Wisdom on the Water - Reflections of Willie C. Crockett, Jr

Wisdom on the Water - Reflections of Willie C. Crockett, JrWillie Carroll Crockett Jr., the humorous and homespun Onancock, VA resident whose seaboard paintings and well told stories made him one of the Eastern Shore of Virginias most celebrated artists. His everyman demeanor and genuine likability helped make him a living legend and a foremost Eastern Shore patriarch. Known simply as Willie, he seemed on a first name basis with an entire region. With his tall frame, gray beard, balding head and piercing

Willie Carroll Crockett Jr., the humorous and homespun Onancock, VA resident whose seaboard paintings and well-told stories made him one of the Eastern Shore of VirginiaÕs most celebrated artists. His everyman demeanor and genuine likability helped make him a living legend and a foremost Eastern Shore patriarch. Known simply as ÒWillie,Ó he seemed on a first-name basis with an entire region.
With his tall frame, gray beard, balding head and piercing eyes, Crockett cut a figure that would have looked at home as an old salt standing amid the gray skies and salt marsh featured in many of the coastal landscapes he painted since opening his Onancock gallery in 1969.
He also had a fondness for the written and spoken word, acting out scenes from Shakespeare with adults on his native Tangier Island during his youth. Along the way, Crockett became the quintessential Eastern Shoreman who lived life on his own terms Ñ hunting and fishing when he wanted, enjoying a weekly card game, reading and studying in his easy chair, and painting some of the most memorable and defining works of Eastern Shore of Virginia coastal art.