New book explores local, state lighthouses

Jul. 29—William Rawlings' love of history runs deep. He grew up with a strong lineage, dating his family's connection to the land they live on back two centuries.

"I'm from Sandersville, Ga., and my family has lived on the same land here for more than 200 years," he said.

It laid the foundation for a lifelong passion for tilling the soil of the past. A physician by trade, Rawlings retired a few years back. But that doesn't mean that he's sitting around twiddling his thumbs. In fact, he's been cultivating a "side hustle" for years.

"I've written 11 books, so I'm a fairly well-established author. I started with fiction and later moved to nonfiction," he said.

In his work, Rawlings has explored true crime stories throughout his home state. One of his most popular books is titled "Six Inches Deeper: The Disappearance of Hellen Hanks." The case took place in Valdosta in the 1970s and proves a riveting read for fans of the genre.

"It's a really fascinating case," he said.

But Rawlings' interests extend well beyond the dark world of murder and mayhem. He has also probed the origins of some of the coast's architectural wonders — lighthouses. His latest release, "Lighthouses of the Georgia Coast," takes a look at the five existing structures that dot the state's landscape.

That includes Savannah, Tybee Island, St. Simons Island, Little Cumberland Island and Sapelo Island. Each individual lighthouse holds an allure all its own. That proved fascinating to Rawlings.

"They continue to fascinate us, not only for their intrinsic beauty, but also as monuments to our shared history, and as symbols of hope and salvation to those cast adrift on the stormy seas of life," he said.

"From the mid-18th through the early 20th centuries, the waterways of coastal Georgia from the St. Marys River in the south to the Savannah River in the north were an integral part of the state's economy, vital to the trade in cotton, rice, timber, naval stores and other products shipped to ports in America and around the world."

Of course, for Rawlings who have been coming to Sea Island for decades, the St. Simons Island lighthouse was particularly interesting. In fact, he chose a photo of it to grace the book's cover.

"There are really two crown jewels of lighthouses on the east coast and that's Tybee and St. Simons. They are both very well preserved ... almost pristine in that they resemble what they looked like 100 years ago. Both have museums attached and have really friendly staffs," he said. "But we had a house on Sea Island for 25 years and one day when I was down last year, I went over to St. Simons in the middle of the night took that picture on my cellphone. I just thought it was really neat in the way it came out."

The mystic surrounding the lighthouse and its legends also seemed to match the mood of the photo.

"The St. Simons lighthouse has a great story. It was originally constructed by James Gould in 1810. Then, you have the Confederates blowing it up in 1861 during the Civil War so that the Northern troops couldn't use it as a navigational device," he said. "The structure there now was built in 1871. And, of course, it is supposedly haunted by the ghost of the lighthouse keeper who was shot and killed by his assistant in 1880."

But it's not just the St. Simons Island lighthouse that has a connection to a tragic tale. Rawlings says the lighthouse keeper on Little Cumberland Island piloted the last slave ship, The Wanderer, which docked on the south end of Jekyll Island.

"Every lighthouse has a story," Rawlings said.

It took him roughly a year to wrangle all of those tales into one book. But within the lull of the coronavirus lockdown, he found himself with plenty of time on his hands.

"COVID is of course terrible. But the silver lining was that I had a lot of time without much else to do," he said.

Rawlings has been making a number of trips to the Golden Isles to share his work with the Literary Guild of St. Simons and the Coastal Historical Society.

And while he doesn't have any book-related trips to coast currently planned, the book has a strong local presence.

"You can get it at all the usual places but I know that everyone wants to support local bookstores.

It's at Righton Books in Redfern Village and GJ Ford, too, it's also at the Coastal Georgia Historical Society's gift shop at the lighthouse on St. Simons Island," he said.