News Release

Cape Lookout National Seashore Selects Volunteers of the Year for 2022

Volunteers of the Year -- From Left to Right - Al Heltzel, Lawrence "Scotty" Scott, Tom Atkinson, Rich Rehm pose in front of completed Summer Kitchen

NPS photo

News Release Date: January 12, 2023

Contact: Nate Toering, 252-838-8909

HARKERS ISLAND, NC – Typically, a single volunteer is selected each year in recognition of their outstanding service to Cape Lookout National Seashore. However, 2022 was not a typical year for volunteer service in the park.

For 2022, Cape Lookout has selected four Volunteers of the Year:

• Tom Atkinson
• Rich Rehm
• Lawrence “Scotty” Scott
• Al Heltzel

Last year, these four park volunteers completed a project which began nearly four years earlier.

In September of 2018, Hurricane Florence brought 100 mph winds to Cape Lookout. Those winds caused damage throughout the park. One building which was severely damaged was the Cape Lookout Lighthouse Summer Kitchen. The Summer Kitchen had lost the majority of its roof and a good portion of its siding. Worse yet, the interior framing holding the building together was severely compromised from water damage.

It was a daunting task to take on, and it was taken on as an all-volunteer project. Beginning with a new cedar shake roof to keep the water out, the team of volunteers diligently worked to restore the building back to its former glory. They replaced large portions of several load bearing walls, completely re-sided the exterior with wood planks, and hand-made custom windows, doors, stairs, and trim. They left the building better than they found it by adding beautiful interior wood siding and repairing a substantial broken section of concrete slab flooring.

The long-term plans for the Summer Kitchen are to prepare the interior as a living history museum that highlights what it might have looked like in 1917. Park visitors arriving for lighthouse tours will first conduct a tour of the Keepers Quarters and Summer Kitchen Museum before beginning their tour of the Cape Lookout Lighthouse. The park intends to synchronize the opening of this new museum with the re-opening of the lighthouse for public climbing after lighthouse renovations are completed.

The opening of this new park museum and the substantial improvement to the visitor experience it will bring, could not have been accomplished without the hard work and dedication of these four volunteers.

In addition to their outstanding group work, each of these four volunteers also contributed substantially as individuals.

Tom Atkinson served as a Keepers Quarters volunteer, sharing his knowledge and love of the park as well as speaking with visitors about the ongoing restoration project on the Summer Kitchen. In the latter half of 2022, Tom also became certified as an ATV operator and began assisting the park’s resource management staff.

Rich Rehm also served as a Keepers Quarters volunteer, relying on his knowledge of cultural history after years of experience giving tours of the Cape Lookout Lighthouse. He also worked as a frontline interpreter with the park’s brand new, “Can You Dig It?” program, which connected park visitors with a field biologist during the excavation of a recently hatched turtle nest. Rich also assists resource management and compliance staff with office duties at park headquarters. Finally, Rich will be taking on the roll of a coordinator for an upcoming public outreach program scheduled to begin in 2023.

Lawrence “Scotty” Scott was heavily involved with assisting the resource management division. In particular, he worked closely in monitoring the wild horses of Shackleford Banks. In that duty, he assisted with everything from general censusing to more complex tasks like DNA collection. Scotty was heavily involved in the removal of large pieces of trash from Shackleford Banks after a vessel broke apart and scattered debris across the island. His supervisors praised his ability to be self-sufficient in these duties.

Al Heltzel shared his deep love for the park with visitors at many locations at the park. He served quite regularly at both the Harkers Island Visitor Center and the Beaufort Visitor Information Center. His enthusiasm about the park was infectious and he couldn’t talk about the lighthouse without a smile on his face. In addition to his duties at the visitor centers, Al also regularly assisted the resource management division with horse monitoring activities and assisted law enforcement staff with distributing off-road vehicle passes on Core Banks. Al received the “Volunteer of the Year” award in 2018. He will be the first volunteer in the 24-year history of this award to receive it twice. Unfortunately, Al will receive this award posthumously, as he passed away in December of 2022. He will continue to be remembered through his long-standing contributions throughout the park.