HOWARD COFFIN:

In 1912 Sapelo was purchased by Howard Coffin, one of the founders of the Hudson Motor Company, and a man of great public spirit and inventiveness. Sapelo provided him with a challenge and he enthusiastically set about revitalizing the island.

He set up a canning industry for oysters and shrimp to provide employment for the island’s black community, descendants of Spalding’s slaves. Sea island cotton and food crops were planted and he built roads, sank artesian wells, and brought in cattle. Chachalaca (a pheasant-like bird) was imported from Guatemala as a game bird and its call can still be heard from time to time in the forest.

Coffin engaged archeologists to examine the Indian mounds, shell rings and various ruins because he was intrigued by the evidence of earlier inhabitants.

At first Sapelo was used as a vacation retreat for the Coffins and they lived in the partially restored South End House with the addition of the outdoor swimming pool and some additional columns. In 1925-28 the house was completely restored and a second story added as we see it today. With the building of a luxurious home they finally took up residence on the island remaining there only a few years because Howard Coffin’s energies became directed toward the development of the Sea Island resort, adjacent to St. Simons Island.

Coffin built many of the buildings present today: the greenhouses, docks, the dormitory (once an administration building), and two of the older houses on the south end. An inside swimming pool was added to the main house complementing the older outside pool; the water garden near the Institute and the north end duck ponds, fed by artesian wells, were all part of his vision for Sapelo.