Byline: Brian Hicks
Nov. 28--NORTH MYRTLE BEACH, S.C.--The club sits off Main Street, hidden in the shadow of high-rise condos and oceanfront hotels.
Beach music drifts through the parking lot; and inside, the clock spins back 40 years as three couples shuffle across the dance floor to the tune of Gary Bass singing 'Soothe Me.'
These people have just learned to shag, and a packed house of locals, dancing in place, drinks in hand, cheers them on. When the song ends and another begins, this time Percy Sledge's 'Nine Times a Man,' half the crowd takes to the dance floor in a cinematic moment of spontaneity. Some don't even bother to set down their drinks.
'Fat Harold' Bessent watches this scene from the corner of his bar, and a thin smile spreads across his lips. Bessent, 70, is doing his best to make sure this is one South Carolina tradition that does not die, and his best is pretty good. He offers free shag lessons to anyone who'll take them.
'It's very popular with the young people right now,' Bessent says. 'If they teach their children, we'll be all right.'
In these parts, Bessent is a legend, the former owner of North Myrtle Beach dance clubs such as the Spanish Galleon and the Pad, places that ensured the shag and the Grand Strand would be forever linked. His new club, Fat Harold's, harkens back to the beach town's golden age, when it was just a strip of mom and pop hotels, penny arcades and clubs that kids cruised in convertibles every night of the summer.
Back then, everyone danced here, mostly to the sweet soul music of bands like the Drifters. The sound became so closely associated with the place that it is still called Carolina Beach Music.
It was a magical time, the sort of era that fuels lifelong nostalgia, inspires movies and gives a place its own identity.
Today it is a world that barely exists outside the walls of Bessent's club.
The Grand Strand is a much different place today. Now, the epicenter of this tourist Mecca lies a few miles west of the beach along a divided highway lined with theme bars, T-shirt shops and all-you-can-eat restaurants with large, stucco shellfish looming over their entrances.
This sprawl is the heart of Horry County, which in 20 years has doubled its population to 200,000 people. Along the way it has become one of the top tourism destinations in the country and a favorite retirement destination for migrating snowbirds.
In this new Myrtle Beach, people flock to a huge theme park-like shopping and restaurant complex called Broadway at the Beach, which really isn't at the beach. Fat Harold's, virtually a museum to the state dance and the town's bygone days, does not warrant mention in the tourism brochures.
But then, history has little place in this new world, and the shag is just another reminder of a time that many locals miss today, another piece of a disappearing coastal culture.
'I worked on the beach when I was 14,' Gary Anderson says between dances at Fat Harold's. 'I pushed a snow cone cart up and down the beach. When I got here, the tallest hotel was two stories. We had the Galleon and the Pad and it was a fun time. But that's all gone now, and I hate it.'
From the Cherry Grove fishing pier, the Strand stretches south in the haze, a line of buildings standing shoulder to shoulder, as close to one another, and to the Atlantic Ocean, as possible. The Grand Strand is a 60-mile stretch of the coast running from the state line south to Winyah Bay, just north of Georgetown, and much of it looks identical to the view from the pier.
It is an imposing sight, reminiscent of Miami Beach, and one that Glenn DeFraine has come to accept. Like a lot of other people who were here before it was a hotspot, DeFraine spends many days fishing for king mackerel and other sport fish from the pier. Even back in the old days, he knew that it was just a matter of time before all this happened.
'When we came down, there wouldn't be any restaurants open in the winter,' he recalls. 'This is happening everywhere. Up north the development just came faster and was denser.'
The Grand Strand is catching up in a hurry. The U.S. Census Bureau ranked the Myrtle Beach metropolitan area the 13th-fastest growing in the country during the 1990s, a decade that saw 36.5 percent growth here. Lured by relatively inexpensive coastal land, a temperate climate and memories of past vacations, many people have found it to be almost paradise.
It wasn't always that way.
More than 100 years ago, a handful of South Carolina businessmen decided to build a small beachfront resort. In 1901, the Seaside Inn opened with rooms for $2 a night, and it caught on quickly. By the 1940s, Myrtle Beach, named for the Sweet Myrtle Tree, a shrub native to the area, was the favorite coastal destination in the Carolinas, anchored by a small downtown where people got burgers at Peach's and then went next door for beers at a place called the Bowery. At the time, the town of Myrtle Beach had a full-time population of fewer than 1,600.
In 1941, the Myrtle Beach Air Force Base opened just as the United States got into World War II. The base, and the war, brought a lot of activity and new people to the area. Some of those, including a future novelist named Mickey Spillane, were hooked.
Bolstered by tourism and visiting military families, the Strand began to grow. Between 1940 and 1950, the little town of Myrtle Beach doubled its population. Beach cottages were torn down and replaced by mom and pop hotels in an effort to build another Ft. Lauderdale. The town was on the verge of taking off in 1954 when Hurricane Hazel nearly wiped it off the map.
Undaunted, Myrtle Beach started to rebuild.
It hasn't stopped yet.
IN THE SHADOW OF THE NEW
The smell of surf and funnel cake mingle at the corner of Ocean Boulevard and 9th Avenue North. A barker tries to lure people into the Pavilion amusement park. The music of an old carousel completes the illusion. It is 1960 once again.
For a moment, it seems that Myrtle Beach hasn't changed much at all. Here the Grand Strand most closely resembles the classic beach towns of the northeast, Coney Island and Asbury Park. But the scene is quickly disrupted, if not by the 'No Cruising' sign, then by the rap music blaring out of a gift shop.
Times are changing. Soon, the Pavilion will be shut down, relocated, probably to the Highway 17 bypass. It will be an emotional move. Every time the city tries to change something, there is a fight here. A lot of people want the city frozen in time, others want to continue the process of turning it into a year-round tourist destination.
'There are some people who don't want to see any change,' says Jack Walker, planning director for the city of Myrtle Beach. 'They are the ones who say let's raise the bridge. There are also a certain number of people on the Boulevard who don't want to see things change because it's working for them now.'
The city sees the prime real estate of the Pavilion as a waste. The park is open barely one-third of the year. City fathers believe a year-round attraction on the site would help Ocean Boulevard businesses, many of which have to shut down at the end of the season.
Others argue that's the way it's always been and the way it should stay. Like a town of bears, many locals just hibernate for the winter, making the money in the summer that they need to survive the rest of the year.
Burroughs and Chapin, the development company that is a major force in this town, is looking to relocate the Pavilion, which is hemmed in and can't grow. At the same time, word around town is that another major theme park developer is sniffing around with the idea of building a year-round theme park of the magnitude of a Universal Studios. These moves would only change the face of the Strand even more.
It will not be the first makeover for South Carolina's busiest stretch of oceanfront. In the 1970s and 1980s, mom and pop hotels were routinely knocked down in favor of the 10-, 18- or 20-story hotels and condos that now line the waterfront. There are few mom and pop hotels left, and fewer beach cottages. In North Myrtle Beach, there is still a mix, as that stretch has developed more slowly, skipping a step in the process. In places, it has gone from cottage to high-rise condo.
For a town trying to become a year-round, family-oriented tourist destination, there are few restrictions to building. For now, the city is simply trying to deal with the traffic it is creating. Last summer, in an effort to combat congestion, the city put in a mass transit lane on Ocean Boulevard, something many locals applauded, while others criticized.
That's just the way it goes in a town undergoing major change.
One place that has not changed during all this is the Bowery, which sits at the foot of 9th Avenue North, across from the Pavilion.
When it opened in 1944, there were only a couple of places to drink in Horry County. Locals flocked to drink one brand of beer one way, in glass mugs, and listen to the house band. Since 1954, Mouse -- the only name he'll give -- has worked at the Bowery and has watched this area go from being 'the place to be' to a bar that locals rarely frequent. The Bowery is almost more popular, more famous, in other parts of the world, in part because the house band for years was a country group called Alabama.
Victor Shamah, owner of the Bowery, says that now his most steady customers come from places such as West Virginia and Ohio. The development that has eclipsed his business, however, doesn't really bother him. He has a draw that is much deeper than casual tourism. The Bowery is, for some people, a destination itself.
'Broadway at the Beach is not really our competition,' Shamah says.
In some ways, the Strand today is divided into two worlds. There are the crowds, congestion and glitz of the bypass -- the Dixie Stampede, the House of Blues and the NASCAR Cafe -- and then there are places that look as if they have been untouched since the 1960s. In Garden City, a few miles south of the strip, tourists pile into Sam's Corner, a diner at the pier and Atlantic Avenue, and it's like stepping into an Archie comic book.
The diner looks much older than its 30 years, with fountain drinks, malt machines and signs advertising 5-cent coffee. At the counter, Jim Williams of Charlotte sits with his family, eating cheeseburgers. Even though the rest of the beach has changed dramatically -- more condos, huge vacation homes -- this little place has remained the same. That's why Williams says he brings his daughter, Bailey, two or three times a year.
'We like to show her what it was like down here,' Williams says.
This is just what happens, most folks around here say, when you've got a good thing. Soon, everyone knows about it. And then it's ruined.
It is a sentiment expressed in an old sign hanging above the door inside the dark confines of the Bowery. It says, 'If you like this joint ... keep your mouth shut. If you don't, tell your friends.'
MORE GROWTH
A decade ago, the epicenter of the Grand Strand moved west, away from the water, as the Highway 17 bypass became home to a stretch of shops, restaurants and tourist attractions, including the gold pyramid of the Hard Rock Cafe, a Planet Hollywood and even a franchise of Medieval Times, where you can eat a steak dinner and watch knights joust. Today, Medieval Times is about the closest thing to a historically themed attraction on the Strand.
In recent years, the anchor of this 20-mile strip has become Broadway at the Beach. Broadway at the Beach is like Universal Studios without the rides. A healthy helping of Jimmy Buffett music is piped into the park, and everything about the complex screams middle class tropical vacation ideal. But at its heart, this is basically just an outdoor mall.
Still, Broadway at the Beach is at the center of a stretch of development that attracts 14 million visitors a year, and in 2000 drew the ire of the Sierra Club, which claimed the bypass build-up was 'destroying the open space that makes the town such a popular tourist getaway and residential community.'
The Sierra Club said the town has skirted regulations, destroying wetlands and open space, and has made the town so congested it is barely navigable.
The city is trying to manage the growth as well as it can, encouraging higher density development where residential and commercial areas mingle, reducing the need for cars. The old Air Force base is being considered for high-quality development, and the city plans more greenways, bike paths and wider streetscapes to encourage other forms of transportation.
But there are no plans to stop the growth. Growth, in fact, is the idea.
'I realized when I came here 19 years ago that the city was determined to let itself become an urban resort,' Walker says. 'The thinking has been that it's not bad to be an urban resort if you do it right.'
If popularity is the yardstick, it would be hard to argue Myrtle Beach has done it wrong. The town's appeal continues to grow, its tourism numbers rising steadily.
Charles Kovacik, director of the S.C. Geography Alliance at the University of South Carolina, says Myrtle Beach in some ways has done a better job than the rest of the coast in remaining accessible to more people because it is a little more middle-class.
'You always hear people saying nobody goes to Myrtle Beach because it's so crowded,' Kovacik said. 'I think it's so popular because of its diversity. It's got golfing and the coast.'
There likely won't be any impediments to further development from the state or local level. Tourism is the state's No. 1 economic generator, and the Strand is the state's No. 1 destination. That puts a premium on the success of the area. And to succeed, any tourist attraction must grow. Rick Devoe, executive director of the Sea Grant Consortium says the question is: Is it more beneficial to preserve what's left than to develop more?
'It's an example of the goose and the golden egg,' Devoe said.
KEEPING THE OLD WAYS
South of Myrtle Beach, as the coast begins its gradual fade from Strand to Lowcountry, the changes become more subtle. The old fishing village of Murrells Inlet retains much of its charm, but the tourist restaurants are encroaching. There is less development leading into Georgetown, but what there is of it is fairly exclusive. The mainland community of Pawleys Island is becoming the upscale center of the northern coast, but the island itself clings to life without commercial development.
That is by design.
In 1985, Pawleys incorporated to curb development on the island. Now the town requires any houses built to be between 2,000 and 4,000 square feet and bans businesses, duplexes and timeshares. That law has stopped Pawleys from being overrun. Right now, there are 55 condos and 538 single-family homes on the island.
'We have limited our building to residential to hold on to the character of the island,' says Don Manning, building and zoning official for Pawleys.
While Pawleys might no longer be the same ramshackle collection of beach cottages that Charlestonians once slipped off to for their summer vacations -- Hurricane Hugo changed the island irrevocably -- it still proudly clings to the 'arrogantly shabby' label. At the Pelican Inn, a bed and breakfast that does not advertise, the owners don't bother with television or telephones in their rooms. Instead guests relax under live oaks and stare out across one of the best beaches on the coast while lying in a Pawleys Island hammock, just the way it used to be.
The Inn, which was bought years ago by a Greenville family that intended to convert it to a private home, is a reminder of the old days along the coast. When the Evans family moved into the house, they began to get cards and letters from people who used to stay there, urging them to re-open. So they did.
'They just fall in love with the quaintness,' Hope Evans says.
If Pawleys seems unspoiled, that's because it mostly is. But a few miles away, a truly unchanged piece of the South Carolina coast remains largely undiscovered. In the middle of the Intracoastal Waterway, Sandy Island sits cut off from the mainland and the ways of 21st century life.
About 50 families, almost all of them black, live a boat ride away from the changing coastal environment. And they want to keep it that way.
Sarah Deas grew up on Sandy Island, which didn't have electricity until the 1960s, and immersed herself in severe culture shock by moving to New York City. She lived in the city for years before returning, not long ago, to her birthplace.
'It's heaven,' Deas says. 'I like the peacefulness, and that when you're home, you're home. I feel blessed to live here where you don't have to lock doors or put on chains.'
Deas' mother, Onetha Elliott, is the oldest woman on the island. She lives in a nice but modest house in the island's interior, a place so quiet you can hear the crickets chirping in the neighbors' yard in the middle of the day. Elliott, 88, has spent her entire life on the island and has not tired of it yet. These days she rarely takes a boat ride across the Intracoastal. Not even for Wal-Mart.
'I don't even want to go shopping anymore,' she said. 'I am happy, satisfied.'
Sandy Island isn't a closed community, but it is guarded and doesn't freely invite strangers over. The ones who work on the mainland take rickety boats across the waterway and down a channel to a small boat landing where they keep their cars parked.
Those without boats sometimes will hang out at the landing for hours, until someone comes along and gives them a ride. They wait patiently, in a way that most people living in the 21st century could never fathom. Their only concession to modern convenience is cell phones.
It is a world in stark contrast to the glitz and bustle of Myrtle Beach, and the residents like it that way. Years ago, the state floated a proposal to build a bridge to the island. It was promoted as a way to allow the people to drive home at night like everyone else, but development was the ulterior motive.
The residents fought the bridge and eventually were successful in killing the plan. They knew all too well what would happen if the island became easily accessible. From their peaceful homes across the water, they have watched what has happened to the rest of the Strand, and they don't want that. The island remains zoned strictly single-family residential by Georgetown County, and the islanders rarely, if ever, sell to anyone from off.
It is their way of ensuring that Sandy Island remains, for the time being, anyway, separate from the rest of the world.
'Not everyone wants to get in a boat to go to Sandy Island, and that's fine,' Deas said. 'If I didn't have to work, I wouldn't go to the other side.'
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