Jekyll Island Historic District
200 Hopkins Ave
Jekyll Island, GA
The winter playground where Rockefellers, Morgans, and Vanderbilts once gathered, a whole village of turreted cottages under the live oaks and Spanish moss.
In 1886 a group of the wealthiest men in America bought Jekyll Island off the Georgia coast and turned it into their private winter retreat, the Jekyll Island Club. For the next half century it was one of the most exclusive gatherings in the world, its members including Morgans, Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, Pulitzers, and Goodyears, who came south each winter to escape the northern cold.
They built a grand turreted clubhouse and a village of elegant winter cottages beneath the live oaks, and it is that village, the Historic District, that survives today. Preserved as part of a state-owned park, it is a rare, intact window into the Gilded Age, and a strikingly peaceful one, spread along quiet lanes under the Spanish moss.
What Guests Love
- Riding or walking beneath moss-draped live oaks past the millionaires' cottages
- The grand turreted clubhouse, once the most exclusive club in America
- A guided tram tour that opens cottages and tells the club's stories
- The stained-glass Faith Chapel, its window signed by Louis Comfort Tiffany
Worth Knowing
- Jekyll Island charges a daily parking fee at the causeway that funds the island's upkeep
- The best way into the cottages is a guided tram tour, which runs on a schedule
- Bikes are a lovely way to see the district and reach the beaches and Driftwood Beach
- The island is a state-managed park, so development is limited and the pace is slow
Details
Jekyll Island, GA
Learn about Jekyll Island Historic District
The club of the century
The Jekyll Island Club opened its clubhouse in 1888, and membership was capped and fiercely exclusive. It was said that the members represented a large share of the entire nation's wealth, and they treated the island as a private world, hunting, riding, dining, and relaxing through the winter months away from the public eye.
History was made here. In 1910 a small group of financiers met in secret on the island to draft the plan that would become the Federal Reserve System, and in 1915 the first transcontinental telephone call was celebrated from the club, connecting the coasts. The clubhouse and grounds hosted a slice of the American elite at the height of the Gilded Age.
The cottages and the chapel
The members did not stay only in the clubhouse. Many built their own winter cottages nearby, grand homes they modestly called cottages, in shingle, Mediterranean, and other fashionable styles. Names like Indian Mound, the Rockefeller cottage, and the Crane cottage still mark them, and several are open to visitors on guided tours.
A jewel of the district is Faith Chapel, a small stone church whose windows include a signed piece by Louis Comfort Tiffany, one of very few Tiffany windows that carries his signature. Set among the oaks, the chapel is a quiet, luminous space that anchors the village's sense of an entire community built for a single season of the year.
Decline, war, and rescue
The club's golden age faded with the Depression and the shifting fortunes of its members, and the Second World War effectively ended it. With German submarines prowling the Atlantic coast, the island was considered vulnerable, and the club closed for good in the early 1940s, its cottages shuttered and its grand rooms falling silent.
In 1947 the state of Georgia bought the entire island and made it a state-owned park, saving the Historic District from ruin or private redevelopment. Careful restoration over the following decades brought the clubhouse and many cottages back to life, and the district today is both a hotel and a museum village, its buildings preserved rather than replaced.
The island beyond the district
The Historic District is only part of Jekyll Island. Because the whole island is a protected state park, development is limited and much of it remains wild, wide beaches, salt marsh, and maritime forest laced with bike paths. On the north end, Driftwood Beach is a haunting stretch of bleached, weathered trees where the sea has slowly reclaimed the forest.
The island is also home to a sea turtle center that rehabilitates injured turtles and educates visitors about the loggerheads that nest on Georgia beaches. Between the history, the quiet, and the natural beauty, Jekyll offers a slower, older kind of coastal Georgia than the busier resort islands nearby.
Closest Boutels
The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.
Things to Do Near Jekyll Island
Driftwood Beach
About 4 miles north
A stretch of bleached, weathered driftwood trees along the island's eroding north shore, striking at sunrise.
Georgia Sea Turtle Center
Within the district
A rehabilitation hospital and education center for sea turtles, where visitors can see recovering patients.
St. Simons Island
About 20 miles north
A larger Golden Isle with a historic lighthouse, oak-lined village, and Fort Frederica's colonial ruins.
Brunswick
About 10 miles west
The mainland port city, gateway to the Golden Isles, with a historic downtown and shrimp-boat docks.