Sea Pines Resort

The Sea Pines Resort or Sea Pines is located in Sea Pines Plantation, a 5,200-acre private residential gated community located on the southern tip of the island which comprises the town of Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. Sea Pines is home to four golf courses, including Harbour Town Golf Links, Ocean Course, the Heron Point golf course (formerly known as the Sea Marsh course) and the Club Course. The RBC Heritage is a PGA Tour event held annually in April at the Harbour Town course.

On June 20, 1957, the Sea Pines Company was formed by Charles E. Fraser and Joseph B. Fraser Jr, with their father Joseph B. Fraser Sr serving as Chairman of the Board. The original offices of the company were located in a trailer on Sea Pines Circle (the intersection of William Hilton Parkway, Palmetto Bay Road, Pope Avenue, and Greenwood Drive). The only phone on the island was a car-based mobile unit.

During the late 60s and early 70s, Fraser hired locals as well as young Turks and pioneered new principles of land development and management including environmentally sensitive land use, blending with nature rather than overpowering it and nature oriented tourism. Harvard business school grads worked alongside creative land planners and contractors. Some of the first computer modeling in the South demonstrated how they would leverage land and their planning with Real Estate Investment Trust and banks.

Fraser encouraged his people to learn through travel, to stay fresh by playing tennis in the middle of the day and picnicking with family and friends and to have plenty of gatherings where networking and cross fertilization would take place. Several developers across the nation that cut their teeth on Fraser and the Sea Pines Company.

In 1967 Fraser had been developing 5,200 acres for 10 years, all on Hilton Head. By 1971 the company had 135,000 acres under development or planning with models showing positive cash in just 3 years. When the Prime Interest Rate jumped from 6 at the beginning of 1973 to 11.75 in October 1974 the company began to unravel as most of their loans were cost 3 points over prime. With a jump of 5 and ¾ percent in such a short time sales had no way to keep up.

...
Wikipedia