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In Pictures: 2020 A year-end visual review of 2020

Harvey Bruce, owner of Poor Piggy’s BBQ and Goin’ Ham food trucks, made deep-fried pork tenderloin with oyster balls on the side, served with eggs and pancakes. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough) - January
Erin Ellsworth, owner of Petals To The People flower bus, makes a delivery in January for a monthly subscriber in Wilmington. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
The Alcove Beer Garden is the city’s newest craft beer bar and the latest addition to a business incubation project known as the ‘Outpost’ inside Wilmington’s growing Cargo District. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Former mayor of New York City and Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg prepares to hit the stage during a rally at Laney High School this weekend. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
(Top) Michael Bloomberg addresses the crowd at Laney High School in March. (Bottom left) Bloomberg talks with Wilmington Mayor Bill Saffo before endorsing him.
The Maine Lobster Company opened in February. The “Stonington” is served on a toasted, warm split-top roll topped with 4 oz. of fresh lobster meat caught off the coast of Maine. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Gene Merritt at a Save Our Hospital meeting in March. The lights in City Hall temporarily went out in the middle of the press conference. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Beth Commander, owner of Southport’s Trolly Stop, takes an order from customers in March. Southport small businesses attributed a slowdown in business to the offline ferry system. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Top) Rebecca Trammel, founder of the non-profit Champions for Compassion, carries a foldable table across Rankin Street to set up a meal pick-up station at Rankin Terrace for children who could not otherwise access meals available for pick-up at various New Hanover County Schools. (Bottom) Rachel Freeman School of Engineering Principal Dionne Sturdivant shares an elbow bump with a student during meal pick-up hours as schools remain closed due to the coronavirus. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
NHRMC staff donning face masks guard the main entrance of the 17th Street hospital mid-March, allowing only a limited number of support personnel who are free of symptoms. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
On the front lines of the Covid-19 crises, essential workers handle cash and cards, restock empty shelves, and routinely clean surfaces where the virus is known to stay intact for hours, and in some cases up to three days. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Victor Treto, an employee at Harris Teeter on Oleander Avenue, said he's seen customers clearing out shelves, particularly items like meat, bread, toilet paper, water, and hand sanitizer. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Gearing up for their busiest season, most small local farmers invested ahead of spring production. With the pandemic, some find themselves with unforeseen hurdles getting their products to consumers. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
By mid-March, New Hanover County Chairwoman Julia Olson-Boseman confirmed that 28 tests had been taken in the county but zero confirmed cases of Covid-19. Just two days later, she announced the county's first presumptive positive case of Covid-19, and an increase of total tests to 65. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Thousands gathered at Carolina Beach near the town’s boardwalk on Friday afternoon as Town Council voted to close all beach accesses. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Zachary Howard works out at the O2 gym on Independence Blvd. and Oleander Ave. The next day, 02 announced it was temporarily closing its facilities based on advisories from federal, state, and local governmental authorities. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Single mother Tiffany Bradley, 37, takes care of eight children in Wilmington’s northside. “I don’t count on apples I don’t have in my hands. Because the apples that I’ve got, I need them to feed the kids,” she said of rationing both food and money during the coronavirus outbreak. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Tyler Younghans, 6, and his dog Jewel look out the window of their home in Leland. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Top) Thirteen-year-old twins Hadlie and James McAbee look outside their Wilmington house during the coronavirus stay-at-home order with handmade masks their family makes from their living room. (Bottom) Tatum, 10, and Landon Aarnink, 7, peer through the window from the “Aarnink Academy,” a dining room their mom has designated as a learning space during the stay-at-home order in Wilmington. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Port City Daily photos/Mark Darrough)
5:30 p.m. A car turns onto a relatively empty Dawson Street mid-March. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Pastor Tyler Daniels pictured in the empty pews of Zion United Methodist Church in Leland in April. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Portraits of Wilmington residents wearing homemade cloth masks, ski masks, bandanas, N-95 respirators, and surgical masks. (Port City Daily photos/Mark Darrough, Johanna F. Still)
(Left) Julie Romero, owner of Hands in the Sands, looks at her N.C. Department of Employment Security portal, hoping for an update that hasn’t yet come. (Right) Aida Maldonado in her salon, Power of Beauty in Wilmington, closed for four weeks due to the coronavirus under government orders. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Public beach accesses in Kure Beach and Carolina Beach remain closed in April as several beach communities along the coast reopen access points, allowing existing residents to exercise on the beach strand. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Top) Public health nurse Tammy Dilling, who teaches at three schools in the county, was eager to join the frontline in fighting the pandemic. “I’m very blessed and excited. Public health is our role – we’re assigned school health but public health is our passion and our life,” she said. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Closed and warning signs taped and fasted to shops downtown Wilmington in early May alert customers not to enter, ask them to order takeout, or simply announce the small business’ closure due to the coronavirus. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
From right to left, Dameon Shepard, his mother Monica Shepard, and their attorney Jim Lea on the front porch where the armed mob allegedly threatened to enter the Shepards’ home. (Mark Darrough/Port City Daily)
Friends mourn the loss of Stephanie Mayorga and Paige Escalera at a memorial set up in May above a curb where it appears Escalera’s car made contact before landing approximately 150 feet away in a wooded marsh. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Chase Duncan sprinkles P.T.’s Grille’s “gold dust,” the restaurant’s signature lemon pepper seasoning on burgers late April. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Chef Tripp Engel, right, takes an order from a customer while parked outside Triangle Lounge off Wrightsville Avenue. His assistant cook, Willie Swain, looks on. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
A waitress at Olde Salty in Carolina Beach takes an order on the first evening of dine-in service in two months. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Top) Brent Featherstone smokes a cigarette and drinks a Miller High Life from the second-story balcony of Olde Salty in Carolina Beach on its reopening day Friday. (PCD/JFS). (Bottom) Kristen Gruodis, who owns Little Dipper Fondue with her husband, enjoys ice cream with her sons, Taj at left and Indy beside him. (PCD/MD)
The Intracoastal Waterway was packed with boaters celebrating Memorial Day early. (PCD/MD)
Tugboats push the bow of the 357-meter MV Hyundai Hope cargo ship back downriver before it docked at the Port of Wilmington. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Protestors gather at City Hall to advocate for law enforcement reform in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis last week. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
(Left) WPD Sergeant Craig Melville before a debriefing with his team in downtown Wilmington. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Protestors gather on Third Street after NCSO deputies had driven by multiple times to warn the crowd to stay off the street. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Protestors refuse to disperse as clouds of tear gas spread at the intersection of Princess and Third Street. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Protestors gather at City Hall to advocate for law enforcement reform in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis last week. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Sheriff Ed McMahon addresses the crowd at the 1898 memorial site at WPD's peach march. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Top) Moms-N-Mourning founder Judie McKnight gets shade from the sun under the Michelle Obama umbrella. (Bottom) (From left) City Councilman Clifford Barnett, New Hanover County Sheriff Ed McMahon, Wilmington Mayor Bill Saffo, and Senator Harper Peterson stand in prayer at the 1898 memorial. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Right) Caution tape surrounded the George Davis statue on Market and Third Street in downtown Wilmington. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
A New Hanover County Schools Operations employee paints over red spray paint on the Walter L. Parsley Elementary School sign Friday morning after it was vandalized. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Left) Though the copper bar isn’t open for now to prevent congregating, Whiskey Trail Midtown has a wide selection of craft beer. (Right) Lean cuts of hickory-smoked brisket are a specialty of the Leland Smokehouse, Southport Smokehouse’s second location. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Sarah Mertz arranges houseplants she has for sale at her new business, the Plant Outpost, located in the Cargo District in downtown Wilmington. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
An old U.S. Coast Guard cutter, rechristened The Brian Davis, is sunk 21 miles east of Wrightsville Beach to create an artificial reef in honor of a UNCW graduate and avid spearfisherman who died during a 2017 diving accident. (PCD/Mark Darrough)
Grouper and snapper fisherman Charlie Mac looks up at pilings that were scraped with Hurricane Isaias’ storm surge, marking the high water line from the night he stayed put in his boat in the Southport Yacht Basin. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Left) A Fishy Fishy Cafe staff member sweeps debris off a damaged dock, taking care to look out for misplaced butter packets. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Madison Elliott takes pictures of the waves hours before Hurricane Isaias made landfall southwest of Carolina Beach at Ocean Isle, 6:40 p.m. Monday, Aug. 3. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
(Top left, clockwise) Carolina Beach residents talk inside a carport just over an hour before Hurricane Isaias makes landfall to the southeast at Ocean Isle, 9:51 p.m. Monday; A Carolina Beach resident takes a picture of her home, 6:33 a.m. Tuesday; A heavy wind gust whips down Lumberton Avenue, 10:05 p.m,;A man drives a golf cart beneath the lines coming from a damaged electric pole, 7:13 a.m. Tuesday morning. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
John Clift walks across flooded Beach Drive on Oak Island after Hurricane Isaias. “They should have never built on these lots,” he said of the oceanfront homes that removed dunes in front of his house. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Counter-clockwise from top) Vacationer Michael Davis carries his two-year-old son Wilkes through flooded East Pelican Drive, passing by one of many submerged vehicles claimed by Hurricane Isaias; A group of young men hitch a ride in the back of a pickup truck to cross East Pelican Drive, glancing at a submerged vehicle as they pass; Kathy Ipapo looks to see if a large wood-framed couch was submerged in her pool after Hurricane Isaias. Her neighbors later found it in their backyard; Three-year-old Chandler Darnell plays in a shelf of sand off East Beach Drive, pushed up by bulldozers attempting to clear the roads after Hurricane Isaias. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Vacationer Bennett Lane, 9, throws a cast net out in light rain at the 40th Street Inlet Park in Oak Island two weeks after Hurricane Isaias made landfall. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Counterclockwise from top) A member of the Knights of Columbus – Council 1074 marches down Chestnut Street; Back the Blue protestors walk past diners on Front Street in July; A member of the American Honor Guards of North Carolina marches down the sidewalk on Front Street. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Members of the American Honor Guards of North Carolina, a veteran group, say the pledge of allegiance. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
(Left) A pizza pie is prepped before it’s put in the oven; Davis Kranchalk, a high school senior and son of Fat Daddy’s Pizza owner Jay Kranchalk, preps the oven for the next round of pepperoni and sausage pizza. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
A young boy salutes Air Force One as it lands on the tarmac at Wilmington International Airport. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
A Trump supporter cries moments after Trump’s motorcade passed along 23rd Street; Merchants sold Trump-related clothing, banners, buttons, flags, and more at the impromptu event. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Trump waves to his supporters as he enters the presidential limousine nicknamed the ‘Beast.’ (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
(Left) Matt DiGioia stands by his SUV as Congressman David Rouzer speaks. DiGioia said he added the Trump decorations and slogans to his car a week back; Lara Trump speaks at a rally held at the New Hanover County GOP headquarters. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
A Trump supporter cries moments after Trump’s motorcade passed along 23rd Street. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
A car is pulled out of the Cape Fear River opposite downtown Wilmington. It was the same car seen launching over the Riverwalk and sinking into the river the night before. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Novant Health employees hold up branded”better together” signs in support of the hospital sale in front of the historic county courthouse ahead of the county commissioners’ meeting Monday. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Center) Save Our Hospitals’ attorney Alex Hall holds up contact information for the N.C. Attorney General and State Treasurer while urging supporters to raise their concerns regarding the hospital sale; Save Our Hospital supporter Neal Shulman holds up signs while facing proponents of the hospital sale on Princess Street. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
WPD Chief Donny Williams crouches behind a patrol vehicle while talking on his cell phone during a nine-hour standoff in Creekwood; Neighbors watch the scene near a memorial for Zalleux Johnson, who was shot and killed in Creekwood South in February 2019. In the shooting’s aftermath, then-WPD Chief Ralph Evangelous and Johnson’s mother begged for an end to all attempts at retaliation. According to Evangelous, the shooting was considered gang-related. (Port City Daily photo / Mark Darrough)
Brewer Harrison Parker of Bill’s Brewing takes a hearty sip of Halfway to Nowhere, a West Coast-style IPA brewed in collaboration with three other Wilmington breweries, to benefit the work of Nourish NC. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
A crazed clown grabs an actress from behind at the Panic Attack haunted attraction in southern Columbus County. (Port City Daily photo/Mark Darrough)
Trump supporters stand for the National Anthem ahead of Vice President Mike Pence’s arrival at the Wilmington International Airport Tuesday evening. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Vice President Mike Pence addresses a crowd of supporters at the Wilmington International Airport on a campaign stop one week before Election Day. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
A rally attendee adorned with President Donald Trump and Lt. Governor Dan Forest buttons stands in the crowd while awaiting the vice president’s arrival. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Dolores Vann, local GOP volunteer, said President Donald Trump’s status as a businessman resonates with her and that she worries about the economy should Joe Biden be elected. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
A county employee sits among dozens of boxes, used to store either election equipment or PPE; New Hanover County Democratic Party chairman Richard Poole (center) compares notes with attendees at the New Hanover County Board of Elections meeting; New Hanover County Board of Elections member Derrick Miller inspects a pile of absentee by-mail ballot envelopes prior to approving them at the board’s meeting. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
(Left) New Hanover County Commissioner Deb Hays lets out a “Woohoo!” after taking a seat behind the dais for the first time; A county employee removes former Commissioner Woody White’s framed portrait from the historic county courthouse, preparing to replace his spot with new commissioner Bill Rivenbark. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Peter Rawitsch, co-admin of the Facebook group “When public schools reopen…”, brought a Plan C sign to the NHCS meeting. (Port City Daily photo/Alexandria Sands)
Stella chomps down her breakfast along 19th Place; A barred owl at Sea Biscuit Wildlife Shelter (Port City Daily photo/Alexandria Sands)
Solange Thompson, the businesswoman behind one of the region’s most beloved restaurants, Indochine, has a few big plans before she retires. (Port City Daily photo/Johanna F. Still)
Organizers unload boxes of free shelf-stable items from the Food Bank Monday during a free pop-up event in Wilmington. (Port City Daily photo/Alexandria Sands)
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Mark Darrough, Johanna F. Still