Thousands of people visit Mary Ross Waterfront Park in downtown Brunswick every year without knowing the story of the accomplished woman for whom the park is named.
Born in Camden County in 1885, Mary Ross grew up in Brunswick, graduating from Glynn Academy in 1898. After attending the State Normal School in Athens for training as a teacher, she returned to Brunswick to teach school.
Photo courtesy of Georgia Archives
Mary Ross
In 1910, her quest for knowledge took her far from Glynn County. After spending time at the University of Chicago, she transferred to the University of California Berkeley where she received a bachelor’s degree in history in 1916. While there, she studied under the prominent historian Herbert Bolton, whose recognition of her academic ability encouraged her to pursue a master’s degree in history.
After receiving this degree in 1918, she worked as Bolton’s research assistant on a book he was writing about the role of the Spanish during the colonial period in North America. He selected Ross to research the Spanish settlements in Georgia and Florida, using primary sources in Spanish archives. Published in 1925, The Debatable Land, which Ross co-authored with Bolton, was both groundbreaking and controversial, ultimately dealing a crushing blow to Ross’s reputation. In the book, she incorrectly identified tabby ruins in Coastal Georgia as the remains of Spanish missions. Twelve years later, historian E. Merton Coulter published Georgia’s Disputed Ruins, which correctly identified these ruins as 19th century sugar mills.
Coastal Georgia Historical Society archives
Reprint of an article Mary Ross wrote for the September 1926 issue of the Georgia Historical Quarterly.
The damage to Ross’s confidence as a scholar was profound. From that point forward, she refused to publish her research. She continued teaching and preparing research papers but withdrew from the front lines of academia. When her sister became ill in the 1950s, Ross returned to Brunswick, living there until her death in 1971. During her later years, many visitors were drawn to her home through the warmth of her personality and the depth of her knowledge.
In 1973, the importance of her research was recognized when the Georgia Department of Archives and History acquired her papers, which contain her personal library, correspondence, and thousands of facsimiles and transcriptions of documents from archives in Seville, Madrid, and Havana.
This month’s image from the Coastal Georgia Historical Society archives shows a reprint of an article Mary Ross wrote for the September 1926 issue of the Georgia Historical Quarterly. It includes corrections in the margins, written in her own hand. The picture of Mary Ross is courtesy of the Georgia Archives.
Coastal Georgia Historical Society presents this article and images from our archives as part of our mission “to connect people to Coastal Georgia’s dynamic history.” The Society operates the iconic St. Simons Lighthouse Museum and the World War II Home Front Museum, housed in the Historic Coast Guard Station at East Beach. To learn more about the Society, its museums, diverse programs, and membership, please visit coastalgeorgiahistory.org.
