What makes this Georgia barrier island so extraordinary and what forces are working to reshape it.

Cumberland Island National Seashore is one of the most ecologically rich and historically layered landscapes on the American East Coast, and it faces a pivotal moment. In this episode, Bill and Anders sit down with Jessica Howell-Edwards and Dani Purvis, the volunteer advocates behind Wild Cumberland, to explore what makes this Georgia barrier island so extraordinary and what forces are working to reshape it.

Jessica and Dani walk listeners through Cumberland’s layered past: from the Timucua people who first called it home, to the plantation economy built on enslaved labor, to the Carnegie family’s sweeping land acquisitions in the late 1800s, and ultimately to the island’s designation as a National Seashore in 1972. That history, they explain, is not just background. It’s the foundation for understanding why the Park Service’s current proposals, including a Visitor Use Management Plan that would more than double the daily visitor cap and a proposed land exchange with private inholders, deserve intense scrutiny.

The conversation also turns to what makes Cumberland ecologically irreplaceable. The island accounts for eighteen miles of Georgia’s undeveloped coastline and hosts between twenty-five and thirty-three percent of the state’s sea turtle nests each year, in part because of its rare, nearly uninterrupted darkness. With only 4.7 percent of Georgia in public ownership, Cumberland carries an outsized conservation burden, and both guests make clear that protecting it requires not just passion but process, public engagement, and long-term thinking.

In this episode:

• What Cumberland Island is actually like: Jessica describes an eighteen-mile stretch of undeveloped shoreline, more than twenty thousand acres of live oak maritime forest, over three hundred bird species, and an atmosphere that offers something increasingly rare: genuine wildness within reach.
• A layered history of land and power: Dani traces the island’s history from indigenous Timucua communities through Spanish settlement, plantation agriculture, and eventual Carnegie family dominance, providing essential context for understanding how the National Seashore came to be and who its stakeholders are today.
• Wild Cumberland’s founding and role: Comprised entirely of volunteers, Wild Cumberland fills a gap that few people realize exists: Cumberland Island is one of only two National Seashores without an official friends group. Jessica explains how the organization works to raise visibility, build community relationships, and serve as a long-term institutional memory for the island.
• The Visitor Use Management Plan (VUMP): Dani breaks down the January 2026 iteration of the VUMP, which proposes to more than double the daily ferry visitor cap from 300 to 700, expand campgrounds and infrastructure, authorize bicycle and e-bike use in sensitive habitats, and add concessions, all without a wilderness management plan and with significant gaps in transparency and environmental analysis.
• The proposed land exchange: A separate 2024 proposal would swap publicly owned parcels with private inholders, but the plan lacks disclosure on parcel values, sizes, ecological assessments, and critically, any language restricting how private landowners could develop the exchanged land. Over 500 public comments opposed the proposal at a Camden County commissioners meeting in March.
• Sea turtles, shorebirds, and the value of darkness: Cumberland hosts a disproportionate share of Georgia’s sea turtle nesting because of its undisturbed dunes and near-total absence of coastal lighting. Dani explains how a proposed new campground in the interdunal area, and existing light pollution from a nearby paper mill, threaten this rare ecological condition.
• What public lands mean in Georgia: With Georgia ranking 39th in the country for public land, Cumberland plays an outsized role in providing accessible wilderness, supporting coastal water quality, and sustaining the shrimping industry, all reasons the guests argue its protection must be held to a high standard.
• Personal journeys to the work Jessica first visited Cumberland as a fourteen-year-old on a photography trip and has been returning ever since, now bringing her own four children. Dani came through a graduate program in climate and sustainability, found Wild Cumberland while looking to deepen her connection to place, and got, in her words, “sucked in.”

Links & Resources

Connect with Wild Cumberland

• Wild Cumberland’s website 
• Instagram 
• Facebook

Places & Landscapes:

• Cumberland Island National Seashore (Georgia) The largest barrier island on the Georgia coast, designated a National Seashore in 1972, with fifty-six percent of its roughly thirty-six thousand acres designated as wilderness or potential wilderness.
• Camden County, Georgia The county in which Cumberland Island is located; referenced in the context of a March 2026 commissioners meeting at which the proposed land exchange was discussed and over 500 public comments were submitted in opposition.
• Fernandina Beach, Florida A developed community across the Cumberland Sound from the southern end of the island, home to a large paper mill whose constant artificial lighting affects sea turtle nesting conditions on Cumberland’s southern shoreline.
• The Golden Isles (Georgia) The broader network of barrier islands and salt marshes along Georgia’s coast, whose water quality and fishery productivity Cumberland Island actively supports.
  
• Atlantic Flyway A major migratory corridor for shorebirds along the East Coast; Cumberland Island is described as a critical stop for species sensitive to artificial light, including piping plovers and rufa red knots.

Government & Policy:

• Cumberland Island National Seashore Enabling Legislation (1972) The law establishing Cumberland Island as a National Seashore, with language specifying that no parts of the island should be developed beyond basic visitor purposes.
• Cumberland Island Wilderness Designation (1982) Federal legislation protecting fifty-six percent of the island as designated or potential wilderness; no wilderness management plan has ever been adopted at the seashore in the more than forty years since.
• General Management Plan (1984) The foundational management document for Cumberland Island, which included one of the first carrying capacity limits in the National Park System and prohibited concessions on the island.
• Visitor Use Management Plan (VUMP, 2022 and 2026 iterations) A Park Service planning document that, in its 2026 form, proposes to more than double the daily visitor ferry cap, expand campgrounds and infrastructure, and authorize bicycle and e-bike use in sensitive habitats, without a wilderness management plan or full transparency on implementation.
• Proposed Land Exchange (2024) A Park Service proposal to swap publicly owned parcels on Cumberland Island with private inholders; criticized for lacking disclosure on parcel values, ecological assessments, and development restrictions on exchanged land.
• National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)Referenced in the context of bicycle and e-bike use on the island; guests note that no NEPA review has been conducted to assess potential impacts to loggerheads, piping plovers, and rufa red knots in shoreline habitats.

People Mentioned:

• Carol Ruckdeschel Marine biologist and naturalist credited as one of the founders of Wild Cumberland; described as someone who understood that wilderness protection requires long-term, sustained advocacy.
• Lucy Carnegie Member of the Carnegie family who sought to acquire all of Cumberland Island’s roughly thirty-six thousand acres in the late 1800s; her family’s landholdings shaped the island’s ownership structure for generations.
• Charles Fraser Developer of Hilton Head Island; referenced as a buyer the Carnegie family considered selling to in the years before the National Seashore was established, a deal that would have dramatically altered the island’s trajectory.

Dani Purvis is a volunteer and board member for Wild Cumberland, the Georgia Sierra Club Wildlands Chair, and the Urban Field Scientist and Data Systems Associate at Roots Down, an urban regenerative land management organization. Maintaining and preserving the wildness of land, from concrete jungles to the Wilderness, is her passion.

Jessica Howell-Edwards is a lifelong Georgian, mom of four, and advocate. She began her career in journalism and currently volunteers as Executive Director for Wild Cumberland.

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