Fort Frederica National Monument Superintendent Mary Beth Wester is pleased to announce a partnership program between the National Park Service and the Coasters. This upcoming program will highlight the history of the plantation on St. Simons Island. This second program of a series will occur on Wednesday, Oct. 14, 2009 at 5:30 pm within the visitor center auditorium at Fort Frederica National Monument.
Susan Garrett is a retired broadcast journalist and business communicator. Her career included news reporter and anchor positions in both radio and television in Virginia, corporate business communication in Florida, and freelance video and print communication in Virginia. Susan is a graduate of Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, Virginia where she majored in English and History. She became involved in historic preservation in Opelika, Alabama and has continued her interest in “days gone by" with docent duties at Christ Church and the Coastal Georgia Historical Society here on St. Simons.
Garrett’s presentation on “Plantation Days on Old St. Simons" will explore the lifestyle of the island’s plantation culture from the late 1700s to the early 1800s. The discussion will focus on four of the fourteen working cotton and rice plantations that formed the planter society of St. Simons Island. “I am always struck by the strength of the planter families who arrived on something of a wilderness island, and carved a successful, close-knit and very beautiful culture out of that wilderness," said Garrett.
Source: U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service
