About

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Edward Ellis was born in New Bern in 1950 and raised in New Bern and Havelock. In his early twenties, he began a career in the newspaper business that included roles as a reporter, editor, and managing editor of the Havelock (NC) Progress, managing editor of the Garner (NC) News, editor of the North Carolina Farmer, and the South Carolina Farmer, editor and publisher of the Tar Heel Reporter of the N. C. State Government Employees Association, Raleigh, N.C. 

In 1985, under the banner of Ellis Publishing Company, he became the publisher of The Windsock, the official newspaper of Marine Corps Air Station Cherry Point, and in 1986 founded the Havelock News.

Since the purchase of Ellis Publishing Company by a national media firm in 1993, Ellis has concentrated his business activities on real estate ventures in North Carolina and Florida.

He began his research on the history of Havelock and southern Craven County in his early teens and was named Official Historian of the City of Havelock in 1984. He has written hundreds of newspaper and magazine articles -- and four books of local history. He has spoken about the area’s heritage for decades. 

Through the years, he’s collected documents, letters, interviews, prints, maps, surveys, artifacts, photographs, albums, collectible books, newspapers and other writings, which have been accepted as donations by archives including Tryon Palace Historic Sites & Gardens, the Southern Baptist Historical Collection, the State Library of North Carolina, the Kellenberger Room of the New Bern-Craven County Library, the Havelock Public Library, the New Bern Historical Society, the Town of Garner, N.C., the Heritage Center of Lenoir Community College, the Carteret County History Museum, UNC-Asheville, and MCAS Cherry Point. 

His major work – the Havelock, N.C. Historical Collection – is preserved as the Edward B. Ellis, Jr. Papers and the Henry Havelock/British India Collectionat the Joyner Library, Special Collections, East Carolina University. 

Ellis was instrumental in the creation of the Havelock History Exhibit for the Eastern Carolina Aviation Heritage Foundation. It’s open to the public at the Havelock Tourist and Events Center.

Eddie and his wife, Veronica “Ronnie” Ellis, live in Melbourne, Florida.