John and his wife, Pearl Frink. John captained the 92’ “Thunderbird II” (at the time the East Coast’s largest party fishing boat) from 1963-1975. He ran out of ports from Key West, Florida to Calabash, North Carolina. Pearl was born in a log cabin in Calabash less than a half mile from where you are sitting here at Capt. John’s this evening. Her parents, with her aunt and uncle, founded one of the
first restaurants on the waterfront in Calabash in 1955. After sampling seafood from the Gulf of Mexico to the Carolina coast, Capt. Frink decided to open a place where others could enjoy the culinary delights they had experienced while working in the fishing industry. Many of the items on our menu are dishes Mrs. Pearl’s mother, “Grandma Janie”, featured in her kitchen as early as the 1930’s. Others are favorites they discovered in their travels. John’s serves the freshest seafood we can buy. From Morehead City, NC to Charleston, SC and all ports in between. The Town of Calabash itself was so named by the local Native Americans before the first European settlers arrived. The natives said the twisting, turning river so resembled the neck of the Calabash ground, they call the area Calabash. Traditional Calabash seafood or “Calabash Style” simply means very lightly battered and deep fried until golden brown then served in heaping portions. Calabash style originated here on the banks of the Calabash River. The founding families lived in a close knit community where the men gathered seafood from the local estuaries and the women cooked it on the riverbank, often over open fires. Visitors to the area witnessed the communal feasting and were often invited to “Pull up a seat and join us”. It didn’t take long to figure out there was a business opportunity here. Calabash, at one time, boasted 85 residents and 30 restaurants. Though the numbers have dwindled somewhat, of the original seven or eight founding families, all are still involved in the seafood industry in some way. So sit back and enjoy yourselves while we do what we’ve been doing for over fifty years, serve some of the best seafood found on the east coast! Bon Appetit!
