page_title: Skidaway Institute of Oceanography
section_title: The Founding of SkIO
hierarchical_section_title: Skidaway Institute of Oceanography / History / The Founding of SkIO
caption_attribution_description: English: Main entrence to the Skidaway Institute of Oceanography Deutsch: Haupteingang zum Skidaway Institute of Oceanography
context_page_description: The University of Georgia Skidaway Institute of Oceanography is a marine research laboratory with a focus on research, education and service. Over the course of a half a century, the institute has established an international reputation for excellence. The institute is located on a 700-acre campus on Skidaway Island in suburban Savannah, Ga. Founded in 1968, Skidaway Institute was merged into the University of Georgia in 2013. Institute faculty are members of the Department of Marine Sciences at UGA and serve as mentors and advisors for undergraduate and graduate students from UGA and all over the world. Institute resources include state-of-the-art research laboratories and instrumentation, and the 92-foot Research Vessel Savannah.
context_section_description: In 1966, the Georgia Science and Technology Commission of the Georgia General Assembly proposed the establishment of an oceanographic research center on Skidaway Island. The thought at the time was to foster economic growth in coastal Georgia by attracting secondary industries of oceanography, in much the same way that secondary industries of space exploration had arisen around NASA.
  Dorothy Roebling donated approximately 790 acres (3.2 km²) of the Modena property to the State of Georgia for this purpose in 1967, including 384 acres (1.6 km²) of high land, all of the buildings and farm workers, and both of their docks on the Skidaway River at the western side of the island. In addition, Union Camp donated 635 acres (2.6 km²) of the Orangedale property, including 300 acres (1.2 km²) of high land with access to the Wilmington River at the eastern side of the island; this portion of the campus is now called Priest Landing.
  With the land donations, the Georgia General Assembly created the "Ocean Science Center of the Atlantic (OSCA)" in 1967. The Skidaway Institute of Oceanography was officially created in January 1968 with Thomas Jackson (formerly of Georgia Tech) as director, two co-directors, a secretary, and several former workers inherited from the Roebling farm. Its first faculty member, Herbert L. Windom, began work in July 1968. President Richard Nixon and Governor Lester Maddox dedicated the first building of the program in 1970. Governor Jimmy Carter dissolved OSCA in 1972, at which point SkIO became an independent research unit in the University System of Georgia. In 2013, Skidaway Institute was merged with the University of Georgia.
  SkIO has had five directors during its existence: Thomas Jackson (1967–1970), David Menzel (1970–1993), Herbert L. Windom (1994–2001), James G. Sanders (2002–2016), and Clark R. Alexander (2016–present).
caption: Main entrance to SkIO
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