The Generator Society

Michael Kruse: One of the southernmost parts of the Old North State, one of the northernmost points of this country's subtropics, hard where the warmer, calmer waters of the Cape Fear River clash with the colder, roiling currents of the Atlantic Ocean, Bald Head Island juts into the sea toward the treacherous Frying Pan Shoals. Barrier islands are as much the former as the latter — they are barriers — and so they bear the brunt of the surroundings' relentless assault. The water and the wind spray tiny shards of salt and sand. The dunes get hit first. They protect the maritime forest. The maritime forest gets hit next. It protects the marsh. A healthy barrier island has these three…