For over twenty years , Virginia - based journalist Earl Swift has been write about Tangier Island , a midget slip of demesne in the Chesapeake Bay several miles from mainland Virginia . Most of the island ’s men make their life catching downcast crab , while the womanhood run eatery , the inn , and the grocery store . It ’s one of the most isolated spots in America , and one of the most conservative . Eighty - seven percentof Tangier Island ’s elector throw off ballots for Trump in 2016 .
That voting record might seem ironical consider that the community is also one of America ’s most imperiled thanks to mood change . Since 1850 , Tangier has lost almost 70 percent of its land mass due to sea layer rise and other environmental factors . The mass of Tangier are poised to be among America ’s first climate refugee .
In his coming record , Chesapeake Requiem : a Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island , Swift describe the year he spent with the islander to learn about why their island is drop down and what — if anything — can be done about it . He ’s not promising for their future .
With a universe of just 450 and dwindling away , state of matter and Union governing have n’t made the island ’s hereafter a priority , hang back their feet on grant the support need to build a flood management system . The island-dweller seem disappointed , but not panic . Most do n’t believe that ocean - floor rise is a real terror and seem to suppose they have longer than they do . Swift figures they have another 20 to 25 days top .
His book therefore reads as an ode to a people who are go away , capturing the ins and out of their everyday life : the ways they make for , speak , campaign , make jokes , and voting . Taken together , Swift ’s descriptions indicate that Tangier might be one of the most interesting — if strangest — places in the state . And that ’s just why , he fence , the island deserves save .
Earther spoke with Swift about the new book . The interview has been edit for duration and limpidity .
Earther : Tell me about how you discovered what ’s pass to Tangier Island .
Swift : I was a reporter at the Virginian Pilot , the newspaper in Norfolk , Virginia for 21 years , where I found myself assigned to Tangier for various reasons . I counterfeit relationships on the island and became increasingly conscious of what was happening to the place because of climate change . You see , I used to live near the water in Norfolk , where north easterly and hurricanes would bring the water into my vicinity . It seemed that no matter how serious the storm , the pee came high each year . I found myself wondering , “ If it ’s this bad down here in the metropolis , what ’s it care on Tangier , where there is nothing keeping the piddle from come up over the land ? ”
Earther : Why is Tangier at risk of disappearing ?
Swift : The water is rising all around the world , include in the Chesapeake Bay . But Tangier — and much of the farming in the mid - Atlantic and south Chesapeake — is also sink because of a physical process called postglacial , or isostatic , rebound .
It ’s a by - product of the last Ice Age . think a waterbed . If you drive your hand down into it , the H2O beneath your hand moves to another section where it raises the bed . That ’s what come about here . During the last Ice Age , the Arctic and sub - Arctic built up ice sheets so thick and hard that they compressed the Earth ’s surface . That compressed surface labor down on a gel - like mantle beneath the crust of the Earth , causing the mantle to squeeze out away from the point of compression . Islands in the South Chesapeake and in the mid - Atlantic resulted from the rise . But now that the shabu has melted , the ground has rebounded and the mantle has begun to suck up back northward . As the mantle seeps off , the island sink .
Earther : Tangier is also losing almost 15 foot of shoreline each class because of rising sea and erosion .
Swift : Yes , on average . But one of the puzzling things about Tangier ’s situation is that its land red ink precedes by 200 years any kind of fall into place realization that sea level rise is a problem . Tangier ’s always lost land , especially on its Mae West side . When a storm hits from the west , and the wafture roll in , they do n’t climb to a decent peak . Instead they smack powerful into an scarp of turf and give out it off in huge lump . If you look at maps from 1850 and compare them with Tangier today , it ’s dumfounding . Mind boggling . Most of the places you could have work up a sign on back then are now gone .
Earther : Why do you think the phrases “ climate change ” and “ ocean level rise ” are still met with mistrust on the island ?
fleet : First of all , this is a community of old school Christians , many of whom are scriptural literalists . So , sell them on the notion that part of their job is due to an Ice Age that ended eleven thousand age ago — when their rendition of scripture distinguish them that the Earth was create just six thousand year ago — is a tough thing to get them to accept . Second , they ’re wonted to having scientist distinguish them thing about the blue crab and the bay laurel , about all of the other aspect of the sea that they experience as watermen , and they just do n’t agree with it . They ’ve come to view scientists in general as book smart , but know - nothings when it fall to the water .
Earther : That serve me to understand why a bulk of islander voted for Trump , a man who state that climate change is a humbug .
Swift : The less I say about that the better , I recollect . I understand why it happened , but oh boy it ’s frustrating .
Earther : Did n’t Tangier ’s city manager , James Eskridge , speak to Trump about protect the island ?
Earther : Even if Trump had want to help them , is it in reality potential to follow up a flood management system on Tangier ?
Earther : What surprised you the most about your year on Tangier ?
fleet : One of the thing that impressed me the most is their willingness to help each other . Last April a crabbing gravy boat get into fuss about six miles to the West of the island where the alcove is at its widest . A tempest run into , and the boat began to sink . Every capable - embodied , male member of the population hold up out into that tempest to attempt to save the boat ’s captain , Ed Charnock , and his son Jason , when they sleep together the tempest was deadly . Whatever failings they might have … they are a community of people that has each other ’s backs to a academic degree that most of us ca n’t even fathom . The idea that we may lose that makes me really deplorable . I think we need places like that to bring home who we are at nub .
Earther : Is Tangier a case study in how we will deal with other communities at peril of sea level salary increase ?
fleet : We ’re going to front Tangiers by the hundreds in a very few old age . This is just a stoolie in the ember mine . How we manage with Tangier will form how we deal with so many other communities threatened by ocean stage wage hike . So , in a way , Tangier impel us to answer some interrogation : Do you save a office because it ’s reflective of the American experience , or because it ’s an outlier ? This is not a typical American Ithiel Town . It ’s one of the weirdest towns in America ; it ’s a dotty place . But the fact that it live , I think , enriches all of us .
Chesapeake Requiem : a Year with the Watermen of Vanishing Tangier Island goes on sales agreement August 7 , 2018 .
Amy Brady is the deputy newspaper publisher of Guernica magazine and the elderly editor in chief of the Chicago Review of Books .
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