Retired journalist chronicles conversations in 'Tybee Island Heroes and Hooligans'
Who has had the most love affairs on Tybee Island? I know the winner by a long shot, and he just released a tell-all book.
The book is “Tybee Island Heroes and Hooligans: The Making of an Island Paradise, Vol. I" (Maudlin Pond Press 2023) The man is J.R. Roseberry. What’s in the book are not secret love affairs, fodder for gossip or whispers. These are platonic love affairs with some of the real-life characters who have made Tybee a beach town, a fabled community, like no other.
Roseberry retired to Tybee in the 1990s after a long career in journalism. But, as he says in his introduction, he was in his early 20s when Tybee first seduced him. He worked as a reporter and editor for the Savannah Morning News at the time and found, usually after midnight, that Tybee bars were the best places to unwind.
More: 'The Post' triggers memories, reminders of important work
Open Race: Tybee Island Mayor Shirley Sessions says she won't run for re-election in November
“Those were the good old days.” He was regaled with Tybee stories and was taken with how unpretentious those late-night denizens were. “They didn’t ask about your pedigree. They weren’t class conscious. They were Guale salt of the earth.”
The good old days occurred again in the 1990s when J.R. returned to Tybee after decades at the Washington Post. He immersed himself into the island culture. The reporter in him was thrilled to discover the life stories of one after another Tybee citizen.
“I discovered the many turns and the many incarnations there can be in the lives of people. You think that you know them in the present, but I was always amazed at how much you didn’t know about their past. The lives they had lived – strong, creative, hilarious, adventurous.”
Retirement to Tybee Island reveals captivating stories
After retirement, Roseberry wrote a weekly column for the Morning News called “J.R.’s Island View.” He profiled the fascinating people who he met on Tybee. People who felt comfortable telling him their stories. There are thousands of stories in the naked city, and this book captures 20 of them.
As I say on the book’s back cover, “You know it’s a good book when you wish you’d met every one of the characters in it. This is that kind of book. You want to look up and reconnect with every one of J.R.’s subjects – people who Tybee can be forever proud to claim.”
A born storyteller, Roseberry introduces many of the folks who have made Tybee Tybee. Among them, Nickie Alexander, Dirty Dan Deloach, George McDonald, John O’Neill, Sally Bostwick, Albert Seidl, a nomad known as “Sinbad,” Linda Odom, Michael Hosti, George Oliver, Marlyce Kling, Bob Martin, Mike Ryan, Jenny Orr, Steven Scheer, Leonard “Sandman” Miller, Mola Chu Jung, Joan Chu Wong, Lance Smith, Burke Day and Sylvia Gott.
These folks are strands of Tybee DNA. According to Roseberry, “I wrote ‘Island View’ because I wanted to introduce these people to their neighbors and to share the impressive things they had seen and done. There were things...that you would never guess. I’m an easy person to talk to, and so they did.”
And J.R. is already pulling together volume two. In it, you’ll read about the Tybee man who was a WWII bomber pilot and how he helped dig the tunnel from the Stalag featured in the movie, "The Great Escape."
Meanwhile, settle in with volume one and see if you can resist falling as Roseberry did for Tybee's heroes and hooligans.
Ben Goggins is a former marine biologist and a regular contributor to Savannah Morning News. He is a founder of and author with Maudlin Pond Press.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Real-life characters profiled in 'Tybee Island Heroes and Hooligans'
