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A Short Visit

7/24/2017

Owens-Thomas House sits on Oglethorpe Square where Moravian Monument stands

Savannah was and is the home to many ethnic groups. The Moravians were one of the earliest groups to come to Savannah. They arrived in Savannah on April 6, 1735. Yet they lived the shortest amount of time In Savannah. In fact their time here has been described as “a failed prelude to building bigger and better things to come.”
Protestants were needed not only to protect Charleston from Spanish military takeover but to create a religious buffer between Spanish- Catholics in Florida and French-Catholics in Louisiana. The first group of Moravians were ten men who after nine weeks at sea finally reached their new home. They were to be the first wave of Moravians and they were expected to lay the groundwork for many more Moravians. They included masons, carpenters, weavers, gardener and game-keeper. They were granted 500 acres outside of Savannah to develop and one hundred acres in Savannah.
Their leader Zinzendorf instructed them: “You must live alone, establishing your own little corner, where your customs will irritate no one...Your one aim will be to establish a little place near the heathen where you may gather together the dispersed in Israel, patiently win back the wayward, and instruct the heathen tribes.” One of their early friends in the colony was Tomochichi the mico of the Yamacraws who lived near Savannah. Tomochichi would let them start a school to educate the people of his tribe.
By all appearances they were going to be a great asset to the new colony. They were industrious. They finished their cabin in six days and layed out ten acres of garden on plots outside of town in less than two weeks. The first ten men were successful and a second group of 25 men and women arrived on February 23, 1736.
But with the second group they began to create a critical and potentially politically strong group in Savannah. This caused a closer inspection of their beliefs by the other older settlers of Savannah. What they found disturbed them. The group desired to unite the Christian churches into one. And they were very missionary in their promotion of this idea as they thought it was their peculiar call to make this happen. They also accepted women preaching and holding religious offices something most Protestants were against at that time. They also were opposed to slavery and started evangelizing the slaves. But probably the most disturbing religious belief was their pacifism which may them refused to bear arms. One of the most important responsibilities of the Georgians was to keep the Spanish and French from entering in and settling the so called ‘disputed lands’. This put them at odds with most of their fellow colonists for it was everyone’s duty to help create an army to keep the Spanish and French out.
The group because of these conflicts with their fellow colonists and their own internal conflicts were doomed for failure. Thus by 1740 they had dwindled down to six. Their vision and the hopes they had for Georgia were never to be realized. The remaining six would follow others who had abandoned Georgia and left for what turned out to be greener pastures in Pennsylvania.
Yet this group would leave their mark on America. They had introduced John Wesley who had traveled by ship with them to Savannah to a more pietistic religion which led to his eventual founding of Methodism. They had started and India mission which educated the Native American outside of Savannah in English and European ways. But more importantly it marked the beginnings of the Moravians very successful settlement in North America. The community was an important part of the ongoing evangelical revival that swept Europe and the colonies of North America referred to as the Great Awakening.
Today there are over 60,000 Moravian church members. The towns of Bethlehem, Nazareth, Emmaus, and Lititz, Pennsylvania, were founded as Moravian communities and were influential in settling North Carolina with a settlement in Winston-Salem. This small influential group had its beginnings in the city of Savannah. One of the only remains of their presence here in Savannah is a small monument in Oglethorpe Square.

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A Guiding Light: Ralph Mark Gilbert

7/16/2017

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Ralph Mark Gilbert

One of Savannah’s greatest citizens was Ralph Mark Gilbert. Gilbert was born on March 17, 1899 in Jacksonville, Fl. He was a Renaissance man. He was known for his tenor voice, his superb oration, his plays, and civil rights work. He was Savannah’s Paul Robeson and more.
Gilbert earned his degree from Michigan University. He was in his prime at the age of forty in 1939 when he became the pastor of the historic First African Baptist Church (one of, if not the oldest black churches in the United States). He would lead this church until his death in 1956.
His leadership of the Savannah NAACP from 1942 to 1950 would bring great change in the lives of his fellow black and white citizens. He reorganized and politically jumpstarted the organization. He led a voter drive in which hundreds of blacks were registered to vote. Their new found voting power led to the election of a progressive white mayor (John G. Kennedy) and the city’s police department hiring their first black police officers. They became known as the Original Nine and were some of the first black officers to serve in the South.
But Gilbert did not stop wielding his power as a leader in the new Black voter’s bloc he helped to organize Savannah’s Greenbrier Children’s Center (still in existence today). He also was influential in orchestrating black and whites to found the West Broad Street YMCA for the black community located on May Street.
Stepping up as the organizer, convener, and first president of the Georgia NAACP, he was responsible for forty NAACP chapters being organized in Georgia. Gilbert was mentor and precursor of W.W. Law who would become Savannah’s civil rights leader in the tumultuous sixties on through to the 21st century. Law would also receive national recognition for his work in the preservation of black history in Savannah.
It was Law’s work as a preservationist and civil rights leader that led to the Ralph Mark Gilbert Civil Rights Museum’s creation in Savannah. The museum’s building history is unique and important. It was originally constructed in 1914 as an African American bank and built by an African-American contractor Robert Pharrow. It later served as the Guaranty Insurance Company (owned by a black Savannah millionaire) and as the Savannah office of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
The museum has a bronze bust of Gilbert on its first floor. Gilbert is an often unsung hero of Savannah but his impact is still felt today in many of our institutions.

Savannah's Ralph Mark Gilbert Civil Rights Museum

First African Baptist Church

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Trustees Garden and a Pirate's House

7/9/2017

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Pirate's House

In 1734 a house for a gardener for Georgia’s Trustees Gardens was built off Bay Street. It was called the Herb House. The Trustee’s Garden was an experimental garden that Oglethorpe, the founder of Georgia, started to see what was compatible to growing in Georgia’s environment. The garden never was able to get the longed-for silk and wine industries off the ground. But it did have success in assisting in two of Georgia’s most famous products: cotton and peaches. That Herb House which stands as part of the Savannah’s famous Pirate’s House is Georgia’s oldest building.
In 1753 the garden was abandoned as the residents had been here long enough to discern what crops from abroad could best grow here. The house was converted into a bar and inn for sailors. It took the name of the Pirate’s House Inn and has, in one form or another, maintained that moniker since then. Sailors from as far away as Singapore took refuge here. The house became somewhat of a no-man’s land for the citizens of Savannah because of the characters and drunken debauchery found there.
It took its place in literary fame in Robert Louis Stevenson’s pirate novel Treasure Island written in 1881. In the beginning of the book the flamboyant pirate Captain Flint died in a pirate’s tavern in Savannah. In story and in reality fame the Pirate’s House had an underground tunnel that went to the river. It is said the tunnel was used in the early years for transporting rum to Savannah, which had a prohibition against alcohol. Another use was to kidnap drunken sailors to serve on ships in need of crews.
In more recent history, part of it was used to house Hard Hearted Hannah’s East a nightclub owned by Savannah’s legendary bassist Ben Tucker. But after a major restoration which earned it the approval of the American Museum Society. The society lists it as a "House Museum". Currently, it has fifteen separate roaming dining rooms on the first floor of a popular restaurant rightfully called The Pirate’s House. It is also said to be haunted by a pirate, and ghost tours mention its ghost quite frequently.
The early days of this infamous place can be captured in the lyrics of the Ella Fitzgerald song below:

"Hard Hearted Hannah"
In old Savannah, I said Savannah,
The weather there is nice and warm!
The climates of a Southern brand,
But here's what I don't understand:
They got a gal there, mighty pretty gal there,
Who's colder than an Arctic storm,
Got a heart just like a stone,
Even the ice men leave her alone!

They call her Hard Hearted Hannah,
The vamp of Savannah,
The meanest gal in town;
Leather is tough, but Hannah's heart is tougher,
She's a gal who loves to see men suffer!
To tease 'em, and thrill 'em, to torture and kill 'em,
Is her delight, they say,
I saw her at the seashore with a great big pan,
There was Hannah pouring water on a drowning man!
She's Hard Hearted Hannah, the vamp of Savannah, GA!

They call her Hard Hearted Hannah,
The vamp of Savannah,
The meanest gal in town;
Talk of your cold, refrigeratin' mamas,
Brother, she's a polar bear's pajamas!
To tease 'em, and thrill 'em, to torture and kill 'em,
Is her delight, they say,
An evening spent with Hannah sittin' on your knees,
Is like travelin' through Alaska in your BVDs.
She's Hard Hearted Hannah, the vamp of Savannah, GA!

Can you imagine a woman as cold as Hannah?
She's got the right name: The vamp of Savannah.
Any time a woman can take a great big pan
And start pouring water on a drownin' man
She's hard hearted Hannah
The Vamp of Savannah GA

Hard Hearted Hannah's Entrance

The old Gardener's Shed

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A Place of Mercy

7/1/2017

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Entrance to Bethesda Academy

Bethesda means “House of Mercy”. It is the name given to an orphanage founded near Savannah in 1740. The great evangelist named George Whitefield saw the many orphans in Savannah when he arrived in 1738 and he decided his Christianity called for him to do something about this. So as he was starting the Great Awakening with his sermons around America he was also working to found the first orphanage in America. Many historians credit Whitefield’s preaching his message of individual salvation received in grace versus by election of a select few was one of the key philosophical and theological concepts that helped ignite the American Revolution.

So when he was not reviving the souls of America and planting the seeds of revolution in the heart of Americans, he was collecting money to assist those in need. Bethesda sits a few miles outside of Savannah in a rural setting. One of Savannah’s early leaders was one of its first residence: Lachlan McIntosh. While the children grew most of the orphanage food, the enterprise was more expensive than anticipated, and Whitefield went into debt. Benjamin Franklin suggested that due to the scarcity of workmen and materials in Georgia, it might be better to move the orphanage and its children to Philadelphia. Whitefield refused to move the orphanage because his contributors donated money specifically for the Georgia project.Whitefield died in 1770 and left the orphanage to the Countess of Huntingdon. She sent teachers and missionaries to care for the orphans. Despite a fire in 1773 and the American Revolution which kept Savannah in a flux throughout the war the orphanage survived.
The countess died in 1791 and the state of Georgia took the orphanage under it swings. Georgia appointed trustees to manage the orphanage. They started a school in the early eighteen hundreds. The orphanage struggled throughout the nineteenth century but continued in some form throughout the Civil War and other hard times.

In 1900, Bethesda was re-named the Bethesda Home for Boys. Its mission was to serve as a home for troubled boys or whose families for whatever reasons could not support them. This stayed its mission until 1992 when a school was started which allowed not only residents of the home attend but children from the general public attend. In 2011, the school was officially re-branded as Bethesda Academy, reflecting the school’s commitment to college preparatory learning.

The rebranding was an attempt to emphasize that they were not an orphanage anymore but a private boarding and day school for boys in grades 6-12. They hold dear George Whitefield’s founding mission to teach “a love for God, a love of learning and a strong work ethic.”

Bethesda over the years has served more than 12,000 boys. Many becoming leaders in the Savannah Community. Today on the over 650 acres of land they house boys. Bethesda Academy features a wildlife management program, an organic farming program and a nationally-ranked chess team, civic groups, and a wide variety of athletic teams. They have a weekly farmer’s market. The William H. Ford, Sr. Museum & Visitors Center with 2,200 square feet of exhibition space devoted to Bethesda’s rich history It stands as testimony to one renown preacher and his love for the children of Georgia.

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Whitefield Chapel on Bethesda Campus

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Historical Ruminations

A Short Visit

A Guiding Light: Ralph Mark Gilbert

Trustees Garden and a Pirate's House

A Place of Mercy

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