovering the unique stories that make North Carolina My Home.

♪ Come home, come home ♪ ♪ - Well, I, well, just the fact that I am famous.

I hate to say it, I am famous.

I don't walk down that way anymore.

I walk, always walk down to the east end.

I came from small town, and I always want to speak to everybody I see, and I still do that.

If I get 'em to stop long enough, I'll tell 'em I'm the Kindred Spirit Mailbox man, and, oh, we're so glad to see you.

Let me tell you what happened to me down there.

[chuckles] [peaceful music] - [Writer] Kindred Spirit, I'm here for the first time with my newfound family, and the love of my life.

Never before have I been this happy, and finally, I have someone who understands the meaning of true love and loyalty.

- [Heather] On a remote stretch of beach on the North Carolina coast near Sunset Beach, it's a treasured tradition for thousands who visit these waters each year.

- [Frank] Everybody comes down there feeling blue, and leaves feeling great.

- [Heather] After a mile and a half walk on Bird Island, you'll see the flag, and then the Kindred Spirit Mailbox, which for over 35 years has uniquely safeguarded thousands of secrets, joys, and heartaches within its tightly-bound journals.

- You see how many composition notebooks are in there, and even children's writings are just the best.

- [Jenna] Hi, my name is Jenna.

I am 10 years old.

I live in Cleveland, Ohio.

I have been going to Sunset Beach for 10 years, and my dad has been going here for 40 years.

- [Heather] For years, no one knew who put the Kindred Spirit Mailbox here until just recently.

- And I always felt like the people that went down there were the Kindred Spirits, and they brought the Kindred Spirit when they come.

- [Heather] Frank Nesmith and his late former girlfriend Claudia put the mailbox here over 35 years ago.

The story goes that Frank found Claudia struggling to put the mailbox up, and Frank found a piece of driftwood to steady it.

That's when they met.

- Well, you know, that's the same old piece of driftwood I found 35 years ago, and put it together, and it's still there.

- [Heather] The two placed a notebook inside, hoping people would write in it.

But Frank says they never dreamed of how people would connect to this place.

- Surprised to pieces.

I can't tell you how.

I had no idea it would take off like it did.

- [Heather] People come to write about love and family, silliness and joy, but you'll also find sadness, longing, and loss within the openly-penned diaries of the Kindred Spirits who come to the mailbox.

- [Writer] Today marks two years since God called you home.

I miss you terribly.

And the first year was grief, and just trying to survive, the second year, loneliness and longing.

- It's good to recall 'em, because I can tiptoe through the tulips, and pick some mighty nice wildflowers out of those books.

- [Heather] Frank, now 88, says he can't make the big walk down to the mailbox anymore, so he relies on helpers like local author, Jack DeGroot, who along with her friend Sandy keeps the Kindred Mailbox going.

- But I think people just need some, a place where they can go where they can say it all.

They don't have to hold back.

They don't have to worry about people being judgemental.

It's, these are their thoughts, and they're gonna put 'em out there.

I feel like I'm doing something to help people.

If the notebooks weren't collected, if they weren't saved, that would be terrible.

- [Heather] Hundreds of the journals are now in special collection at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington's Randall Library, where their unique voice will always have a home.

- [Writer] We have always come down to Kindred Spirit for clarity and guidance.

You have been part of reunions of kindred souls, crossroads in my life, and new beginnings.

I have the love of my life with me now, and we are starting a new chapter in our life.

- [Heather] As for Frank Nesmith, he enjoys talking to anyone about the legacy of the Kindred Spirit Mailbox that he and Claudia started so long ago.

- Regardless of what ever else happens around here, the Kindred Spirit, she'll still be alive and kicking when I'm dead and gone.

- We are heading to Topsail Beach to meet with Doris Jenkins.

She has an unusual job.

She runs the post office by day, and then a roller skating rink by night in the same building.

She and her husband built that roller rink over 60 years ago, and when you walk into the roller rink, people tell me it's nothing short of magic.

[peaceful music] [waves washing] [lively music] ♪ - [Doris] Well, I've done so many years, that's all I know to do.

I'm Doris Jenkins, and my home is Topsail Beach, North Carolina.

I've been in the public eye all my life, and I just enjoy the public.

- Thank you.

- Thank you, bye bye.

The name of our business is the Topsail Skating Rink.

[upbeat music] ♪ - Hey, Miss Doris.

Where's my box to roll up?

- [Doris] I work in the post office in the morning, and the roller skating at night.

- Have people ever come up to you and said how unique it is to see a post office and a roller rink above it?

What do people say about that?

- Oh, they just never seen it before.

We put it upstairs to keep the hurricanes from messing up the floor.

My husband designed the building, and we built it ourself in May of 1964.

We met at skating rink, and his name is Joseph Jenkins, but they call him Sonny.

He was three and a half years older than me, so he didn't look at me.

[chuckling] We just enjoyed it.

I mean, we just, we just loved skating.

[lively music] [indistinct chatter] Thank you.

Sometimes they come in and say, "Well, I haven't skated in 40 years," and I'll say, "Put your skates on, and hang around the rail till you get used to it."

Y'all stay under your numbers, stay under your numbers.

I don't hear any music playing.

Don't move again until the music starts to playing.

We have to let the numbers called out leave the floor in safety.

- [Heather] What kind of music do you guys play?

- '50s, '60s, '70s, and '80s.

I got a whole stack of Elvis Presley.

We don't play acid rock, and all that other stuff.

- Which music do you like to hear the most?

- Oh, I skate by slow stuff.

When I'm out there skating and doing this, I don't think of nothing else.

If I did, I wouldn't be able to skate.

- [Heather] So you have done some couples skating in your time?

- Oh, yeah, quite a few miles, quite a few miles.

I wish he was here.

I'd skate the night with him, but he's not.

- [Heather] When was he diagnosed with Alzheimer's?

- Four years ago, this past October was four years ago, and I wish I could tell him, "Sonny, you remember so and so?"

but he, I can say that, but he doesn't.

I don't try to say things like that.

'cause then I'll cry.

[chuckles] Still got his skates.

I wouldn't do nothing with his skates.

Still got his skates, and they'll be right there.

It's one place that all the family can come, and they can all do the same thing, not having bring their worries, and troubles, and all that.

We're just an old timey skating rink, and people love it.

The next skate will be an all skate, everybody skate.

I see my myself skating till I'm 125.

[laughing] [peaceful music] - Commercial fishing is a way of life on the Outer Banks.

But in 1937, one man took a chance on a new way to support his family, and created the Albatross Fleet, the very first charter boat fishing on the Outer Banks.

- You clear that inlet in the morning, and the sun is coming up, and you look out there, and you have no idea, and every day is a potential adventure.

My name is Ernie Foster, and my home is Hatteras Village.

[peaceful music] [seabirds calling] One of the neat things for me growing up, my daddy was a fisherman.

I mean, everyone's father fished, but my father was in the sport fishing business.

I've lived here all of my life.

I was born in the area, and all of my grandparents were born here on Hatteras Island.

[peaceful music] A great thing about living in a small place is everyone knows you.

Terrible thing about living in a small place, everybody knows you.

[chuckling] [happy music] - This has changed so much since you were little because with the bridge and everything.

It's changed everything.

- It is so so dramatic.

And fishing is a big, obviously, a big part of this community.

One of the great things about Hatteras is that our fishing offers a lot of variety.

Let's get it up.

The most spectacular fish we catch are, of course, the bill fish, and the greatest one of those by far is the blue marlin.

And the notion that the closest thing we have to a statue is basically a mounted marlin, that was a big deal when it was caught, says something about what this village thinks about the importance of fishing.

- And that was your uncle that caught that?

- That was my uncle that caught that.

This is gonna be the 80th year of the Albatross Fleet, which, began to realize that's a long time.

My father name was Arnold Foster.

He would say, "I came up with this idea, and all of the old timers in the village told me how crazy I was," that people would pay him to take them sport fishing.

So he saved up his money for a couple of years.

He bought the wood, and found someone who would build him the boat that he wanted, and it literally was the first boat built in North Carolina for the purpose of taking people out in the Gulf Stream sport fishing.

[peaceful music] He started taking me fishing with him.

I'd just ride along.

Well, that lasted until the summer I was 13, and then he put me to work.

I've worked every fishing season since then.

[peaceful music] To have a job in which a day off grinds on you, you never have a season in which you don't see something that you have never seen before.

It's amazing how that cove has set on down like that.

You don't just meet customers.

They kind of become your friends.

You game?

- [Customer] Yeah.

- If you're gonna spend 10, 11 hours a day with them, you want them to be your friends.

[chuckling] Let's go ahead and get one.

Gotta get it inside the boat, get it inside boat.

Seeing the smiles, when that smile goes from ear to ear, and you know that you have helped them experience something.

Woo-hoo, there we go.

It keeps me for taking it for granted.

[peaceful music] [upbeat music] - [Kenny] Growing up surfing was I ate it up and lived it.

I knew it somewhere, some way down the line, it was gonna be my livelihood.

[upbeat music] - [Shawn] God, surfing, and family, that's what we're about.

God gave us the ability to build these, and to do what we love to do for a living, and we're both are on the same mission.

We're a team.

- [Kenny] My name is Kenny Briel.

- [Shawn] My name's Shawn O'Donnell.

- [Both] and our home is Wilmington, North Carolina.

[upbeat music] [waves washing] - I'm born and raised here in Wilmington, North Carolina.

I started surfing when I was about 12 years old with all my friends.

I just did it to have fun with my friends, and to meet girls.

You know, that's why I think every surfer starts surfing.

[upbeat music] - Growing up, I couldn't hardly get through school because of surfing, and if the surf was head higher or bigger, I could see it from my classroom windows, and I literally would walk out and go surfing.

You just can't get it outta your blood no matter what you do.

[upbeat music] - I was 17 years old.

I quit high school, and I walked into the surf shop, and the guy looked at me and said, "Well, you're gonna be a pro surfer.

You can't even win every contest locally," and he popped me in the back of the head, and said show up at my surfboard shop Monday morning.

And here it is 28 years later, and I'm still doing this.

- I grew up never wearing a shirt, never wearing shoes, always fishing, living off the land, and I had a buddy that I grew up with.

He used to call me the Savage, and that's how the name kicked up for the label.

Originally, I started building surfboards in 1972.

I started building a few boards on a custom level, and at that time I started bringing 'em down to Shawn who was Wrightsville [indistinct].

And we decided to team up, and start producing the boards on a little bit larger scale, and he got in a head-on accident.

- 2014, I was in a very severe car accident.

I spent almost five months in a medical chair.

I had just met Kenny about probably five to six months before that, and I was doing work for him, and I believe it's a God thing.

Kenny lives an hour and a half away, drove here every day and ran my surfboard factory for me while I was healing, and didn't charge me one dime, nothing.

It just showed me how much this guy cared.

And I mean, he would come in, tell me what was going on day-to-day, and just tell me to focus on healing.

[waves rushing] - At that point, the retirement or semi-retirement ended, and went back into full swing which was fine, because I love it.

I drive basically an hour and a half to hour and 45 minutes a day, and people ask me, "Why do you do that?"

And I go, "'Cause I love my job."

[waves rushing] - It was just this great mixture of old school and new school, that we really bounce good ideas off each other.

With his 40 plus years of building surfboards, and I'm into my 28th year, there's a lot of cool things that we embrace technology, and we still respect the old school way.

I think that's really why we're growing, and keep getting bigger every year.

[tools scraping] [upbeat music] - Every dollar I bring in here, I consciously try to buy locally, and I mean from our fiberglass cloths, our resins, our foam.

And I know if I'm buying it locally, that that money's circulating back into the community.

It's going right here within North Carolina.

To me, it's a 360 circle.

I believe that we all have a duty to help make our economy grow strong.

- Building surfboards, and deadlines, and paying bills, that stress can be real sometimes.

Man, in my whole life, I don't even feel like I've ever had a job, but at the end of the day, I get to make surfboards, so it's awesome.

I love it.

- It's honoring.

It's humbling to be able to build something that you create through your mind, that then is gravitated from eyes to your hands, to then be able to craft that project, and then be able to watch somebody else take that piece of material that you've carved and finished, and watch them gravitate and then enhance the same joy, the same excitement that you have been able to do surfing.

Now they get to do it, and they're doing it through something you created.

[upbeat music] - To go out and surf something that you made, and you're just like, "Wow, I made that."

But while you're paddling back out, and seeing what the younger kids can do with something that you made, it's mind-blowing.

[upbeat music] ♪ - And I think the last part of my legacy in this industry is I would like to know that everything I was taught, that I would like to pass on to them, 'cause I don't believe it's mine to keep.

I believe it's mine to continue to hand on to the next person.

[upbeat music] [upbeat music] ♪ ♪ ♪