Promise-landers

In my research I have come across an interesting group of people who literally moved their houses by boat to the more prosperous Morehead City during the era I am writing about. They called it the Promiseland and became known as the Promise-landers. As one of my characters goes back to what he loves, the sea, I am anxious to see how he connects to this unique group of people. They seemed to set aside prejudice of North versus South, skin color, and gender in favor of "working the water" - if you could "work the water" you had value and worth. This is quite unique in this time period and I can't wait to see how it affects the other characters in the story.