March 28, 2024

Help Captain Pat’s: Help the Watermen

The loss of Captain Pat’s Seafood restaurant in Lexington Park has ramifications beyond its disappointed patrons, and even beyond the owners facing a cataclysmic loss on top of the economic uncertainty the coronavirus pandemic is wrecking on the restaurant industry.

Also suffering are local watermen, according to LexLeader’s own Cap’n Jack Russell. He describes Captain Pat’s Seafood as one of the few local buyers for fresh Chesapeake Bay and Potomac River seafood. “Captain Pat’s was a local buyer who demanded top quality, fresh seafood all year-round.”

The additional costs of transportation adds not only fuel and vehicle costs but substantial investment in refrigeration and additional, licensed labor. Most commercial watermen remaining in Southern Maryland are part-timers. That is, part of their time they spend doing something else so to make ends meet. Without a reliable local buyer, fewer of the part-timers can remain.

Media reports the fire marshal deemed the fire accidental and caused by an malfunction in the boiler. Significant damage has been done to the building and its contents.

Cap’n Pat Wathen’s daughter has launched a GoFundMe page to help her dad get the restaurant back in order.

 

Till next time, remember “It’s Our Bay, Let’s Pass It On.”

To learn about tours and trips into the Chesapeake, keep in touch with Fins + Claws on Facebook. Please visit Cap’n Jack’s lore and share with your social media sites. Or reach him here: [email protected]  or 240-434-1385.

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