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Come See Me at the Tybee Farmer’s Market
TYBEE BEACHCOMBER | JUNE 2018 25
What is
By Jimmy Prosser
the History of Tybee?
What a brilliant question. Tybee is like no other, a town so unique there is
no way I can give you all the details in just one measly article, but that’s not
going to stop me from trying.
Tybee was founded hundreds and fifties of years ago, many believe by the
French, some believe by the Spanish, others believe by wealthy merchants
in the distant land of “Savannah” looking to get away from their children,
and maybe contract typhoid as they ventured through the miles of marsh,
over-populated with feral cats, dumped by horrible people venturing to the
new world. “Free cat to good home!” they’d shout from their pilgrim wagons.
“We’re moving and we can’t take it with us to our new apartment,” they’d lie.
The truth is for as far as anyone can remember, people have always dumped
cats on Tybee. (Fun Fact # 1: The aborigines were using cats as currency,
they constantly reproduced, and made everyone wealthy, until the invention
of inflation, I’m off topic).
Tybee is native for “Salt” which turned out to work in their favor when
the founders discovered they were actually on an island surrounded by salt
water. (Fun Fact # 2: Tybee does actually mean salt.) With a new island to
develop, and salt on the mind, the colonists made margaritas with salt, and
built a lighthouse. Which explains why roughly 17 of our lighthouses are
lying at the bottom of the ocean. Too drunk, and unable to stand, how would
you expect us to build a lighthouse?
At some point pirates took over. But that’s poorly documented seeing how
the academic curriculum onboard a pillaging vessel was subpar. And mostly,
paper and water don’t mix, which pirates would have learned in science
class, but the instructors were less than qualified. I digress.
Right around the time of The Civil War, The Civil War broke out! No one
had any idea what to do. A fort was built, and quickly the north whooped
some southern Ass, and took over. But the north being progressive, just
freed everyone, and opted to not burn down Savannah. And lucky we are,
otherwise the largest St. Patrick’s Day Parade in the South would have to
move to another city, a less fun city, like Jacksonville, or anywhere in North
Carolina.
Sometime during the prohibition era, the government outlawed alcohol,
and if I can imagine Tybee then, like I know it now y’all, everybody was
pissed. (Fun Fact#3: Nay! Real Fact - don’t touch our booze). Our only way
to and from the island, unless you commandeered a boat, was by train.
Sometime after the turn of the century, but before my mom was born,
Federal Officials would sneak out to Tybee by train to surprise attack and
bust everyone for drinking. Now this train, she wasn’t having it, our one and
only train, with a whistle and the capability of moving at very slow rates of
speed, had a plan; sabotage. The one and only whistle blowing slow train,
carrying federal officials out to Tybee was eventually given a medal of valor
for ensuring there was never a bootleg bust. For you see, our speakeasies,
like The Wind Rose and Wet Willies, saw and heard the slow train blowing
it’s whistle, they called everyone a Breezy, which was the name of the town
horse, who took them all to the two brothels on the island, to hide. The feds
has nothing on us!
BOMB. So this one time, in 1958, the United States Air Force may have
accidentally “misplaced” a 7,600lb Mark 15 Nuclear Bomb by launching it
from a plane as the plane crashed just off shore. No need to panic, the bomb
has never been found, so it’s likely that it hasn’t fallen into the wrong hands.
Or fins. Because, fish. (Fun Fact #4: This is actually true, we’re missing a very
very very large bomb).
The Pier. Before our current pier, we had another pier, there’s a yet again
poorly documented story about what happened to it. I’m not going to tell you,
and you can google all you want but you’re not going to find anything on it.
So there, how’s that for a cliff hanger?
Happy summer y’all. Remember, 15% isn’t a tip, it’s an insult. Servers and
bartenders make $2.13/ hour.
MMM...So
Good!
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