Savannah's First Partier 32.081360° -81.092032°

Georgia’s First Partier — George Symes

Hey, everyone!

What a great day for a podcast!

I don’t know if you know, but Savannah, Georgia, where this podcast… is based… is known for being a bit of a party town.

If you’ve never been here, this is a place where you can walk around downtown with a plastic cup of your favorite beverage… of any kind… in your hand… legally.

Also, our city has… as claimed by some people… the second-largest St. Patrick’s Day celebration in the country. That, of course, is in the springtime.

But it also has a large and popular Octoberfest in the fall.

And… during the rest of the year, there are parties going on just about every weekend.

Now, as for St. Patrick’s Day… as for the claim as being the second largest… I don’t know… but on some years when St. Patrick’s is on a weekend… I can tell you that they have been crowds numbering in the millions.

It’s a big deal here… lots… of… parties.

So, if Savannah… or even the State of Georgia, ever elects a patron saint of /partiers, I nominate a guy named George Symes because he was and should be remembered as Savannah… and Georgia’s first recorded party \boy.

That was back in 1733 when he, his wife Sarah, and all of Georgia’s first settlers followed Colonel James Oglethorpe to the New World. By the time they arrived… they had been through a lot on their grueling sea voyage of two long months.

Now, they were stressed and tired when… at last… they were within view of the coast of the Carolinas. There near Edisto Island is when pirates challenged, and they had to fight them off.

Finally, they landed Charles Town, South Carolina. But after a a short stay in that town it was back on the boat and down the coast to the fairly new settlement of Beaufort.

Symes was ready to let off some steam. But he had to hold on and wait for the right time. His group still had one last canoe trip before their journey was finally over.

I’m JD Byous and welcome to History by GPS, where you travel through history and culture GPS location by GPS location. You can find transcripts of this episode along with the coordinates of where all these events happened at HistoryByGPS.com.

Now, the main coordinates for this episode show the location of James Oglethorpe’s tent. That’s where the party started.

And those coordinates are…

 32.081360° -81.092032°

So, follow along on your favorite map app… or later… when you’re not… at… work. We always want keep the boss happy.

Okay, back to the story.

George Symes had some pent-up tension as he and others waited to be transported to their new homes in the brand-spanking-new Colony of Georgia. That soon-to-be colony would be destined to become the thirteenth English colony along America’s eastern coast that would join to become the United States of America.

Now, George Symes was a pharmacist. I say, “pharmacist.”

His actual title was apothecary, which is an older term that means he does the same type of thing pharmacists do today… prepare and distribute medications… Of course, Symes and the other colonist didn’t have the opportunity to oxcart down to the local Walmart and stock up on Tylenol and Preparation-H… Symes had to make all of his medications up from scratch.

So… we can safely assume that he was an educated guy. But education does not trump logistics. They had crossed the Atlantic Ocean and finally made it to within thirty-five crow-flight miles of where their new homes would be. But things had to be prepared for him and the others before they could continue. So, they hung around the little town of Beaufort, South Carolina, learning how to drill like the military and