Georgia Natural Wonder #47 - Tybee Island (Part 2). 618

[Top Row Dawg]

Georgia Natural Wonder #47 - Tybee Island (Part 2)

We did the approach islands and a lot of the history of Tybee island yesterday. We continue today as Tybee has been the playground of Savannah's wealthier citizens for more than a century, and today the island's many beautiful homes with docks leading out to expensive watercraft testify to the fact that its popularity endures.



When the island became more accessible in the mid-1800s with the development of the steamboat, the general public started coming more often. Resort hotels, such as the Bolton Hotel and Ocean House, were established, and lots were sold for $200, plus $150–$200 for a frame house. Tybee's development as a resort picked up more steam after the Civil War, when public transportation to the island improved with the establishment of a rail link with Savannah in 1887. The three-hour steamboat journey was reduced to an hour train ride, if the train didn't break down. By the Roaring Twenties, more people called Tybee home, and thousands of visitors would come to the island in the summer.



Photos reveal that beach outings were quite a different sartorial event in the early 1900s. Men wore suit coats and long pants with ties and bowler hats while women wore fancy hats, fine long dresses, and high-heeled shoes—as dressed up as any Sunday church gathering today—as they walked on the beach.



Tybee was dominated by a cottage culture, with more than 400 summer residences built on the island. A photograph hanging in City Hall (a duplicate is also in the Tybee Museum) shows a row of cottages facing the beach behind a set of dunes from 11th Street to 5th Street, or the mid-beach area. These family cottages had wrap-around sleeping porches to take full advantage of cooling ocean breezes at night.



The builders of these cottages wisely set them back behind the second dunes, looking for protection from storms. A sidewalk ran in front of these cottages, some of which featured grand wooden staircases centrally located and oriented toward the beach.


Dune buffer from beach.

The fact that these early homeowners built back from the beach affected development patterns to come because the property in front of their houses became valuable. Since the 1960s and 1970s, ownership of many of these cottages has turned over from one generation to the next, with second generation family or developers developing four or five homes directly in front of these charming cottages.



As it usually happens with historic properties, some have fallen into neglect, others have been remodeled, obliterating their historic character with stucco and frosted windows, and others have been torn down to make way for half-a-million dollar homes.



But some cottages retain their elegant beach character and a few of the residents have successfully resisted upgrading their free, natural cooling systems for air conditioning.



The main hub of social activity on Tybee Island was the Tybrisa Pavilion and the old and new Tybee Hotels (the first one burned), popular gathering sites at the south end of the beach. When the palm-lined Tybee highway was opened on June 21, 1923, linking Tybee with Thunderbolt, a new era was ushered in. In the 1920s and 1930s, Tybee Island was one of the busiest seaside resorts in the Southeast.



Butler Avenue at one time had a train running down the middle of it, with a turntable rail yard at the end near 17th Street. The steam engine would drop its passenger cars, be turned around, then push the passengers back to Savannah. The Tybee Highway replaced the train tracks, and Butler became a wide, palm-lined, divided road. But the palms were cut down to make way for parking spaces on either side of the street, which added to municipal coffers but took away from the attractiveness of the avenue.



With the boom in population and recreation coming to all of America's shorelines, prosperity in the form of real estate development has had its effect on working class residents. Locals will quickly tell you a story of how a house and lot purchased for $15,000 only 20 years ago sold last week for over $300,000. One island native, Michael Bart, says Tybee Island has changed more in the last 10 years than the previous 50, with property taxes on a steady march upward. Because of the desirability of the beach, developers are staying busy with redevelopment on the island, tearing down older structures and filling in with new. Today, the sound of hammers and saws competes with the cries of seagulls as Tybee Island continues to change.


So much more tranquil in years past.

Tybee Island's Natural Features

Ecologically, Tybee Island would be a great place to earn a Ph. D. on the effects of development to a barrier island. Barrier islands are very impermanent geological entities. The sand is always on the move, leaving to go somewhere else or arriving from somewhere else. Tybee Island is no different and the struggles the island has gone through to literally hold its ground are instructive for all barrier island communities.



Since 2014, 1.3 million cubic yards of sand were added to 3 miles of beach front from the north beach near Old Fort Screven to 18th Street, south of the public fishing pier.



Despite its small size and overdevelopment, Tybee Island surprisingly still has threatened loggerhead sea turtles nesting on its beaches—as many or more than St. Simons Island, another developed island. In 1998, three brave turtles nested on Tybee Island compared with a solitary individual on St. Simons Island. Cumberland and Little Cumberland islands lead the Georgia coast with a combined 10-year average of 242 nests a year.



As of July 26, 2015, there are ten sea turtle nests on the beach on Tybee. They are all loggerhead nests, but we may also have a leatherback nest. In June, volunteer Kristin Peney found a huge leatherback (the largest sea turtle in the world) and this one is estimated to be 1,600 pounds! They aren’t sure if the turtle laid eggs, but the volunteers will continue to monitor the area where she was seen.



Tybee Island's natural beach sand is not as fine and white as that of the beaches of the Gulf of Mexico because of Tybee Island's high organic mix and the quantity of rough dark granite in its sand. Beach sand on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts generally consists of three components: fine minerals, crushed seashells (calcium carbonate), and detritus from other dead organisms, including marine plants and animals. Low wave energy on the Georgia coast prevents heavy deposits of calcium carbonate and the sand grains found on the beach are rougher, due to a lack of rounding from wave energy.



The higher the quartz content, the finer and whiter the beach sand, such as you find near Grayton Beach, Florida. When you hear the sand squeak under your feet, that's the angular, translucent crystal of quartz rubbing together. This quartz has been brought down to the beach from the Appalachians. In essence, you are walking on the Blue Ridge Mountains when you are walking on a southeastern Atlantic or Gulf of Mexico beach. Some beaches, such as ones near St. Augustine and in the Bahamas, have a high calcium carbonate component and when viewed with a hand lens will be revealed as crushed sea shells. Sand on a barrier island beach does not stay in one place for long. Wind, rivers, tides, and currents all play a role in growing, shaping, and destroying barrier islands. Tybee's mineral components have, over the millennia, come from the Appalachian Mountains via the Savannah River drainage. A mix of quartz and granite gives the beach a gray color. The black streaks are pulverized granite, washed down from the mountains.



The Savannah River has historically been a contributor to Tybee's beaches. But at least three major impoundments or dams trap sediments upstream from Tybee Island, keeping natural sediments from adding to the shoreline. Also, a deep channel cut, or trench, is maintained by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for the Savannah River Harbor, allowing large commercial freighters access to the Port of Savannah. This 42-foot-deep trench, which left to natural forces is 24 feet deep, traps southward-moving sands from South Carolina, preventing the natural renourishment that sustains and helps create the beaches. As the trench fills, dredging operations collect the sediments and move them to official Savannah Harbor Ocean Dredge Material Disposal Sites. The sediments, totaling 7 million cubic yards a year, are not all beach compatible. Some of them are, however, which leads some people to argue that the sandy component should be deposited on Tybee.



The bottom line is that Tybee Island, like many barrier islands in the U.S., has been losing beach, especially at the northeast end, as prevailing currents, tides, and winds have moved sand southward from the island. Take a walk north on the beach at high tide from the Tybee Pier and you will run into trouble as you pass Third Street on your left: you run out of beach. Over the years, officials have built more than 100 beach-trapping structures of different degrees of effectiveness in an ongoing effort to stop the island from losing its beach. In 1941, a sea wall was constructed along the length of Tybee on the eastern side from the north to the south end.


Sea wall today south end.

Older strategies that employed sea jetties or groins to hold sand in place prove eventually to be disastrous. These structures, which run perpendicular to the shore, interrupt the normal littoral drift of sand and sediments, essentially robbing Peter to pay Paul, depriving down-coast areas of natural replenishment and causing erosion. This damming of the natural flow of the river of sand eventually causes severe erosion either in front or behind the jetty. Sea walls, which run parallel to the shore, protect structures directly behind them, but deflect and increase wave energy that eventually undercuts the structures and causes erosion. On the southern end of Tybee, beyond the seawall, there used to be 15-foot high dunes. After the renourishment project, the dunes washed away for 30 feet behind the seawall. Controlling barrier islands is unpredictable and some beaches grow despite of these structures.


Tybee Beach circa 1975.

As the sand builds up, pioneering plants that can tolerate salt spray, exposure to the sun, and tenuous soil conditions start to colonize an area. They trap blowing sand and eventually create a dune. As the dune stabilizes, a greater diversity of plants develops, with some plants on the exposed top of the dune (sea oats) and others in the more protected, moister bottom. On Tybee Island, a young Holocene island (4,000–5,000 years old) the best natural dunes are found on the North Beach area and in the Mid-Beach area around 10th Street.



In the long run, barrier island beach-holding strategies can only have a temporary effect. Statistically, the Georgia coast should experience six major hurricanes a century. In the 1900s, Georgia has been lucky and not experienced even one, making homeowners and developers somewhat overconfident about their real estate investments. In the nineteenth century, the Georgia coast was hit by six major hurricanes. The most destructive was the hurricane of Aug. 27, 1881, which completely submerged Tybee Island under a 20-foot storm surge, destroying most of the island. Ominously, most experts believe it is only a matter of time before another one lands on the coast.


Mexico Beach last year with Michael.

Bird-watching on Tybee Island

The North Beach area has traditionally seen the greatest variety of species, but new development has decreased sightings of shy species. Regardless, the north end is a stop on the Colonial Coast Birding Trail established by the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.



Seen at the north end, as well as on the rest of Tybee's beaches, have been Wilson's plovers in the summer, and during winter red knots, pectoral sandpipers; royal, sooty, Caspian, Sandwich, and gull-billed terns; black skimmers, dunlins, and piping and semipalmated plovers. Occasionally seen in summer flitting through tree canopies on the northern end are painted buntings and yellow-billed cuckoos, and in winter various warblers are uncommon visitors, including the orange-crowned. Common on the beach are ring-billed gulls, brown pelicans, black skimmers, and boat-tailed grackles. During the winter, migrating species are seen in the air heading south in their V-shaped formations. Rock jetties attract ruddy turnstones and purple sandpipers. The interior creeks on the western side are home to the American oystercatcher, which feasts on the exposed oyster beds at low tide. Dunlins and black-bellied plovers are seen here as well.



Tybee Island: Fort Screven, North, and Mid-Beach Areas

The Fort Screven and North Beach area offers fascinating military history, beautiful dunes, long beaches, a nice park, and an eclectic community of homes that is fun to observe on foot or bike. The natural dunes, with sea oats and other dune plants and animals, along with a view of Tybee Roads and Daufuskie and Hilton Head islands, make for a beautiful natural setting worth visiting. Also attracting attention are the mammoth container cargo ships, some almost as long as a 75-story building, plowing the waters of Savannah harbor. The Fort Screven installation gave Tybee a military character for more than 50 years, when 30 percent of Tybee Island's population consisted of military personnel. Today, the abandoned base is a National Historic District.



The north end of Tybee Island has been considered strategically important for hundreds of years. The first Europeans to visit the area were the Spanish, who explored the area 212 years before Gen. James Edward Oglethorpe established the town of Savannah in 1733. The Spanish claimed the area from Port Royal, South Carolina to St. Augustine, Florida, as Spanish territory, naming it La Florida or Bimini. In 1526, only 34 years after Columbus, a lawyer named Lúcas Vázques de Ayllón sailed along the Georgia coast from the Antilles, looking to establish the first colony in the New World. The location of the first Spanish mission, San Miguel de Gualdape, is still unknown, but some archaeologists believe it was somewhere in McIntosh County near Sapelo, St. Catherines, or Blackbeard islands. Disease destroyed the mission, which was abandoned after only two months, leaving behind the bodies of Ayllón and 200 colonists. When Hernado DeSoto visited Tybee in 1540, he found a rosary and knife he believed belonged to the Ayllón explorers.


Fort Mountain, Desoto Falls, Hernando got around in Georgia. Only trace of him here today is hotel in his name.

The first written description of Tybee was by another Spaniard, Captain Francis de Ecija, who described Tybee Roads at the mouth of the Savannah River as "The Bay of Shoals." When Oglethorpe began the colony of Savannah, he established the first "permanent" structure on the island, a 90-foot lighthouse designed by Noble Jones of Wormsloe and built in the Fort Screven area north of Brumby Battery, it is believed. A stronghold named Fort Tybee was established near the lighthouse. During this period, the island was used as a hiding place for pirates such as Blackbeard, and today beachcombers patiently scan the beaches with metal detectors for buried treasure.


Pirates still raid Tybee every year.

During the Revolutionary War, the French Fleet, the greatest gathering of foreign ships ever assembled in American waters, anchored off Tybee in support of American Patriots in their losing effort to take Savannah back from the British.



In 2015, a modern replica of the French ship Hermione sailed into the harbor at Yorktown, Virginia, flying U.S. and French flags as those on shore cheered and applauded. It is a three-mast, 216ft-long vessel armed with 26 cannon. This is one of the same ships took part in French naval actions off Tybee Island.



In 1808, recognizing its strategic value, the Federal government acquired jurisdiction in the Fort Screven area. Between 1812 and 1815, a lookout tower and fort known as a Martello tower was constructed by Isaiah Davenport of Savannah.



Today, nothing is visible of the round structure, except what remains for archeologists to find. (In 1794, the British attacked a round stone tower at Martello Point, Corsica, and were greatly impressed with its defensive qualities. The British built more than 100 Martello towers on the south and east coasts of England between 1805 and 1812.) At various times in its history, the tower served as headquarters for the Georgia Telephone and Telegraph Company and was a post office. During the antebellum plantation era, the tower was a popular site for duels between South Carolina "Southern gentlemen" who used pistols to decide an issue. It also housed Union troops during their occupation of Tybee Island during the Civil War.



It was serving as the Fort Screven post office when it burned in 1913. In 1914, the tower was blown up to clear the field of fire for Fort Screven's guns.



In 1819, President James Monroe traveled from Savannah to Tybee on the steamboat SS Savannah, which later became the first steamship to cross the Atlantic. OK I am going to resist a full blown tangent here, and I will only provide a link to a full blown tangent. I know I learned this school but I forgot it and this tangent is pretty cool.


British Rebuttal.

The Fort Screven Historic District was home to a military base that was active from the Spanish-American War of 1898 through the end of World War II. Initially a fort for the Coastal Artillery, in 1929 it was taken over by the famous 8th Infantry. During the Great Depression in 1932, Fort Screven was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel George Catlett Marshall, who went on to command the entire U.S. military during World War II and author the Marshall Plan, which rebuilt war-torn Europe after the war and earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 1953. In 1940, the Coastal Artillery Corps took over again. During the years of World War II, a diving school was established to train engineers for underwater salvage operations and the repair of bomb-damaged ports. The United States Army Engineer Diving and Salvage School became the only school of its type operated by the Army in the United States. At the end of World War II the fort was declared surplus and sold to the City of Savannah Beach (now Tybee Island) for $200,000, which in turn auctioned it off to the public.


Not gonna do a tangent just because Marshall commanded here for two years, but is is worth a link to a tangent for those inclined.Marshall Plan

Today, Fort Screven is an unusual hodgepodge of historic military quarters, huge concrete military batteries, charming summer cottages, new condos, winding roads with Live Oaks, and beach and dunes. Less than 1 square mile, the area is fun to tour on a bike.

Touring Fort Screven National Historic District

Located at the north end of the island facing the mouth of the Savannah River, the Fort Screven coastal defense combined the strength of poured concrete and granite with the defensive and camouflage qualities of earthen fortifications. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers drew up plans for a fort on the northern end of Tybee in 1872, acquiring the land in 1875. Ten years later, President Grover Cleveland commissioned Secretary of War William C. Endicott to study U.S. coastal defenses. Endicott submitted a 400-page report that made recommendations for the Atlantic, Pacific, and Great Lakes coasts, and requested $97 million. But appropriations for construction were slow in coming, and it wasn't until 1896 that contracts were made for construction.



At first the new fort was to be called Fort Tybee, then Camp Graham, but finally it was named Fort Screven in honor of Revolutionary War hero General James Screven, who was killed in Liberty County in action near Midway, Georgia in 1778. We showed a tangent on Screven in yesterday's post and did a deep dive back in Liberty County.



Eventually in the Fort Screven area six batteries were built. Only one, Battery Garland, is open to tour. The others are on private property and must be viewed from the street. Some of these old concrete structures have been incorporated into private homes. Originally, they all would have been covered and camouflaged with sand and dune plants on the beach side to make them look like sand dunes from a distance.  Much of the sand was removed to help build US 80 connecting Tybee with the mainland. The batteries were executed along Endicott's design: many batteries, with few guns at each, spaced well apart and hidden from the enemy. The batteries were protected by 20-foot-thick walls and surrounded by 30 feet of earth.



Battery Garland, located across from Tybee Lighthouse, was built in 1899 and armed with 12-inch rifled guns (Tybee Museum is located inside).



Battery Brumby, located next to Battery Garland, was built in 1898 and armed with four 8-inch guns on disappearing carriages, and was the only fortification finished in time for the Spanish-American War. These guns could fire 200-pound projectiles over 8 miles.



Battery Fenwick, located next to Brumby on Taylor Street, was armed with two 12-inch guns. The Tybee Lite Shrine Club is in here.



Battery Backus, located on Pulaski Street, was built in 1898 and had a 6-inch rapid-fire gun, then later was enlarged and equipped with 4.7-inch guns that originally were used at a fort on Wassaw Island.


Just left of Battery Fenwick.

Battery Gantt, also on Pulaski Street, was completed in 1900, and was armed with two 3-inch rapid-fire guns in 1903, and is considered to be the most intact of the six batteries at Fort Screven.



Battery Habersham, at Pulaski Street and Van Horn Drive, was armed in 1900 with eight 12-inch steel rifled mortars, the most devastating artillery at Fort Screven. These guns would fire 700-pound shells in a high arc from four or eight guns at a time, with the intention of landing shells on the deck of an enemy ship at once.



One of these mortars is part of the Fort Screven logo at the Second Avenue Gate No. 2 entrance.



Another Fort Screven battery, Battery Hambright, is located at Fort Pulaski and open to the public. Studied in yesterday's post on Cockspur Island.



There are many other structures in the historic district that are still in existence from the Fort Screven era. We think Sandra Bullock's house is somewhere along the water (we've also heard that Tom Hanks and John Travolta have houses here, but were not sure how accurate that info is) ...



Some are private residences and apartments, and at least one is a bed and breakfast, the Fort Screven Inn. A large, long brick structure on Van Horn Street near Gate No. 2 Sentry Booth served as the base movie theater. Officer's Row Houses on Officer's Row Street—many of which have been cut into smaller apartments—rest on top of an artificial berm, looking out to the Savannah River and Atlantic Ocean over a new development of luxury beach homes designed in a style to match.



The impressive officer's homes were constructed of cypress and pine and raised above ground level on brick and granite piers.


Then and today Officer’s Row.

Behind the Officer's Row houses is the former parade ground. Today is it Jaycee Park. This is the best park on the island, equipped with a jogging path, exercise stations, and a baseball field.





Lieutenant Colonel George Catlett Marshall during his command here planted the moss-bearded crape myrtles. A small creek winds through the park, adding to its attractiveness, as do the Live Oaks, cedars, bayberries, and wax myrtles.



Connecting the park with US 80 is palm-lined Campbell Street, which served as the main entrance to Fort Screven. The large building where Campbell Street meets the park was Gate No. 1 Sentry Booth for the fort.

Tybee Lighthouse and Tybee Island Museum

Tybee Lighthouse is a national treasure that is a must-see for anyone visiting the island. The view from the observation deck—145 feet above the ground—is one of the best on the Georgia coast. To enjoy the view requires paying a modest admission to the Tybee Historical Society and climbing 178 black stairs. The admission fee also gets you into the Tybee Island Museum, located across the street from the lighthouse in Battery Garland at Fort Screven. More than 70,000 people visit the lighthouse each year, a testament to the romantic lure these old structures have on the public. The Tybee Historical Society recently received funding to launch long-needed restoration work on the lighthouse and cottages.



Originally used to guide British ships into Savannah, the lighthouse was also helpful to pirates. Blackbeard, who headquartered his crew in the Tybee area, is believed to have buried his treasure in the sands of Tybee Island. During the Civil War, the lighthouse was an important observation post. Today, it continues to guide ships from around the world safely into Savannah Harbor.



Tybee Lighthouse is the tallest (154 feet) and oldest (the lower portion is 225 years old) in Georgia and one of only 20 of the 850 lighthouses in the U.S. that still has its original support buildings. Tybee Light is one of the 450 still active lighthouses, and one of 122 that are open to the public. Most—339—use modern lighting devices. Tybee Lighthouse is one of only 13 that still uses its first order Fresnel (pronounced fre-nel) lens. Tybee Lighthouse was the second established in the colonies and is the second oldest in the U.S. using its original tower. The Tybee Island Light Station is nominated for National Landmark Status.



What you see today is actually two lighthouses: the third lighthouse (the bottom 60 feet completed in 1773) and the fourth lighthouse (the top 94 feet added to the original foundation in 1867). The octagonal structure is made of brick, with 12-foot-thick walls at the base tapering to 18 inches at the top.


Lighthouse in 1964.

Tybee's first lighthouse was a daymark—a lighthouse without a light—designed and constructed by Noble Jones of Wormsloe Plantation for Gen. James Edward Oglethorpe three years after Oglethorpe had founded the English colony of Savannah. This first structure, said to be the tallest structure in America at that time, was a 90-foot octagon made of brick and cedar piles. Storms and beach erosion (nothing new on Tybee) first threatened then carried away this first effort in August of 1741, forcing the commission of a second lighthouse. The second lighthouse, finished in March of 1742, was a 90-foot stone and wood tower, with a 30-foot flagpole, used to communicate with passing ships. Oglethorpe said this structure was "much the best building of its kind in America." However, it too was built too close to the Atlantic Ocean and was threatened by forces of the sea.



In 1768, the third lighthouse was authorized to be built on the current site, much farther inland than the original two. Finished in 1773, it was built of Savannah grey brick, with interior wooden stairs, and stood 100 feet tall. It was also a daymark. When Georgia ratified the U.S. Constitution in 1790, the lighthouse and property came under the ownership and management of the United States Lighthouse Service, and lights were installed, using large candles and a large metal disc as an illuminate. Later, 16 whale-oil burning lamps were installed. George Washington personally reviewed the rebuilding of the woodwork of Tybee Lighthouse. When given the choice of "a hanging staircase for the sum of 160 pounds" or "a plain staircase for 110 pounds," the frugal and laconic Washington wrote the following: "Approved with the plain staircase. G. Washington."


Stairway today.

In the 1800s, the lighthouse survived several powerful hurricanes, damage by Confederate soldiers, and even an earthquake. In 1857, the lighthouse was improved by installing an 8-foot-tall, second order Fresnel lens, meaning the keeper had only to keep one lamp lit, making trips up the stairs with heavy oil a much easier task.



During the Civil War, with Federal troops using Tybee Island, Confederate volunteers at Fort Pulaski grew concerned that the lighthouse would be an aid to Union gunboats. So one night a raiding party, under the command of Captain James B. Read, removed the lens, exploded a keg of gunpowder, and burned the stairs. Union troops quickly repaired the stairs, and used the lighthouse as an observation tower to plan and watch the successful bombardment of Fort Pulaski on Cockspur Island in spring of 1862.


View from top.

In 1866, the fourth lighthouse was approved for Tybee made of brick and cast iron. Engineers used the lower 1773 portion as the foundation, added 94 feet to the top, and installed a first order Fresnel lens. The new light shone for the first time on October 1, 1867. The lighthouse required three keepers to maintain the light, each taking a three-hour shift and responsible for carrying 5 gallons of fuel to the top. In 1871, the lighthouse was damaged by a storm that pounded the coast, and in 1886 was cracked in several places by an earthquake that centered on Charleston, South Carolina.


Looking other way from top.

Since the late 1800s, the lighthouse has seen relatively few changes. The 1867 lens rests in its original supports and visitors ascend the same cast iron staircase to marvel at the view. In 1933, electricity powering a 1,000-watt bulb replaced kerosene as the energy source for the light, and only one lightkeeper was needed. George Jackson, the last keeper, served in that capacity until he died in 1948 and the U.S. Coast Guard took over the operation and maintenance of the lighthouse. In 1987, the Coast Guard relocated to Cockspur Island and formed a joint partnership with the City of Tybee Island and Tybee Historical Society, which is responsible for maintenance and restoration of the six historical buildings on the 5-acre site delineated by a neat, white picket fence.



A $400,000 restoration of the lighthouse was undertaken in 1998 and 1999, changing the daymark to the 1916 to 1964 version of black, white, and black (the longest running version—the lighthouse has had five daymark changes), and completing other long-needed repairs. Tybee Island Historical Society Director Cullen Chambers, who previously restored lighthouses in Key West and St. Augustine, Forida, directed the work. The society was helped by the donation of $63,000 by Bill Younger of Younger & Associates and the Harbor Lights Collectors Society—the company that makes lighthouse collectibles. The Georgia Department of Transportation provided a $250,000 reimbursement grant through a federal I.S.T.E.A. program. The Tybee Island Historical Society also plans to restore three of the cottages to their circa-1900 appearance.



A 1939 garage building has been transformed into an excellent gift shop and admission building.



Nearby, there is a large bell stamped with U.S.L.H.S., which stands for United States Lighthouse Society. The bell is stamped with the year 1938, which is the year before the Society was reorganized into the U.S. Coast Guard. The bell was used to call volunteers during emergencies, such as when a ship ran aground or was stuck on a sand bar.



Tybee Island Museum

The eclectic Tybee Island Museum has the advantage of being in a historic structure of Battery Garland. You can tour the museum and view its Indian, gun, doll, Civil War, Johnny Mercer, and Fort Screven exhibits. A bell is on display that once was used on a Georgia Railroad steam locomotive and later summoned schoolchildren to Tybee Elementary. For the naturalist, there are collections of shells and bones of marine animals. The museum itself is interesting to walk through and imagine what military duty was like inside these concrete batteries. Walking through the museum requires the ability to climb stairs so is inappropriate for strollers or wheelchairs. An observation deck on top of the battery offers a good view of Tybee Roads and South Carolina's barrier islands. A submarine periscope is fun for children. The museum has a gift shop.



Outside in the parking lot is an unusual monument to Second Lieutenant Henry Sims Morgan, who died in an act of heroism. On August 31, 1898, during a terrible hurricane, the Italian Bark Noe wrecked in Tybee Roads, putting the crew in jeopardy. The 24-year-old Morgan, who was in charge of the fortification work at Fort Screven, and a crew of five volunteers set out in a small craft and attempted to rescue the imperiled crew. Morgan and his volunteer friend lost their lives in the attempt when the boat capsized.


One of the first football players at Valdosta (Lowndes County Historical Photo) and the first West Point graduate from Valdosta.

In 1903, classmates dedicated a plaque to Morgan's memory at West Point. In 1923 at Fort Screven, a duplicate was mounted on a large granite stone, which was moved to Fort Pulaski when Fort Screven was decommissioned but later returned to this spot in 1994.



Here is the worst of the story: his friend’s body was quickly recovered, but Lt. Morgan’s was not. For days, weeks - no one knows how long - his body drifted with the currents along the Georgia coast. Eventually it came to rest on the shores of St. Catherine’s Island. The West Point ring was still on his finger. Black inhabitants of St. Catherine’s discovered the body and quietly buried it, agreeing among themselves that less talk meant less trouble. Unbeknownst to the blacks, the distraught Morgan family had made inquiries all along the coast, asking for help in recovering the body.

Eight years passed.

By the summer of 1906, word of the mysterious body that had washed ashore came to the ears of Gus Oelmer, the superintendent of St. Catherine’s. Oelmer notified the Morgan family, and in September he and a family member exhumed the body. The West Point ring and the 6-foot, 4-inch frame of the skeleton confirmed that the remains were those of Lt. Morgan.



For more information: Director, Tybee Island Lighthouse, PO Box 366, Tybee Island, GA 31328. Phone (912) 786-5801. Museum: Phone (912) 786-4077

Recreation on Tybee Island's Fort Screven, North and Mid-Beach Areas



On the northern side of the Battery Garland and Brumby is a large parking lot and boardwalk access over the dunes to the North Beach area of Tybee Island.



For the naturalist, this is a good area to examine dune formation processes. Gulls and pelicans are common out on the flats. Some locals say the North Beach area has the best shelling, but this could be because it is not as heavily used. Fishermen try their skill casting off into the river currents of the sound. Bikers can enjoy a relaxing trip through Fort Screven's funky neighborhoods, as they ride along narrow roads lined with wax myrtle, palms, and Live Oaks and view the former military base's hulking concrete batteries, eclectic homes, and converted military buildings.



Tybee Island: South Beach Area

South Beach is where the action and crowds are. Here you find the Tybee Pavilion and Pier, Tybee Island Marine Science Center, public beach parking, surfing, restaurants, motels and condos, and honky-tonks.



The central commercial strip is Tybrisa Street, formerly 16th Street, where bars, ice cream parlors, and beach shops compete for your attention.



South Beach is probably the best easily accessible public beach in Georgia. As sand has drifted southward on the island, it was trapped here by now-buried jetties and groins. Notice how the beach is working its way up the steps of the boardwalks over the dunes. The snow fences were established a few years ago, and now the dunes are forming around them. Pioneer dune plants are starting to take hold, including morning glory, recognized by the yellow and white flower. Sea oats, important for their beach-holding character with their 30-foot-long roots, have not yet colonized these new dunes, so the dunes' futures are uncertain.



The beach is broad and flat, so tides move quickly up and down the beach. Twice a day, the water moves 6 to 9 feet vertically, and up to 300 feet horizontally. Tybee Island rookies set up their umbrellas and chairs, only to move them back in five minutes, then move them again five minutes later with irritation.



At low tide, where South Beach wraps around to the Back River area, sand bars or shoals become exposed, stretching southward toward Little Tybee. From the far end, it looks like an easy swim to Little Tybee, but don't try it. Every year someone drowns in the attempt, underestimating the outgoing tides and currents. Where longshore currents meet outgoing and incoming tides in the sounds, tremendous turbulence is created, making for dangerous conditions.





These sand bars are the best places to go beachcombing in the South Beach area, especially at low tide. Here you will find Van Hyning's cockle, a large, pretty shell that resembles a heart when two halves are closed together. Other sea life you will find here are pen and scallop shells; sand dollars; hermit, blue, and spider crabs; starfish; knobbed whelks; and oyster drills. Shorebirds prowl the rills and sloughs looking for trapped fish and other meals. Keep a watchful eye on incoming tides so you don't become trapped on a quickly disappearing sand bar.



The Pier and Pavilion

The pier or the pavilion is a great place to drink a coffee and watch the sun come up—or wet a line with local fishermen when the sun goes down. Built in 1996 in time for the Olympics, the pier juts 700 feet out into the ocean.



The 20,000-square-foot Pavilion can be rented for private parties. Many fish the pier at night, and a fish-cleaning sink is located here. On weekend nights, walking the pier is such a popular pastime that you are transported into a different, simpler era—before Nintendo and cable and VCRs—when you knew your neighbor. Bands play in the sheltered pavilion during the summer.



Below the pier, the pilings located in the intertidal zone are a good place to examine what quickly happens in a marine environment when a hard surface is introduced to the sea. Here you will find oysters, mussels, barnacles, and other marine life clinging to the concrete supports.



The pier south to the main jetty is officially approved for surfing. On days with good wave action, you will see quite a few trying their luck. Surfers also try the waves on the north side of the pier, but officially are not supposed to.



 


I ain't never seen waves like this in person, in Georgia.



Other wildlife you will see on the beach, not including Homo sapiens, includes sea birds begging for handouts. One gull can quickly become a scene from Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds if you give in to the temptation to feed it. You will see menhaden and other fish stirring in the water plus a full complement of sand-dwelling fauna responding to the tides such as sand dollars, mole crabs, cochina, and ghost shrimp. Insects may bite in the summer during sunset if the usual sea breeze is absent, but usually they are not a problem.

Tybee Island Marine Science Center

Located at the base of the Tybee Pavilion and Pier, the Tybee Island Marine Science Center is perfectly located to educate the general public on Georgia's valuable natural resources found at the shoreline. A beach walk with one of the center's educators is a great start to a vacation at the beach and helps the curious of all ages understand the natural processes and flora and fauna that share the beach with man. Volunteers pull a seine net through the surf and analyze the contents. The center, open to the public, has a museum with many exhibits and aquariums featuring native species found along Georgia's shore. More than 30,000 people visited the center in 1997.



For more than 10 years, the center has been conducting seinings and beach walks guided by volunteers. The doors of the center opened in 1988, with the City of Tybee and the University of Georgia Marine Extension Service as initial sponsors. In 1990, these two groups were joined by the Gray's Reef National Marine Sanctuary office of the NOAA. The City of Tybee Island provides the building, which currently is shared with Tybee's lifeguards, and Gray's Reef funds the aquarium and educational supplies. The Tybee Island Marine Science Foundation was formed in 1990 to give the center more stability and allow for donations from major sponsors and individuals.



The museum holds nine aquariums and a touch tank featuring native species, many of which are brought to the center by Tybee's fishermen. Excellent exhibits will educate both children and adults about sharks, fossils, marine mammals, shells, marine pollution, local reptiles, tropical species, and sea turtles.



The museum has a homemade look to it, but in many ways it is superior to the sleek, expensive aquariums found around the U.S. because it offers hands-on educational activities in the natural setting that is its focus. In other words, you can apply what you learn just steps away from the center, something you can't do at Chicago's Shedd Aquarium exhibit on whales. The center sees a lot of traffic from school groups, and conducts popular summer programs including Sea Camp, a summer camp for children ages 3–12; Tuesdays at Tybee, a free guest lecture series held at the pavilion; and beach walks. The center also conducts teacher workshops and group programs for organizations such as the Girl Scouts.



Due to the success of the center, the Tybee Island marine Science Center has gone through a number of changes in the past few years including extensive improvements with new staff, building renovations, exhibit expansion, and more.

Lodging on Tybee Island's South Beach

The South Beach area of Tybee Island has the greatest selection of motels, B&Bs, and condos for rent. The very first Day’s Inn is on Tybee Island.



The second Inn was in Forsyth Georgia.



Motels: Hotel Tybee. 15th Street and Strand Avenue. It is the largest (240 rooms) family-oriented motel on the island, offering some rooms with ocean views that are steps away from the beach, kitchenettes, a pool, and suites. The Hotel Tybee is built on the location of the famous Tybee Hotel, the current motel is built on the old front lawn of the Tybee Hotel. Notice the palm-lined road, the historic center walkway to the beach. There is now a $2 million glass-fronted beach view restaurant.



Restaurants on Tybee Island's South Beach

There aren't a lot of choices, but the offerings run the gamut from hamburger grills to chicken-finger honky-tonks to fine dining.


Crab Shack looks busy.

Breakfast Club. 1500 Butler Avenue. A Tybee legend, the "World Famous" Breakfast Club is the best place for breakfast on Tybee, if not the entire southeastern coast. Owned by chef Jodee Sadowsky, locals and tourists alike frequent the popular restaurant at the corner of 15th Street and Butler Avenue. Famous for its omelets, waffles, Polish sausage, and hot coffee, the Breakfast Club features excellent service and a restaurant policy that calls for your order to be served as soon as it's ready.


Big line for the Breakfast Club.

No cold eggs here. Sadowsky was hired to cook for the John F. Kennedy Jr. wedding on Cumberland Island. The decor is trés Chicago, with signed photos of former Cubs manager Don Zimmer and shortstop Ernie Banks. Try the Grill Cleaner's Special, a yummy concoction of diced potatoes, Polish sausage, peppers and onions, two scrambled eggs, and jack and American cheese. Open 7 days a week, 6 a.m.–1 p.m. Inexpensive. (912) 786-5984.

Night Life on Tybee's South Beach

Some of South Beach's eating establishments double as nightspots, sometimes with live music. You have several honky-tonks to choose from:



Doc's. 16th Street (Tybrisa Street). The longest continually operating bar on the island, Doc's has been serving drinks since 1948. Doc's is to Tybee what the original Sloppy Joe's was to Key West. Here you will hear many "True Tybee Tales" and meet many of the people who make Tybee an interesting community.



A centrally placed bumper pool table has witnessed many an epic battle. (912) 786-5268.

Spanky's. Strand Avenue. Spanky's moved from its rowdy DeSoto Motel location to near the pier, where it offers bar food staples such as chicken fingers and nachos. A deck overlooks the ocean. (912) 786-5520.



Fanny's. 1613 Strand Avenue. A new deck on top of Fanny's gives the margarita and beer crowd a beautiful view of the beach and Atlantic Ocean. Known for its 15 kinds of gourmet pizza. (912) 786-6109.



Camping on Tybee Island

River's End Campground & RV Park. 915 Polk Street. River's End is the only campground on the island, located at the north end of the island only "3 blocks to the Atlantic Ocean."



Whether you are carrying a tent or driving an RV, River's End has the full range of amenities you would expect, with 130 campsites, full hookups, pull throughs, water and electricity, fuel, ice, dump station, pool and bathhouse, laundry, store, exercise equipment, picnic tables, and primitive tent sites. (800) 786-1016.

Biking and Kayaking on Tybee Island

Because the island is small, biking is a favorite way to get to know the town. And the beach is hard-packed enough to accommodate a beach or mountain bike cruise down the length of it. Traffic hasn't increased on the island to where you feel unsafe. Bike rentals are available at Pack Rat Bicycle Shop, 1405 Butler Avenue. (912) 786-4013.



An excellent method of experiencing the Georgia coast is under your own steam in a sea kayak. Sea Kayak Georgia is based on Tybee and offers instruction in surfing, navigation, open water rescue, and eskimo rolls.



They also offer guided tours with ACA-certified coastal kayak instructors and naturalists. For more information, contact Sea Kayak Georgia at (912) 786-8732.

Fishing, Marinas, and Charters on Tybee Island

Sport fishermen use the Tybee and Back River piers, surf cast from the north and south ends, and book charter boats for deep-sea and inshore fishing trips. Sport crabbers use piers, docks, and bridges.


Back pier section of Tybee.

Deep-sea fishing of the Gulf Stream and snapper banks is a longer and more expensive commitment, and focuses on catching snapper, grouper, sea bass, triggerfish, shark, king and Spanish mackerel, barracuda, amberjack, dolphin, wahoo, sailfish, tuna, and marlin.



Inshore fishing is less time consuming and expensive, with trout, bass, flounder, sheepshead, tarpon, whiting, and shark as the fisherman's game.



Nature tours feature trips to Little Tybee and Wassaw islands and dolphin cruises. These playful, intelligent marine mammals are common in the tidal rivers around Tybee.



Marlin Marina is the only marina located on the island. This is the closest marina to the ocean in Chatham County, found in the Back River area at 1315 Chatham Ave. It has a ramp, dock, hoist, fuel, bait and tackle, and a restaurant. You can book fishing trips and nature cruises to Little Tybee and Wassaw islands and dolphin and bird cruises from here. (912) 786-7508.



I like to try to keep you guessing on the next Natural Wonder, but I welcome suggestions. I’m getting into this because I am a tour guide for a living. Ride a bus for 5 hours every day showing and walking folks around Atlanta. (Never been mugged) I wrote my own script on Civil Rights and Civil War tours. Always wanted to design a two week tour driving tour of Georgia, my wife and I had a web site North Georgia Traveler for a couple years. Tourism a lot more fun than insurance adjusting. Our Georgia Natural Wonder Gals of the day, not sure if Tybee beach, hard to scroll past images though.



Now I am going to go along with the Federal Government on these next 9 Natural Wonders of Georgia. We are going with their 11 National Natural Wonders. We have already done Wassaw Island and Okefenokee Swamp. Thursday, we tackle Georgia Natural Wonder #48 and Georgia National Natural Wonder #3. Till then, this is a call for suggestions. Let's see how much we can add to my 275 list. Glory Glory to Ol Georgia.