Profits and politics in paradise
Subtitle: the development of Hilton Head Island
By: by Michael N. Danielson ; with the assistance of Patricia R.F. Danielson.
Contributors: Danielson, Patricia R. F.
Publisher: University of South Carolina Press
Published: 1995
Place of publication: Columbia, S.C
Language: eng
Number of pages: 323
Subjects: Planned communities -- South Carolina -- Sea Pines Plantation -- History.; Planned communities -- South Carolina -- Hilton Head Island -- History.; City planning -- South Carolina -- Sea Pines Plantation -- History.; Retirement communities -- South Carolina -- Hilton Head Island -- History.; Recreation areas -- South Carolina -- Hilton Head Island -- History.; Resorts -- South Carolina -- Hilton Head Island -- History.; Hilton Head Island (S.C.) -- History.; Sea Pines Plantation (Hilton Head,S.C.) -- History.
Description: Just north of where the Savannah River flows into the Atlantic lies an idyllic stretch of beach, marsh, and forest known as Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. In the 1950s, Charles Fraser transformed this almost forgotten barrier island into one of America's premier vacation destinations and, in doing so, invented the modern resort and retirement community. In this case study of that archetypal development and the others that followed on Hilton Head Island, Michael N.

Danielson explores the interplay of private power and public authority as well as the dilemma of growth in America's recreation-based communities. Danielson contends that Hilton Head offers fertile ground for evaluating the influence of private elites and public officials on largely self-contained resort and retirement communities, an increasingly important but previously unexamined component of urban growth in America.

Identifying growth as the island's central political issue, Danielson submits that resorts like Hilton Head face the similar predicament - the reality that economic expansion alters the very attributes that attracted developers, residents, and vacationers to a particular locale. His case study illustrates the impact of growth on the economic and political fortunes of a geographic area and the residents living in it.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 301-315) and index.
Table of contents: title: Ripe for development; title: Uncommon vision; title: Developing Sea Pines plantation; title: Beyond the Sea Pines gates; title: Benevolent dictators; title: Plantations and people; title: Growing pains; title: Across the bridge; title: In their own hands; title: Second fall of the plantations; title: A friend in court; title: The new Hilton Head; title: Preserving paradise; title: Private and public communities.