One of the few remaining structures of the Jekyll Island Club which hasn’t been restored, the carriage house used by the Baker and Crane families appears to have at least been stabilized. The upper floor was used to house the carriage drivers and handlers and the lower flower was for storage of carriages and stabling of horses. It was also occasionally used as a social hall for staff of these families.
Jekyll Island Historic District, National Register of Historic Places + National Historic Landmark
The stables for the Jekyll Island Club were designed by Charles Alling Gifford, a favored architect of the club membership. The facility has served as a museum for many years and was recently rebranded as Mosaic, the Jekyll Island Museum.
Jekyll Island Historic District, National Register of Historic Places + National Historic Landmark
Cherokee was built for Jekyll Island Club member Dr. George Frederick Shrady between 1903-1904. The architect is unknown. Dr. Shrady was one of President Ulysses S. Grant’s last physicians. It was later owned by Dr. Walter Belknap James. One of the most beautifully proportioned cottages in the Millionaire’s Village, it is now a property of the Jekyll Island Club Resort.
Jekyll Island Historic District, National Register of Historic Places + National Historic Landmark
At the north end of Sapelo Island is Cabretta Beach, sometimes referred to as Cabretta Island for its isolation at high tide. If you could imagine a place more isolated than Nanny Goat Beach, Cabretta might come to mind.
The only land-based point of access is the Cabretta Campground, which requires reservations. It’s a pristine natural area with a small comfort station and a canopy of Live Oaks.
A short walk through the dunes provides access to one of the most undisturbed beaches in Coastal Georgia.
Sea Oats are dominant here, as they are on all of Georgia’s Sea Islands.
Like Nanny Goat Beach, Cabretta is a prime example of a barrier island environment that has never been developed.
Driftwood can be found here, as on other Georgia barrier islands.
It remains a favored fishing and crabbing spot for the Gullah-Geechee people who call the island home.
Evidence of the earliest known people in Georgia can be found on Sapelo Island in the form of the Sapelo Shell Ring Complex. Shell rings are also known as middens. Three separate doughnut-shaped mounds rise up to 20 feet above the tide line. Formed from oyster, clam, mussel, and conch shells, the largest ring is nearly 255 feet in diameter.
As landmarks go, they’re almost imperceptible, blending harmoniously into the surrounding maritime forest. But these ancient trash piles are keys to understanding early habitation on the Sea Islands. They’ve been documented in South Carolina and Florida, as well. Carbon dating has placed their construction beginning around 2170 BC, but their massive size is the result of successive generations of Late Archaic people.
While it was initially believed that the rings were built all at once, like later Mississippian mounds, present research indicates that they were never intended to be monumental structures but simply grew as people discarded trash behind their circular villages. These early settlers likely understood that they afforded protection to their villages as they grew in size.
Due to the incursion of the maritime forest, it’s difficult to envision these mounds as separate monuments but it’s obvious that they created a new topography. Research is ongoing.
A revival meeting in 1938 led to the formation of a Baptist congregation on St. Simons Island. What began as a small group grew rapidly over the next decade and by the time First Baptist Church was dedicated in 1947 there were over 200 members.
