Golden Isles History

T his article originally appeared in the January 2026 issue of Elegant Island Living Magazine.  Josh Dukes is a local historian and chair of the Brunswick Historic Preservation Board. He is co-author of the book  Brunswick: Past & Present,  available at local retailers and online. Mrs. Arilee Cox christens the  SS William Cox , a Liberty Ship named in her late husband’s honor. J.A. Jones Shipyard, Brunswick, Georgia. December 1944. Eighty-one years ago this December, a young Savannah widow named Arilee Cox stood before a crowd at the J. A. Jones Shipyard in Brunswick to christen a Liberty Ship bearing her husband’s name.  Obituary for Mr. William Cox, The Afro-American , Baltimore, Maryland. January 13, 1945. The SS William Cox joined the fleet in in December 1944, but its story began years earlier with the man it honored. William “Willie” Cox was born in Cairo, Georgia in 1898 and spent more than 35 years in maritime work, with his career beginning as a coa...

This story originally ran in the January 2026 edition of Discover Downtown Brunswick, a publication of The Brunswick News, Brunswick, GA.   Josh Dukes is a local historian and chair of the Brunswick Historic Preservation Board. He is co-author of the book Brunswick: Past & Present, available at local retailers and online. Brunswick's US Custom House and Post Office still stands today as Brunswick City Hall because of tireless work by preservationists like the McGarvey Sisters. Cormac McGarvey stands above his sisters Virginia (left), Margaret (right), and Mary (bottom) In December 1963, a full-page advertisement appeared in The Brunswick News under a stark headline: “PLEASE HELP SAVE ME!” The voice speaking to readers was not a politician or civic group, but a building at 601 Gloucester Street—the former U.S. Custom House and Post Office. It described its copper details, steel joists, vaulted ceilings, and architectural pedigree, warning that once torn down it could never...

This article first appeared in Discover Downtown Brunswick, a publication of The Brunswick News, Brunswick, GA Each historic square in Brunswick wears its name like a badge—literally in most cases, as you can view most of their attractive signposts from a casual drive by. The squares were never just empty greenspace. They were reserved for domestic use, providing shade, livestock grazing, recreation, and breathing room within the proposed tight urban grid.   They were markers laid into the original 1771 Oglethorpe Plan as deliberately as the streets. And like the original streets, the largest squares were name to remind us of some person or place that mattered at the time.   Some of the smaller green spaces south of the business district— now called St. Simons, Satilla, Frederica, and Crispen – were originally nameless and referred to as “Places” on the town plat. These unassuming parks centered along Newcastle and Norwich Streets are great for a casual stroll these days, an...

This article was originally published in Discover Downtown Brunswick, a publication of The Brunswick News, Brunswick, GA. I’m a Google Maps nerd. I love submitting recommendations for road fixes and adding missing businesses. Waterways are notoriously hard to get corrected on Google Maps, but that doesn’t stop me from trying. If you’ve looked at Brunswick’s winding creeks and noticed a long, unnaturally straight waterway cutting from the Turtle River across high ground to the Altamaha River, you’ve not found a Google mapping error. You’ve found one of Georgia’s most ambitious early engineering projects—the Brunswick–Altamaha Canal. The idea of linking Brunswick’s port to the Altamaha River dates to the 18th century. In a pre- railroad age, rivers were the superhighways. The Altamaha already carried trade from Georgia’s interior forests and plantations, and Brunswick’s natural deep-water port gave it a shot at competing with Savannah and Darien. A canal could shorten transport times a...

This article originally appeared in the December 2022 issue of Discover Downtown Brunswick, published by The Brunswick News in Brunswick, Georgia. Story by Josh Dukes This year, we volunteered our home on Wright Square for the Magnolia Garden Club’s Christmas Tour of Homes.   Between bouts of over-the-top decorating and existential dread over cracks, stains, and bruises that we hope won’t be noticed in each room, I couldn’t help but think about the Brunswick in which this house first appeared.   As far as we can tell, our home was completed in 1907 as one of a group of cottages built as rental properties.   This was a great year not only for our home, but for Brunswick as a whole.   The year 1907 is the same year that Brunswick’s streetcars were first announced to an excited city.   Though they were relatively short-lived, our streetcars still resonate as a representation of great growth and opportunity for a city on the rise. Streetcar lines from a 1923 surve...