‘I wish I still had that T-shirt.’ Here’s how you can get vintage Myrtle Beach Ts.
Editor’s note: What Myrtle Beach people, places or things make you nostalgic? Tell us more about this story or other notable stories that our journalists should know about our community. Email us at online@thesunnews.com.
Al McWhite is on a mission to recreate your favorite old T-shirts from Myrtle Beach’s heyday. Mother Fletchers, Castaways, The Purple Gator, The Water Boggan are all here at Native Sons Apparel Printing.
McWhite, a designer at the company, painstakingly looks through social media posts, collects matchbook covers, and flips through Myrtle Beach high school yearbooks, looking for images to come up with old - and sometimes new - designs that will inspire a sense of nostalgia in Myrtle Beach’s long term visitors and locals.
Native Sons has collaborated with the “Myrtle Beach History” Facebook group to print shirts and hats that harken back to what Native Son’s owner Steve Taylor sees as the beach town’s “zenith” of the 80s and 90s.
“My heyday living the Myrtle Beach life was in the 80s,” Taylor says, “so this is a kind of fun and feel-good thing for our company.”
Taylor recalls beach life during days spent surfing, working and hanging out with his friends at night clubs along the Grand Strand.
Native Sons celebrates the ‘beach lifestyle’
According to Taylor, even the name of his company harkens back to when a group of friends calling themselves by the same name hosted parties at clubs like The Afterdeck and had T-shirts printed to commemorate their events. S
ince 1984 Native Sons has printed apparel, and hosted and promoted events celebrating that “beach lifestyle,” like surfing contests, beach volleyball and Jeep meets.
Taylor and McWhite are active in local area Facebook groups. McWhite says they are are trying to come up with designs for those who think, “I wish I still had that t-shirt.”
McWhite found the design for their popular Electric Surface Arcade and Lounge T-shirt when he noticed a portion of a banner in an old picture from an event held on Ocean Boulevard. Others like the Ocean Forest Hotel and the Hawaiian Village come from archival images of those hotels and McWhite has to use his imagination to come up with time-period fonts and designs.
Where can you get a new vintage Myrtle Beach t-shirt?
Many of the T-shirts are on display and available for purchase for in Native Son’s showroom at 1519 Executive Avenue in Myrtle Beach but Taylor says the bulk of their sales come from their website under the Shop Vintage Myrtle Beach collection
Taylor says that Mother Fletchers is by far the most popular design. But, dozens of shirts are displayed on the site that are sure to spark memories of Myrtle Beach’s favorite locales.
