The Midway Museum

I love Hwy 17. Almost every inch of Hwy 17, the Coastal Highway between Savannah and St Marys, is loaded with some kind of story, some part of Georgia’s history. Needless to say, for me a day spent on GA Hwy 17 is like a day at an amusement park for an energetic kid. When I see something interesting (gee, I wonder how often THAT happens!?) I have to stop and check it out. I meet the most intriguing people and places that way.

The Midway Museum

So when I saw the friendly little structure with a sign out front announcing it was The Midway Museum, well of course I had to stop. Seriously – if you saw a sweet cottage like this with a sign that said you could go inside and see it, you’d stop too. The small house beckons with its wide and welcoming staircase, broad porch, and heavy doors. Built specifically as a museum and to represent a typical Georgia coastal home, the building houses the vestiges of a community that travelled hundreds of miles to find a place where it could set roots, grow, flourish, and stay.

Thus began my obsession with Midway. There is so much hidden history there! I did not know until I found the Midway Museum that this tiny settlement produced families and men who would shape not only the history of Georgia but that of the entire United States!

At Georgia’s Second Provincial Congress in 1775, (held at Peter Tondee’s tavern in Savannah on July 4) eleven of the attendees were residents of Midway. Another Midway resident, Dr Lyman Hall, was one of two delegates elected to the Continental Congress which would meet in September of that year.

Now, this tidbit of information may seem a little ho-hum but when you actually visit Midway and see how small it is and realize how few families actually lived there in 1775, the impact of just how significant this little town is really hits. For all that it is not much more than a blink in the road, this community has produced men who served their country and their fellow men, and helped shape a world.

For instance, did you know these men were from Midway?…

Monument honoring General James Screven and Brigadier General Daniel Stewart. Located in the old cemetery across the street.

- General James Screven, Revolutionary War general. He slowed the British troops by arranging for a leak that provided false information.

- Brigadier General Daniel Stewart, recognized for his outstanding efforts in both the American Revolution and the War of 1812. Great-grandfather of President Theodore Roosevelt.

- Nathan Brownson, a physician and governor of Georgia. His was the task of rebuilding a weary and wounded colony after the Revolutionary War.

- John Stevens, one of the trustees commissioned to lay out the town of nearby Sunbury and distribute land grants accordingly.

- Abiel Holmes, grandfather of Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes.

- Jedediah Morse, father of Samuel Morse, inventor of the telegraph.

- Lyman Hall, signer of the Declaration of Independence.

- John Bacon, Lyman Hall, James Screven, Daniel Stewart – all men of such noteworthiness that four Georgia counties were named for them.

And probably one of the most fascinating personalities to be associated with the Midway community:

- Button Gwinnett. Originally from England, Gwinnett enjoyed a colorful history in Georgia politics and military efforts, and was one of only eight signers of the Declaration of Independence who had originally come from England. Talk about a traitor! The man captivates me. Oh, and if you are from Georgia and were wondering… yes, the name is Gwinnett, as in Gwinnett County.

The Midway Church building.

Sadly, most of these families are represented almost exclusively by the Midway Museum, the cemetery across the street, and the church building next door to the museum. Little of the physical evidence of the Midway families remains. But inside the museum are heirlooms, artifacts, and family treasures donated to the museum by the descendants of the original community, many of whom still live in the area today.

The Midway Museum exists because of a strong-minded group of people who understand the significance of the area and have worked for over fifty years to preserve it. Some of them are descendants, some are historians, and some, like me, are just wandering souls who stumble upon this little pearl and want to help hang on to this little bit of Georgia’s heritage.

The Midway Museum needs you! Please visit on your next road trip or vacation. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 10 am – 4 pm, Sunday 2-4 pm. Closed on Mondays and all major holidays. Admission prices are $3 for children ages 6-18, $6 for adults, $3 for seniors and military. (Wouldn’t this be a great outing for your Sunday School class?)

Upcoming activities at the Museum include

- Tales & Legends, a guided tour of the Midway cemetery given by expert storytellers in period costume. (Last part of October)

- Annual Christmas Tea. Visit the museum as it is decked out for the holiday season, and enjoy tea and cookies and stories told by guides in period costume. (Second weekend in December)

The Museum is also available for weddings, receptions, teas, and other social functions. For more information on these or any events, please call (912) 884-5837 or email the Midway Museum at museum@coastalnow.net

Ohoopee River Tree

... like a perfectly formed natural sculpture.

I fell in love with this tree some time ago. I pass it on my way home from Savannah as I drive along I-16 toward Macon. I spend a lot of time on 1-16, of course, since I am in Savannah so much; so it follows that I would get to know I-16 pretty well. This tree is one of the “landmarks” I look for, so I’ll know how much farther I have to go before I get home. When I see this tree, I know I am about two hours away.

I love this tree so much. I have always wanted some pictures of it. But I always forget exactly where it is, and by the time I see it it’s too late to pull off and take pictures, or traffic is a little heavier than usual and I am not comfortable stopping. Today as I drove home I watched carefully so I wouldn’t miss the opportunity to pull over and get pictures. It was such a pretty day and traffic was very light, so I knew it would be a good day to capture the tree.

It stands there like a perfectly formed natural sculpture. I don’t know what kind of tree it is. I just love the beauty in the texture and swirls of the bark, and the graceful formation of the limbs. The soft colors in the bark are wonderfully soothing and inspiring at the same time. The earth provided it some background foliage and some Spanish moss to frame it and add just the right touches to make it an unexpected and pleasant visual surprise to travelers.

I used to wonder what it looked like when it was living. Now I just appreciate the beauty and the uniqueness it contributes to the southeast Georgia highway. I know some day it will give up and fall over and eventually it’ll be gone. But for now, I smile when I see it. It feels like an old friend, and the longest branch seems to be the old tree waving at those of us who appreciate it for the extraordinary work of art it is.

Savannah Trolley Tour – Oglethorpe Tours

I’ve helped plan a number of trips to St Augustine for friends as well as people who tracked me down via the Internet. And now that I am working on getting my Savannah tour guide’s license and helping friends plan trips to this beautiful city, I am spending a lot of time falling in love with it getting to know it on an intimate level.

I usually recommend a trolley or horse-drawn carriage tour for first-time visitors. I have done carriage tours in both cities but not til yesterday did it occur to me I had never done a trolley tour in either city. And if I am going to recommend them, I ought to know what I am talking about, right?

Well, it’s just freakin’ time to fix that, isn’t it? I swung into the Visitor’s Center and took a look around. I chatted with representatives of several of the tour companies and chose the one that appealed to me most. This morning, my friend Carrie and I headed into Savannah for a day of “playing tourist.”

Margie & her faithful trolley!

I picked Oglethorpe Tours. I’m not sure why this company called to me more than the others, but I definitely chose wisely. I knew right away we were in for a delightful 90 minutes with Margie, The Coolest Tour Guide Ever. Her bubbly personality and outrageous sense of humor had us powering the trolley almost on laughter alone.

When Margie realized I was planning to get my own tour guide’s license, she immediately took me under her wing, so to speak, and took an extra few minutes explaining things and made an extra effort to get to know me and encourage me. I quickly realized Margie and I have a lot in common – primarily that it’s not enough for us to merely know dates and names. We want to know more – we want to dig deep and find the life and breath in the past and bring it to life as best we can.

Like me, Margie is almost obsessed with the desire to know things about Savannah’s history, and to present the city in such a way that it becomes a thing of value to those who come expecting to see its beauty and quaint Southern charm but quickly realize there’s so much more to it than beautiful architecture and blooming azaleas and live oaks dripping with Spanish moss. Margie’s rich voice and honest deep-South accent made her running commentary pure music to hear. Her big laugh is just contagious and her eyes are bright and direct, confirming the old saying that “the eyes are the windows to the heart.” This is a woman who loves what she does and where she does it. How many of us are that blessed?

Margie took the time to point out Savannah's unique and beautiful ironwork.

We began the tour at the Visitor’s Center, which in and of itself boasts a fascinating past. We moved slowly through the Historic District while Margie pointed out landmarks and points of interest and kept up an intriguing dialogue about Savannah’s builders, caretakers, and secrets. Not satisfied with simply pointing out interesting places and buildings, Margie took the time to point out details like Savannah’s beautiful ironwork and tabby streets and a wall on Factor’s Walk that, upon closer inspection, reveals itself to be the remains of an 18th century fort! I wouldn’t have noticed it had Margie not pointed it out! I adore this woman!

We saw the City Market, Juliette Low’s birthplace, Mercer House, and countless other houses and buildings that are an integral part of Savannah’s past. Margie gave a brief rundown of the Squares as we passed each one, pointing out monuments and interesting bits of history. Arriving at the Cathedral of St John the Baptist, she pulled off and allowed us a few minutes to disembark from the trolley and peek inside the magnificent building. Being a sucker for church-building architecture, I couldn’t resist dashing inside. The interior did take my breath away, that’s for sure.

We made a bit of a stop at the old Warren Candler Hospital. This is a building with a past so amazing that my heart beats a little faster just thinking of it. Such a vivid past this old charismatic structure has! Built in 1819, it has housed Savannah’s poor, her freed slaves, a medical school, a nursing school, and operated as a hospital until 1980! The stories this building could tell – and I want to hear them all!

The beautiful architecture of the Cathdral of St John the Baptist.

At the end of the actual tour, Margie let Carrie & me off at the City Market, where we found a café and a late lunch. When your tour has ended, you can leave the trolley anywhere, and get back on again at any one of a number of stops around the city. So that’s what we did – we took an hour or two to stroll about and then a different trolley, this one driven by Lucille, picked us up at the Juliette Low birthplace.

Here is the other reason I was so pleased with Oglethorpe Tours: customer service. A guest had accidentally left a camera on Lucille’s trolley. Not only did Lucille make every effort to get the camera back to its owner, the other guests aboard the trolley were more than willing and eager to help and to wait while the camera’s owner was tracked down. The guest turned out to be a man travelling with his wife and 84-year-old mother-in-law and two very small dogs. The mother-in-law had been optimistic about being able to stroll about in Forsyth Park but the heat had proven too much for her and she really needed to step back aboard the trolley and ride with her family back to their car. The other guests aboard the trolley were happy to wait patiently while the family got the woman aboard and settled for the ride back to the Visitor’s Center. During the last part of the trip, the guests chatted about places to go, things to do, and fun to have in Savannah and on Tybee Island. The warmth and friendliness of the atmosphere was the perfect end to a lovely day in a stately old beautiful city.

Thanks, Margie; thanks, Lucille; thanks, Oglethorpe Tours. Carrie and I had a great time and we’re still talking over the events of the day and what we saw and learned. You guys rock, and we look forward to touring with you again!

NOTE: This is not an “official” endorsement of one tour company over the others. This is simply an account of one “touristy” day I enjoyed in Savannah on the trolley I happened to be on and the people I happened to be with. I plan to take trolley tours with each tour company in the future, so I know what each has to offer. Click here to vist the Oglethorpe Tours website. Or call them at 912-233-8380.

Ophelia Troup Dent

I first met Ophelia Troup Dent in 2002, which was a neat trick since by that time she had been dead for nearly thirty years. But I do that – I tend to “meet” people after they have died. Makes it a heck of a lot harder to get to know them, but I find out so many interesting things along the way.

Miss Ophelia's house at Hofwyl-Broadfield. Photo by Carrie Mayo.

On a trip from Savannah to St Augustine FL, I noticed a National Park Service sign along I-95 stating that the next exit led to “Hofwyl-Broadfield Plantation.” Always curious and inquisitive, I jumped off the Interstate and onto a country road that led to a fenced and gated entrance.  As I drove through coastal Georgia vegetation and hundreds-of-years-old live oaks I was filled with an expectancy that was nearly overwhelming.

I paid my admission at the Visitor’s Center, and made the walk through the white fence rails out toward the plantation house and outbuildings. The delight of the canopy of moss-draped live oaks was worth the price of admission alone; the path that leads to the buildings is completely shadowed by them.

Arriving at the main house, I fell in love instantly and already; even before I stepped through the door I knew I had found a place where I would leave a piece of my heart. I ate up the tour, marveling at the beautiful old furnishings that had been in the family for generations, and I stood in awe of the life Miss Ophelia herself had lived until 1973. And so began my quest to get to know Miss Ophelia better.

I found out some things immediately – she never married, she was very close to her family, she was athletic and loved horses and dogs (that had me, right there). She liked to meet people. She loved books. She loved art. She loved her friends. She loved to travel.

But I wanted more. After all, if life had sent my family to live in Brunswick as it very nearly did, I might have actually met this lady in person. I shiver with delight even now, just to think of it. But alas – no such luck, so I had to start from scratch.

It wasn’t easy. She is still a very loved and protected figure in her community and those who knew her are reluctant to share much. But it’s like sculpting – you chip away everything that’s not a statue and pretty soon a figure takes shape. Miss Ophelia began to take shape for me fairly quickly.

Carrie sitting on an ancient tree stump at Hpfwyl-Broadfield plantation.

Descended from a long line of strong-willed and influential Georgians, Miss Ophelia understood the concept of community and she lived it every day. Along with her sister Miriam, she operated a small dairy to keep the family farm afloat. And by “operated,” I mean, she ran the dairy. She had some part time outside help, but she and Miss Miriam were Hofwyl Dairy. As owner, manager, and delivery-person, Miss Ophelia knew her community well and immersed herself in it.

In 2002 I decided I had to have a Hofwyl Dairy milk bottle. I wanted to have some small part of Miss Ophelia and Miss Miriam‘s life close to me all the time.  I’m sentimental that way. I put out some emails and made a few calls and no one had ever heard of Hofwyl Dairy so I sort of gave up but I always hoped I’d find one. Then in 2008, my friend Carrie, who knows my obsessions with coastal Georgia history (even if she doesn’t always understand them!) made one phone call – ONE, mind you – and gave me a Hofwyl Dairy milk bottle for my birthday. I don’t think I have ever been so blown away by a gift in my life. She has been with me through my digging and researching the Dent sisters and she alone knew what that bottle would mean to me. Using her now-legendary power of discovery, she found one.

Miss Ophelia’s dedication and involvement in her community is still felt today, some thirty-six years after her passing. Many “Friends Of Hofwyl” knew and remember Miss Ophelia, and her presence is still felt in the old house. In fact, if Miss Ophelia came back to life today, she would recognize her home instantly. To the degree that it can be, it is exactly as she left it right down to the dishes in the cupboards and the counterpane on her bed.

The famous "birthday present" milk bottle.

I visit Hofwyl-Broadfield several times a year. I’m drawn to the oaks, the house, the simple life Miss Ophelia and Miss Miriam lived, with no telly, no Internet, no cell phones, no fax machines. Theirs was a life when real people came to visit and letters and cards written in longhand arrived in the mailbox. Their world was the Altamaha River and Darien and Brunswick. Their entertainment was watching the marsh between their front yard and the river – the rising and setting of the sun, the beautiful storms, and the profuse wildlife. Their home was tall hallways, open windows, fresh air, and heirloom furnishings.

I think what is most overwhelming to me is seeing her car in the garage, exactly as she left it in 1973. It’s one thing to see her possessions inside the house – her chairs and drapes and pretty things – but it’s entirely different to see her blue car in her garage right where she always parked it. It makes her real, somehow, more so than I imagined.

I am so grateful to the National Park Service staff that cares for Miss Ophelia’s home and belongings, with limited resources and doing the best they can in these days of shoestring budgets and relentless cuts.

And I am grateful to Miss Ophelia, for her foresight and her generosity in allowing us a peek into her life and her times, and the things that were most valuable to her. I hope she knows that through her gifts, she is still teaching and shaping me even long after she and I ever had the chance to meet.

Hello world!

Hello, and thanks for stopping by. You can call me Summer. It’s my favorite season. I love the sun, the warmth, flip-flops, the freedom, and call me crazy but I even love the traffic when I am travelling and I see other vehicles loaded with luggage, dogs, people, and anticipation of “what-we’re-gonna-do-when -we-get-there.”

I am in my thirtyteens, and I am a writer. I am currently working on a novel about St Augustine and New Smyrna, in Florida. I drive a Jeep named Jonathan (in honor of F/V Time Bandit) who knows the way by heart as we barrel toward St. Augustine every chance we get. Along the way, Jonathan and I often stop at some of our favorite haunts along I-95 and the Georgia Coast. There is marvelous history and wonderful people, places and things along the coast and I love to meander south and stop anywhere that looks interesting.

I live in a little town in central Georgia, when I am not on the Georgis coast or in St. Augustine, Florida, poking around in all the lovely nooks and crannies while soaking up all the essences I can. I am a licensed St. Augustine tour guide although I do not reside full-time in the nation’s Oldest City. When on the Georgia coast or in St. Augustine I’m continually seeking out the next bit of precious truthful information to add to my already bursting collection of research and stories. I also enjoy replacing the looks of feigned interest with wonder on the faces of my family and friends when I drag them along on my visits along the Georgia and northeaster Florida coasts.

My Corgi, Sera, also loves to go along with me and Jonathan. She makes friends easily, and enjoys our evening walks in the historic district in St Augustine. Her favorite spots are Kilwin’s Ice Cream parlor and Pizzalley’s Pizza. Go figure.

Even though it doesn’t sound like it, I do have another life: Along with my husband Bob, I am an equine massage therapist and I am also a double-certified saddle fitter. Bob and I have owned Morgan horses since 1980, and in 1991 we added two Holsteiner mares to our herd. We no longer breed or show, and our horses are simply enjoying their retirement.

I love dogs. I am absolutely crazy about dogs. I have three Australian Shepherds, a little yeller “dropoff” dog someone left in front of my house, and Sera – who thinks she is also a saddle fitter as well as website designer and blog author. (I believe she has an extra ‘positive self esteem’ gene.) Fair warning: if I cross paths with you and your dog in St Augustine, I will want to meet you both.

I love my friends. (‘Scuse me for a moment while I wave at Carrie. Hi, Carrie!) Friends are the best gift you can get. Rita Mae Brown, once wrote, “Whenever I doubt the existence of the Almighty, I remember that through my friends, God has loved me.” Isn’t that the truth! Nothing soothes the soul like knowing you are loved by whoever happens to be on the other side of the door you are about to walk through.

Thank you for visiting and check back often as I add as much odd and assorted info as I can!