Growing up on the central part of the east coast and coming from a family within the waterman community, tales of ships, famous storms and local folk lore were always on hand. My grandfathers favorite reading material was about the sea, as he was a local ship captain and the island where our family originates was a relatively famous pirate enclave originally called Devil's Island. Pirates roamed the Chesapeake Bay and the southern coastline for centuries and went from disrupting shipping lanes during colonial times to becoming Oyster Pirates that my grandfather had to deal with. We also had a few of them in the family, as making a living didn't come easy being watermen.
We have all heard of the most famous pirate of the Atlantic waters, who just so happens to have made his last stand right off the coast of Moorhead City, here in North Carolina. On that fabled day that the British were finally able to defeat the mighty Blackbeard his head was cut off and his body was thrown overboard. Legend states that his body swam around the ship three times trying to find a way back on board, along with a few folks seeing a headless body searching for its head. His haunts of the North Carolina water ways have inspired many including yours truly.
This past week one of the anchors from the Queen Anne's Revenge was recovered off the coast and it should open up a litany of other finds on the wreck, after the ship sank in 1718. After three hundred years his legend still remains with us. Good or bad the world is driven by folks of character and those are the ones whose stories become legend inspiring things such as Rusty Knuckles. One of our main logos was created after a sword while thinking on pirate tales and mixed with modern mechanics. We can thank someone such as Blackbeard for several ideas, including the artwork penned for the first Revenge Run which followed Blackbeard's last stand with the British. Quite soon, we may just have something cooked' up for our brethren in the hills with that tasty Mountain Dew recipe otherwise known as Shine.
