Reports and Studies 2014 Review: 1975 Environment of Kiawah Report | Page 3

Summary & Analysis of the 1975 Kiawah Environmental Report 

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K

iawah Island has a long and rich history. The more modern history begins
with the Vanderhorst family, who acquired a portion of the island in 1775,
and the island was in their hands until the middle of the 20th century. In
1950 C. C. Royal purchased Kiawah from the Vanderhorst estate for the timber
rights, and, in 1954, began the development of summer homes. In 1974 the heirs of
C. C. Royal sold Kiawah to the Kuwait Investment Corporation, and that group commissioned an extensive environmental inventory of Kiawah Island as the basis for a
master plan for development. The environmental inventory was published in 1975,
and contains a wealth of information about the state of our island in the latter part
of the 20th century. That document is the subject of this review.

THE 1975 ENVIRONMENTAL STUDY
The 1975 Environmental Inventory of Kiawah Island was prepared for Coastal
Shores, Inc. by the Environmental Research Center, Inc. of Columbia, SC. The Project Coordinator was W. David Chamberlain, and the Project Directors were William
M. Campbell and John Mark Dean.
The introduction to the 1975 report states that "[The] document reflects 16
months of scientific inquiry into Kiawah Island. A broad multidisciplinary approach
to the environmental inventory was selected in order to address the complex interrelationships of the existing ecosystems and to provide optimum information necessary for informed decision making. Thirteen disciplines, embracing subject matter
from microscopic phytoplankton to prehistoric man, are represented in this
report."
There are 13 sections in the 1975 report. In the order in which they appear in
the report, they are:

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Geology and Coastal Processes
Dune and Marsh Vegetation
Forest Ecology
Climatology
Ornithology
Mammalology
Herpetology
Loggerhead turtles
Water Quality and Microbiology
Phytoplankton
Macrobenthic Community
Nektonic Community
Archaeology

A summary of the 1975 report, as given in its introduction, is attached to this
document as Appendix I.

Reviewing the 1975 Report
The membership of the Environmental Science Committee of the Kiawah Conservancy includes island residents and employees of both the Town of Kiawah Island
(ToKI), and the Community Association (KICA). Committee members read and
then reported to the Committee on eight of the 13 sections. Our objectives were to:
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Inform the Conservancy and thereby the Kiawah community about the information in the report.
Describe the state of the island's environment in 1975 and compare it with
today's environment. There are several important, general questions to
pursue.
·  hat aspects of the Island's habitat have improved? Has there been
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deterioration?

Revised: May 2014_REV 8

• Authors of 1975 Report
John Mark Dean
www.baruch.sc.edu/faculty/
dean.shtml
W. David Chamberlain
(deceased) Wrote a well-known
birding guide for this part of
the U.S.