Ernest McIntosh Sr. and his four brothers were born into a crabbing family, surrounded by 2,700 acres of coastal saltwater wildlife refuge in Harris Neck, Georgia—30 miles south of Savannah, in McIntosh County. Although his brothers immediately pursued crabbing with their father, Ernest worked as a construction laborer until he was laid off in 1978. He returned to the waters of his childhood and began commercially harvesting blue crab on the five boats owned by his family. After seeing no long-term future in the crabbing industry from environmental and environmental changes, Mr. McIntosh and his family began raising oysters supplied by oceanographic and university institutions. The McIntosh family remains the last Black-owned oyster business in Harris Neck, supplying the demands of local seafood restaurants.   

Mr. McIntosh inherited this business from his father, who expanded from harvesting to owning a crab picking house—Blue Crab Lane—in the 1980s. The crab picking house employed up to 50 women who packaged and shipped crab meat across the United States during the decade it was open. As a wholesale dealer and harvester, Mr. McIntosh recalls changes in crab harvesting numbers and seasons that occurred over the past 40 years in the industry. Mr. McIntosh shares his observations of other changes to the environment, industry, and government regulations that forced the Blue Crab Lane and other picking houses to close. After seeing no long-term future in the crab industry, Mr. McIntosh shifted his focus to oysters and continues to pass on his inherited knowledge about the crab and oyster business to his son. Ernest Sr. and Ernest Jr. now provide James Beard Award nominated seafood restaurants in Georgia with quality, hand raised, clean oysters with a “salty taste.”