“Little Necks and Neptune Brand:”

A Look at Collier County’s Clamming Industry

By Lynne Howard Frazer

From 1903 to 1947 two factories on Marco Island processed millions of clams into “Dainty Little Necks,” “Clam Broth,” and “Clam Chowder.” A huge clam bed stretching forty miles through the Ten Thousand Islands supplied the industry with a seemingly inexhaustible source of shellfish and shaped the development of the small island community.

The rich clam bed was first discovered in the late nineteenth century as settlers began moving into the coastal areas. By 1903, E.S. Burnham, a New York match magnate, had established a cannery at Caxambas on the southern tip of Marco Island. The Burnham Factory, a corrugated steel building with a covered dock, steamed and canned clams for the Key West and coastal trade. To attract workers, Burnham had a boarding house and small cottages built for his employees.

The clammers harvested the thick bed at low tide, searching for the hard lump of the shells by foot, and then using a two-pronged hook to pull up the clams. Mr. Preston Sawyer, born on Marco Island in 1901, remembers clamming for the Burnham Company,

“You couldn’t wear shoes; instead we had a heavy canvas shoe that we called a moccasin. The bottom was so sticky, with those spurs and everything, that it ruined your feet.” While searching for the clams, the workers towed skiffs behind them, piling the

“little necks” into the small boats.

Often the clammers camped out in the Ten Thousand Islands, digging the clams in the calm, shallow water during the

 worker could gather ten to fifteen bushels in three hours. “Run boats” came out to the islands every other day to pick up the bushels of clams. Each worker’s catch was carefully recorded, and the men were paid .20 to .25 cents per bushel.

By 1908, the enterprising W.D. Collier, and early pioneer on Marco Island, had invented a motorized dredge system for gathering the clams. Collier’s innovative dredge was built in Tampa to his own specifications, and radically changed the young clamming industry.

The dredging machinery was housed in the hold of a two-story barge and could gather 300 to 500 bushels a day. The 110 foot-long dredge was powered by a 36 horse gasoline “moose” engine, and carried a metal cable anchor line for “runs” through the clam bed. To make a run with the heavy dredge, an 800-pound anchor was lowered into the shallow water and the barge was allowed to drift back to the end of a 1200 foot cable. AS the cable was drawn in, the dredge “digger” pulled up as many as 125 bushels of clams. The shellfish were then deposited onto a conveyer belt just below the water line to rinse the mud off the shells.

At the top of the conveyer belt, four men sorted the clams into baskets. The “carryaway” man took the heavy baskets to the stern of the barge for pick-up by the run boat. Mr. Sawyer remembers that the “pickers” could fill the large baskets so fast that the carry-away man was often “kept running.”

A full crew usually consisted of the captain, an engineer, a cook, the rope or anchor man, two to four pickers to sort the clams, and the carry-away man. Sometimes the dredge worked with two full crews, operating 24 hours a day. The old “moose” engine was so loud that the crew was often kept awake.

Preston Sawyer first signed on as a dredge worker when he was sixteen years old, working nine to ten hours a day for $7.50 per week. The workers slept on bunk beds in the upper portion of the barge, usually four or five men to one room. The beds were “old hard bunks, too, with a blanket, but no mattress.” According to Sawyer, the crew had plenty to eat, but choices usually included only corned beef, clam chowder, and of course, steamed clams. He remembers, “I got tired of the clams down there, but I got tireder of corned beef. Sometimes I’d get the crew together and we’d throw cases of it overboard.”

By 1910 the clam industry was booming. The rich clam bed continued to yield thousands of easily harvested “little necks,” and the market was demanding more. W.D. Collier invited a second canning company to Marco Island to look over another possible factory

site. J. Harvey Doxsee and his family immediately recognized the potential of the huge

clam bed and established the Doxsee Clam Cannery on the northern tip of Marco in 1911.

The new Doxsee cannery was larger than the Burnham factory and could process

hundreds of bushels per day.

Another dredge was built and both companies worked furiously to satisfy the demand for clams. Even with two dredges and two canneries, the factories could never completely fill the orders for the little necks, canned clams, bouillon, and chowder. Deliveries were often 500 to 600 bushels short.

The clam industry changed the relatively undiscovered barrier island. New families moved to Marco to work with the factories and the industry became an important part of the island’s society and economy. Most of the island residents were involved with either the fishing or clamming industries. The 1935 Census for Collier County listed 68 “fishermen,” 23 “factory employees,” and 5 “fish house tenders.”

In addition to canning the clams, the barn-like Doxsee cannery served as one of the first

polling places on Marco Island after the establishment of the county in 1923. J. Harvey

Doxsee became a pivotal figure in the island’s development, supporting the community

by serving as the first Chairman of the Board of Public Instruction in 1923 and later

working as the Marco area County Commissioner from 1925 to 1929. The Doxsee

family was also involved with the operation of the Marco Island Ferry, the “J.H.

Doxsee,” which linked the island to the mainland from 1912 to 1938.

The county’s clamming industry was crippled in 1929 when the Burnham dredge sank

during a strong storm.

The cannery was taken over by Mrs. Tommie Barfield and J.

Harvey Doxsee in an attempt to keep local residents employed during the Depression.

Guavas and sharks were canned, in addition to clams, but the factory’s struggle for

survival ended in 1932 when a hurricane demolished the old building.

The Doxsee Cannery continued to operate, but the peak years of canning had already

passed. In 1932 alone, 1,108,812 pounds of clams were harvested and processed at the

Doxsee factory. By 1947, the dredge and hand-clammers could find less than 200

bushels per day. After years of stripping the clam bed, the “dainty little necks” were

disappearing and the county’s clamming industry dwindled.

J. Harvey Doxsee sold the cannery in 1947 to Alto Griffin, who tore it down and sold the

lumber and boilers for salvage. The Doxsee name known worldwide for fine canned

clams, was sold to the Fred Fear Company of New York. Now only the Doxsee name

survives as a reminder of Collier County’s early clamming industry.

Credits: Collier County Museum—Haldeman Library—Naples, Florida