Golf cart parades, country show and group hugs: How Myrtle Beach became campground haven

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Melissa Parks was just two months old during her first visit to Ocean Lakes Family Campground, where her grandparents had a permanent site, and it’s remained integral to her and her family’s lives in four plus decades since.

“It’s where I caught my first fish, where I learned to ride a bike,” she said. “My first job was scooping ice cream at the Snack Shak ... (and) my oldest sister’s husband, they met at Ocean Lakes.”

Families like Parks’, whose nieces are now fourth generation visitors to the beachfront property, are common within the Myrtle Beach-area campground communities, which have grown from small, rural, tent-heavy oases to full-on resorts complete with every amenity vacationers could desire.

But the heart of these campgrounds, whose growth mirrors that of the Grand Strand as a whole, remains the family atmosphere and memories it has created for the multi-generational visitors and property owners.

“We’re in the people business,” said Barb Krumm, Ocean Lakes’ director of marketing, who has worked there since 1998.

Competitors working together

The family friendly draw that has been key in bringing visitors back year after year has extended to the business interests of the competing operators.

Krumm credited the “founding families” of the area’s oldest campgrounds for working together from the beginning to market Myrtle Beach as a hub for campers.

Annette Shephard, executive director of the Myrtle Beach Family Campground Owners Association, said the campgrounds have been pooling marketing resources since the 1980s to advertise the area as the “Camping Capital of the World,” a slogan they still use today.

Don Perry, president of Lakewood Camping Resort, said his family and other campground owners have had many opportunities to sell over the years, but they’re all committed to offering campers a place to stay within walking distance of the beach at a reasonable price.

Family business

Perry was 19 when his dad opened Lakewood in 1961, and he recalled it cost campers $2.50 per night and when they converted a former Air Force barracks to their first bathhouse, they had limited hot water.

“If you got back from the beach early enough, you got a warm shower,” he recalled, laughing.

The campground expanded when they took in the 1980s when they took over the lease for the former Magic Harbor amusement park — Perry recalled the property housing a dolphin show and alligator exhibit during those early years — and the Perry family has been involved every step of the way.

Perry’s sons used to operate a juice bar on the beach that was destroyed during Hurricane Hugo and his brother Phillip started High Steppin’ Country, a country-based variety show which stands as the area’s longest running show.

Courtney Mauldin, Phillip Perry’s granddaughter, recalled growing up playing putt-putt and basketball with her cousin outside the amphitheater while their moms rehearsed for the show and dreaming about being part of the show herself.

Mauldin did end up performing in High Steppin’ Country, singing songs including “You Ain’t Woman Enough” by Loretta Lynn and “Mama’s Broken Heart” by Miranda Lambert. And now she’s working as Lakewood’s front office manager.

Mauldin said the friends she made while being in the show are still among her best friends.

Keeping vacationers returning

Making lifelong friends is what’s kept many coming back to Myrtle Beach campgrounds for decades.

Steve and Vickie Potts, from Asheboro, North Carolina, have been visiting Pirateland Family Camping Resort for 35 years and bought a permanent residence on the property earlier this year.

“It’s definitely the people,” Steve Potts said when asked what kept them coming back. “It’s always felt like this is home.”

Potts and other longtime visitors also said there’s always fun activities happening.

Parks recalled attending dances as a preteen at the Ocean Lakes recreation center, the iconic Fourth of July golf cart parades and weekly outdoor church services as highlights of her childhood.

Mauldin said the Fourth of July is also a big deal at Lakewood, recalling block parties with hula hoop contests, hay rides and face painting.

Ocean Lakes campground nearly broke a world record with one of its activities, gathering 1,277 campers for a group hug in 2001 as part of its 30th anniversary celebration.

Krumm recalled that they had to fully document the attempt and get all participants to sign a form submitted the Guinness World Record publisher, but they never got any confirmation.

It’s unknown if it was ever officially a record, but the current record, recorded in Ottawa, Canada, stands at 10,544 people, according to the Guinness World Records website.