Crawford Square is on Houston Street between Perry and Hull Streets and is the only square that is still fenced as all the squares were at one time. Crawford Sqaure is probably one of Savannah’s most unique squares. It was laid out in 1840 and was name for Savannah William Harris Crawford. He was a Georgia Senator, Minister to France, Secretary of Treasurer under James Madison as well as major candidate for President. The square is the smallest and was the only square that allowed blacks free use.
 
Crawford Square is the only square to retain part of its fence that all the squares originally had. You can see the multiple purposes squares were often used. After the great Savannah Fire of 1820 two cisterns were placed in the square to give access to firefighters for water to fight fires. These cisterns are partially revealed. In the middle of the square is a gazebo. And on one side of the square is a basketball court.
The basketball court is significant because of how it came to be. In the days of Jim Crow money for the black community and its recreation needs was not highly forthcoming. But the recreation department held a basketball tournament that is still held today and offer the winner of the tournament a basketball court. The Black team from the Crawford Square Neighborhood won the tournament and received the court that now stands in Crawford Square as an award. Through the years developers and others have wanted to do away with the court because of various reasons but the black community has insisted on the court remaining. Thus, it is the only square with a recreational use.
I imagine one day there may be a historical marker alongside the square marking where The Lady Chablis of the Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil fame lived before she became the star she was meant to be. The Square is a reminder of hard times for blacks but also of how they pulled together to create a good place to live.
 
 

Every great city has at least one good independent bookstore. Savannah as I already noted in a previous blog has the new and used bookstore called the Book Lady. But the oldest bookstore in Savannah is E. Shavers Bookseller. Last month in Mother Nature News it was celebrated as one of seventeen extraordinary bookstores in the world.

The bookstore is located on Madison Square in the historic district of Savannah. In an old home behind the Desoto Hotel magical things happen. The store which is over forty years old has seven rooms of new fiction and non-fiction books. Two rooms are dedicated to children’s books and one room is for local and regional topics. Here in this store you can find a chair or two to look at books on every subject from architecture and history to graphic novels and cooking. And to keep you company while you read are two cats who claim the window sills and other nooks and crannies as their home.

They have an old manual typewriter in one room to use to get a feel for how writers used to write their books or poems. Plus you can write a message for future book lovers to find. It also has two rooms dedicated to a Savannah Tea Room. The Savannah Tea Room has one table and a few stools to sit and drink a cup of hot tea. Here in these two rooms you will find all the accoutrements for making tea and tea from all over the world.

E. Shavers has some longstanding book clubs associated with them. The names of a few are The Feminist Book Club, Sci-Fi and Fantasy Book Club, Happy Hour Book Club, and a Graphic Novel Book Club. This rambling building has hosted book signings of famous local and regional authors as Pat Conroy, Harrison Scott Key, Mary Kay Andrews, John Berendt, and this blogger Michael Freeman.

In 1976 when Esther Shaver first opened the store in the Greek Revival home could one imagine the place in now claims in Savannah’s and book lovers’ hearts from around the world. Despite Shaver’s retirement the bookstore persist as the new generation owner Jessica Osborne continues to help warm the heart of many a bibliophile. 
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There was something happening forty years ago in Savannah. In 1976 one of Savannah’s biggest public projects was being completed; Rousakis Riverfront Plaza on River Street. It was a harbinger of a new Savannah. Many people want to credit the Book (Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil) as the moment modern Savannah began its Renaissance. But one would also have to look forty years ago when several businesses and people staked a claim to Savannah.

The biggest of course was the Savannah College of Art and Design. It was started by Richard Rowan and Paula Wallace in the old Armory in 1976. Paula would eventually stay as the captain of the ship that has not only revived the architecture of the town but also infused the city with nearly 8,500 young artists. Today SCAD is one of the premier art schools in the world with outposts in Atlanta, Hong Kong, and LaCoste.

Also in the magical year of 1978 Savannah’s only used and new independent bookstore The Book Lady was started in a house in the Historic District. The Book Lady Bookstore was founded by published poet Anita Raskin. The locals nicknamed her “The Book Lady.” The Book Lady has readings and book signings from authors across the nation. It is at the forefront of promoting local authors. Although Ms. Raskin no longer runs the store it’s keeping Savannah reading.

In 1978 the young entrepreneurs and health food proprietors Janie and Peter Brodhead came to town with a dream, and they have made that dream a reality. They have an independent, locally owned market that offers the very best and healthiest products available. Their store became the Savannah headquarters of the new health movement overtaking the nation. They have also modeled how a small business can be a good citizen through their many gifts to charities.

The year 1978 also brought us one of  Savannah’s favorite charities: Chatham-Savannah Citizen’s Advocacy. Their mission is to “provide protection of and advocacy for people being abused, neglected or excluded because of disability.”  Over the past 40 years, they have made close to 900 of these citizen advocate matches. They have acted as a social conscious of our city. But it also enabled the worker for all things good Tom Kohler to have a voice and strong presence in grassroots advocacy in our city. Tom Kohler, many would say, is the Savannah whisperer for progress.

Another organization that was started 43 years ago has saved and cultivated the history of Savannah. The Coastal Heritage Society started in 1975. Its purpose is to provide educational experiences for the public through the preservation and presentation of the historic resources of coastal Georgia and adjacent regions. It received its first chance to perform their mission after the state decided to close Old Fort Jackson in 1975. The Coastal Heritage Society approached the State in 1976 asking permission to re-open and operate the site, which was granted. The historic site was now referred to as Old Fort Jackson. The Coastal Heritage Society has grown immensely since and they now supervise the Georgia State Railroad Museum, Pin Point Museum, Children’s Museum, and the Savannah History Museum. They also oversee Savannah’s Battlefield Park.

Today it would be hard to imagine Savannah without SCAD, Brighter Day, Tom Kohler and Citizen’s Advocacy, or the Coastal Heritage Society. Maybe this renaissance would have come without the Rousakis Plaza but this civic project made Savannah a little more attractive. Today we have an arena being erected and a canal district that is taking shape. One can only wonder what and who this may bring to our city.

 
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There is a practice called ring shouting (see below) in the Gullah Geechee culture. Gullah Geechee was a culture of the runaway slaves that lived on the barrier islands and coasts off South Carolina and Georgia. These Africans were able to live their lives in isolation from the white world for the most part. Therefore, many say that the Gullah Geechee people are the closest to the West African culture from which they were stolen. Culture is never a fixed thing, it evolves and adapts to different environments. The Gullah Geechee have a unique dialect, religious practices, food, and many other things. But one of the ones I find most interesting is their ring shouts.
These are dances and songs that grew out of their isolation and the pain of being taken to a land where the people did not respect their humanity.  Many of the rhythms and dance steps are ghosts of West Africa where they and their ancestors once lived. These dances and songs (as all of Gullah Geechee culture) came close to being lost. As slavery and Jim Crow ended the children felt the pull as many did to the big urban centers. But a few tireless workers who knew the beautiful culture and its significance worked to maintain the culture.
The music came from contact with the Christian culture. But Christianity viewed through the eyes of slaves and their yearnings and hopes. It is believed that the ring shout was originally two art forms: the shout and ring play. The shout was a ‘call and response’ similar to African-American preachers of the nineteenth century and seen in many Black churches today. The dancing had to be religious in nature as it was thought to be of Satan. Adding to this challenge was that the steps could not resemble secular dancing like toe tapping, crossing of the legs, or fiddle playing. Thus over time the merging of the two art forms began to arise as an acceptable form of religious expression.
Drums were not allowed on plantations because the owners felt secret seditious messages might be communicated. This led to the enslaved African-Americans inventing new rhythm techniques which was called “hamboning” or “Juba Dance.”  They used foot stomping and hand slapping of the chest, legs, hands, cheeks, etc. to keep time and replicate their earlier forbidden drum rhythms.
“Shouting" men and women move in a circle in a counterclockwise direction, shuffling their feet, clapping, and often spontaneously singing or praying aloud. This was done usually around the church building itself but on occasion around the altar of the church.
It was thought that ring shouts were lost in the late twentieth century. But it was found still being practiced in 1983 at Mt. Calvary Baptist Church in Darien, a small coastal Georgia city about forty minutes south of Savannah. From this church would be formed a traveling group called the McIntosh County Shouters. It is a ten-member Gullah-Geechee group. They travel the United States with the "ring shout," introducing the music and movements to the world. It is not uncommon to hear groups practicing the ring shout at various events across the coastal islands of Georgia and South Carolina. Here in Savannah one of the places that celebrate the Gullah Geechee culture is The Pin Point Community and the Pin Point Heritage Museum. The Gullah Geechee have seen a revival and appreciation of a culture that has survived the Middle Passage, Slavery, and Jim Crow. And the children who once thought the culture too ‘country’ are now proud to have come from such a celebrated culture.
“May be the las’ time we shout together”
“May be the las’ time I don’t know”
“May be the las’ time we shout together”
“May be the las’ time I don’t know”
“I don’t know, I don’t know, may be the las’ time, I don’t know”
These words from a ring shout song can be answered ‘I do know, I do know, when will be the last time, I know not now’.
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One of the great civilizations of North America was the Mississippian Culture or as some call them the Mound builders. Their cities can be found by most rivers. They used the rivers to connect themselves with other cities in the Indian Community. At one time, Cahokia, the capital of the Mississippians was larger than London and Paris. They built large several story mounds on which stood the homes of the elite and religious structures.
 
They had ball fields with amphitheaters that held thousands to gather and watch. They had grand festivals such as the annual Green Corn Festival. They had communal gardens and their presence was prolific on this side of the Mississippi River.
 
Eventually, their civilization died out due to disease and environmental ruins among other things. Today the mounds of these great people can be found throughout the Eastern United States. Some mounds are in the shape of serpents. Today there are state parks and national monuments that preserve the remnants of this great civilization. In Georgia you have the Ocmulgee Mounds in Macon and the Etowah Mounds in Cartersville.
 
It is little known but Savannah had their own mound city. It was called the Irene Mounds and was excavated and destroyed for port expansion in the 1940’s. It was located five miles northwest of Savannah. It was occupied during the Middle Mississippian period between 1100-1350. It was abandoned by the time Europeans came. It would be some of what Tomochichi the Native American who was here when Oglethorpe came would refer to when he said he wanted to be close to burial grounds of his ancestors.
 
In 1937 to 1940 it was almost completely excavated by professional archaeologists as part of the Works Progress Administration. Its importance rests on the fact that it was the most completely excavated mound site in Georgia. The excavation was unusual in that black women were used in the excavation. Black women were excluded from many of the Works Progress Administration Projects. But in this project on the Irene Mounds they were welcomed workers and highly praised by the archeologists for their professionalism.
 
The site included a large rectangular, flat-topped mound called the Temple Mound; a small conical mound with much shell and several burials called the Burial Mound; and a square building and surrounding wall at ground level in the village with many burials named the Mortuary. The site also included a series of concentric circular walls interpreted as a rotunda. These and smaller structures were found.
Savannah’s history of the Native American’s who lived here before the Europeans came is not well known. But thank goodness there is a recently published books that gives and excellent bird’s eye view of that history if you are interested: Native American History of Savannah.
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One of my favorite unknown characters in history was briefly in the environs of Savannah. He was Major General David Hunter. Hunter was a West Point Graduate but comes into the historical narrative when he writes a letter in 1860 while he was stationed at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas befriending the new President Abraham Lincoln. Their letters usually consisted of the need to abolish slavery. Hunter would warn Lincoln of rumored assassination plots when he rode to go DC to be sworn in for the first time. And indeed there were many rumors of people organizing to stop Lincoln from ever being sworn in. We know now that there was a plan to assassinate him in Baltimore.

Lincoln and his party were afraid for his safety. So Lincoln called upon some of his trusted friends to accompany him to DC to provide him security. Hunter was one of the men he chose. In Buffalo the crowd was huge and out of control and while trying to protect the President from being stampeded by the crowd, Hunter was thrown against the railroad station wall and dislocated his shoulder. His arm would remain in a swing for the rest of the trip.

In 1861 Hunter fought in his first battle of the Civil War. He was wounded in the neck and cheek while commanding a division under Irvin McDowell at the First Battle of Bull Run in July 1861. This sacrifice would lead to his being promoted in August to major general of volunteers.

In 1861 he was moved to serve under General John C. Fremont the head of the Western Department of War. Fremont would make an order freeing the slaves in the states out west. President Lincoln who was concerned with keeping the border states within the Union was not ready to take this step. So Fremont who had overstepped his authority by making this declaration was removed and Lincoln rescinded the order. Hunter was then placed in charge of the army of the West. Later, Hunter too was found to be too ‘independent’ and was removed from this post.

In March of 1862 he was transferred to command the Department of the South.  Hunter arrived at Hilton Head, South Carolina, in March 1862. Preparations to retake Fort Pulaski in the Savannah River from Confederates were already underway. Hunter sent a flag of truce to the Fort that was immediately ignored. Union troops opened fire on Fort Pulaski on April 10, 1862, and within 30 hours had forced the surrender of the massive fortress. This battle would prove to be the demise of the masonry forts as the new guns used by General Q. A. Gillmore made a rubble of a wall of the fort.

Fort Pulaski was now back under Union control. A blockade of Savannah could now be secured. One may wonder why Hunter did not consider capturing Savannah. It could have been that between 1828 and 1831 he was stationed at Fort Dearborn in Chicago. It was here that he met his wife who was part of the family that first settled Chicago. Her name was Maria Kinzie. The last name for Savannahians should be familiar. Maria Kinzie was the sister of Nellie Kinzie the mother of one of Savannah’s most famous citizens, the founder of the Girl Scouts Juliette Gordon Low, who were in Savannah at the time.

Two of his next acts would be radical and caused much stress in the Union and Confederacy. He declared just as Fremont did in the West an order emancipating the slaves in Georgia, South Carolina, and Florida:
‘The three States of Georgia, Florida and South Carolina, comprising the military department of the south, having deliberately declared themselves no longer under the protection of the United States of America, and having taken up arms against the said United States, it becomes a military necessity to declare them under martial law. This was accordingly done on the 25th day of April, 1862. Slavery and martial law in a free country are altogether incompatible; the persons in these three States — Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina— heretofore held as slaves, are therefore declared forever free.’
This order much as Fremont’s order was remanded by President Lincoln who would not make his own emancipation proclamation until January 1, 1863.

The second act would be of lasting effect on the Union Army. Hunter again flouted orders from the federal government and enlisted ex-slaves as soldiers in South Carolina without permission from the War Department. This action incensed border state slave holders, and Kentucky Representative Charles Wickliffe sponsored a resolution demanding a response.

‘I reply that no regiment of "Fugitive Slaves" has been, or is being organized in this Department. There is, however, a fine regiment of persons whose late masters are "Fugitive Rebels"--men who everywhere fly before the appearance of the National Flag, leaving their servants behind them to shift as best they can for themselves. . . . So far, indeed, are the loyal persons composing this regiment from seeking to avoid the presence of their late owners, that they are now, one and all, working with remarkable industry to place themselves in a position to go in full and effective pursuit of their fugacious and traitorous proprietors.’

President Jefferson C. Davis would put a price on his head and declare him to be hung on the spot if captured. Despite disapproval from the Confederacy and Union governments Hunter began enlisting black soldiers from the occupied districts of South Carolina and formed the first such Union Army regiment, the 1st South Carolina (African Descent). Though Congress ordered him to disband, they eventually came around and he got approval from Congress for his action. This earned him the nickname of "Black Dave."

He would eventually be relieved of his position as head of the Department of the South and moved back to the Virginia army under General Grant. Grant ordered him to conduct a scorched earth policy similar to Sherman’s March to the Sea. He did just that burning down the colleges of VMI and Washington College (later Washington and Lee). He also burned down the Governor’s mansion. These acts would make him a persona non grata in the South. He also in his efforts to punish the South left Washington DC open to attack by Gen. Jubal Early. This would cause once again his removal from the front lines.

Hunter would finish his career with two duties. He would serve as a pallbearer at Lincoln’s funeral and he would serve as one of the judges of the trial of the conspirators who executed the assassination of Lincoln. In the movie directed by Robert Redford filmed in Savannah The Conspirators, he was played by Colm Meaney.

Hunter’s connections to Savannah through his wife, the movie made here, and his time as head of the Department of the South make him worthy of knowing. He was a man probably ahead of his time but also with his appearance in all of the major sites of Lincoln’s presidency and death and the various fronts of the Civil War a Forrest Gump of his time.
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​We all know the most famous forts in the United States. There is the Alamo which played a part in Texas leaving Mexico, Fort Sumter where the first shots of the Civil War were fired, and Fort McHenry the fort under siege while Francis Scott Key wrote our national anthem. But I suggest to you that Fort Pulaski outside of Savannah and right before you cross the river onto Tybee Island is as noteworthy as these.

Recent graduate from West Point Lt. Robert E. Lee was the designer. Lee was assuredly trying to impress with his design of an impenetrable fort. It was as much of the 19th century forts a masonry fortification. The construction took from 1829 to 1847 to complete. The fort is in the shape of a hexagon surrounded by a moat with a parade ground inside the walls roughly the size of a football field.

The muddy, soft earth would not support the weight of the proposed 25 million brick fort. Construction started with seventy foot long pilings. These pilings, driven into the mud, would provide stability for the wooden subflooring. The subflooring, composed of two layers of timber, would provide direct support for the brickwork.

Following the secession of Georgia from the Union to the Confederacy in February 1861, Confederate troops then moved into the fort and prepared for possible attack. In1862 Union troops came to reclaim the fort. The battle that ensued would bring on a new era of war and forts. The Union had new rifled cannons that they wanted to see how effective they were in battle. They set up their cannon rifles on the shores of Tybee Island too far for the guns in the fort to reach them. Within twenty four hours Fort Pulaski’s great brick walls had been breached. The rifle cannons success would rendered brick fortifications obsolete. No longer could brick forts hold up to the onslaught of enemy fire, a new era in battle had begun.  

The new Union General David Hunter issued an order that made all slaves free and Fort Pulaski a safe haven for them. Many slaves were delivered to Ft. Pulaski by a Harriet Tubman type figure, March Haynes. These slave began to taste freedom and create their lives anew on the island.  Others would form some of the first colored troops of the Union serving in the 2nd and 3rd colored divisions.

Yet the history does not stop there in October 1864 what would become known as the Immortal Six Hundred would arrive. These were imprisoned Confederate officers. Try as they might the Union soldier’s efforts to treat humanely the emaciated troops did not occur. The prisoners never received sufficient food, blankets or clothes. Supplies in the South were hard to come by for both Union and Confederate Troops. Thirteen of the prisoners of war would die and be buried on the site. In 1865 they would be transferred to Fort Delaware up North where hopefully the supplies would have been more abundant.
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Today, Fort Pulaski is a national Monument. Two movies about Abraham Lincoln have been made in part at the site: The Conspirator and Abe Lincoln:Vampire Hunter. So between Lincoln and history buffs Fort Pulaski stands as a testimony that in war there is no real protection no matter how great our defenses may be. Maybe Peace is really the answer.  
 

​The Savannah Theater first opened in 1818 making it one of the oldest continually–operating theaters in the United States. Because of the many great fires of Savannah this Grand Dame of the theater world has undergone many transformations physically and in artistic purpose. The original design was by one of the first trained architects to come to America: William Jay. Jay is responsible for some of the great buildings of Savannah such as the Owens-Thomas House, Telfair Mansion, and the Ships of the Sea Maritime Museum.

The Savannah Theater opened its door with a performance of “The Soldier’s Daughter” on December 4, 1818. Its opening would put Savannah on the leading edge of theaters in the country. Such theater greats as Oscar Wilde, Sarah Bernhardt, W. C. Fields, Tyrone Power, Lillian Russell, and Edwin Booth to name a few acted at the Theater. Even baseball’s Hall of Famer Ty Cobb made an appearance in the play The College Widow. Charles Coburn Savannah born and raised Academy Award winning actor worked every job at the Savannah Theater from ticket box to manager before he went on to his celebrated film career.

In 1865, Gen. U. S. Grant was in town and accepted an invitation to visit the theater. The play was ‘The Pioneer Patriot’, featuring Rose and Harry Watkins.  The theater was filled to capacity. One theater critic said "Savannah is the best one-night town in America. Atlanta is an excellent two-night town, but for a one-night stand, Savannah cannot be beaten in this country. I say that without fear of contradiction."

As said previously the theater endured three fires and one hurricane. All of these ‘remodelings’ resulted in the 1948 transformation to its current Art Deco style. The theater is on Chippewa Square where the famous Forrest Gump bench was placed for filming. Today you can see Forrest as he jumps on passing trolley buses to tell his tale of Savannah.

In 2002 a young group of entrepreneurs and performers took the stage with the music revue "Lost in the `50's". They have been going strong ever since. They have performed along with their standard musical reviews such musicals as Les Miserables, Mamma Mia, You’re Perfect Now Change, and others. Savannah’s legendary jazz singer Huxie Scott regularly performs there.

A few years ago country singing star who has won best female vocalist seven times Reba McEntire was in town on vacation and bought tickets to Hooray For Hollywood. She stayed and talked to the cast after the show, took pictures, and went out to eat with some of the cast members at the Six Pence Pub. McEntire sent a Twitter message to the world about the theater: “What a talented bunch of people.”
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Savannah Theater continues to entertain and sell out shows over one hundred years later. It is one of the many gems of Savannah’s musical and entertainment world.