The Treasures of Cumberland: A Museum Collection Unveiled

This is the third installment of a four-part series exploring the remarkable legacy of Carol Ruckdeschel and the Cumberland Island Museum. This series will delve into Ruckdeschel's impact, the museum's contributions, and the importance of preserving this invaluable collection for future generations.

Last November, I received an invitation to visit the Cumberland Island Museum on the north end of Cumberland Island. Carol Ruckdeschel asked me to photograph the museum collection prior to its transfer to Cumberland Island National Seashore staff for inventory. I had to stop and pinch myself to make sure this was not a dream.

I have read many stories about the Cumberland Island Museum collection of deceased specimens. And, as a marine biologist, I could not be more excited about spending two days taking photographs of and recording stories about Ruckdeschel's Cumberland collection.

A full week prior to visiting Ruckdeschel, I went through all my camera equipment and made sure everything was in working order. I packed as light as I could for the 16-mile one-way journey to the Cumberland Island Museum on the back of Ruckdeschel's ATV. Fortunately, the weather cooperated and the ride to her place on the north end of Cumberland was a lovely, dry adventure.

On the way to the museum, we were flagged down by people passing by. Almost everyone wanted to chat with Ruckdeschel. People flagged us down from their trucks. Folks hiking along the road flagged us down for selfies. Park service staff slowed to say hello. She was kind and humble to everyone we encountered.

Ruckdeschel will be the last one to admit she has a fan club. But I am here to say it for her. She has a huge fan club. Everyone wants to know what is going on in “Carol’s Cumberland” world.

After settling in the guest house, I walked across the yard to the Cumberland Island Museum and began the process of photographing the museum collection. I had two cameras, two audio recorders and a video camera to make sure I could document everything to the best of my ability. I did not want to mess this opportunity up.

Ruckdeschel and I spent two days photographing and recording stories about artifacts and specimens in the museum collection. I must admit that even if I had more time to spend at the museum, I do not think my brain could absorb any more information.

It took several weeks to process all audio, video, and photographs of the museum collection. I developed a list of stories and photos to share with you from this information. Here are some of my favorite observations from my big adventure to the Cumberland Island Museum.

The collection contains thousands of specimens and artifacts. Cultural artifacts include Indigenous pottery, arrowheads, grinding stones, flint, European glass, pieces of olive jars, revolutionary musket balls, Civil War buttons, costume jewelry, coins, a large still, ship timbers, and more. I could have spent an entire week just photographing all the unique cultural artifacts in the collection.

As I walked through the museum, I felt as if I was taking a walk down memory lane. Old cigar boxes were used to hold hundreds of cultural and natural artifacts. Optimo cigar boxes held fossils and arrowheads. A Charles Chips canister held the remains of dried shorebird stomach contents. I remember using these same types of containers as a kid to hold crayons and other valuable childhood possessions.

There were several walls of Chiquita banana boxes stacked 15 feet high. Each box contained the remains of a deceased sea turtle that washed up on the beach.

Another small box contained several pairs of very delicate sea turtle eye plates. The plates form a circle in the eye of the sea turtle to help it adapt to pressure changes in the water. Ruckdeschel carefully placed each plate in a ring to demonstrate how they worked in the eye of the turtle.

Next, she pointed to a large turtle shell and explained how to determine the turtle's sex by the tailbone. Then, she proclaimed, “I have never been bored.” The one thing that keeps Ruckdeschel going at 83 years old is working on a project. She said, “I will die working on a project.”

Ruckdeschel pointed out a 55-gallon blue drum full of turtle gut contents. She said, “I had a guy get his master's degree writing about the contents in this drum. I mean really, do you think the University of Georgia will really want this?” We both have a good laugh about that, yuck!

The largest alligator skull I have ever seen sat lurking in a dark corner shelf. The head was so heavy Ruckdeschel was afraid to pick it up. After some debate, we decided to photograph the alligator in place.

As I photographed the skull, Ruckdeschel told me how she came into possession of this alligator and how she discovered where it had been living. The alligator washed up on the beach, so Ruckdeschel did not know where the gator came from. By investigating the contents of the gator's stomach, Ruckdeschel was able to track down where this alligator had been living.

Ruckdeschel told me, “So, here is this big alligator we found and we are going through it, and there is all sorts of stuff, fishing tackle and lines coming out. There is a spark plug without any metal on, just ceramic. The gator ate all the metal off it, I mean that’s how old this alligator was.”

She went on to say, “I was in awe of the age of the crap in his belly. And, as I am taking the fishing lines out, I pull up a handful of stuff and I mean a handful. I see something with writing on it. I think, oh my god, and I quickly fish it out. It is a brass plate. Not a plate, but a dog collar name plate. They put the names of hunting dogs on plates and riveted it to the leather collar. The buckle had dissolved in all the stomach acid but the brass plate had a name and a phone number on it.”

“We called the phone number on the plate. And, we end up driving to Jesup, Georgia. We walked into Gene’s small engine repair and asked the guy at the counter, 'Do you hunt with dogs?' Immediately he was like, 'What is wrong?' I said, 'No, no, no nothing is wrong at all. We are just excited because we found this great big alligator and it had this dog tag in its stomach. We are trying to track down where the alligator came from because we don’t know. It washed up on Cumberland Island beach.'”

Ruckdeschel went on to tell me that the guy got defensive. So, she just kept on talking to him until he softened up. “We told him we had no gripe with where you were hunting, we just want to know where the owner of the dog was hunting so we can figure out where this alligator lived.”

Finally, he said, “I don’t use many hunting dogs and I have not lost any. But, my brother uses hunting dogs with brass plates labeled like that one you are holding.” Ruckdeschel asked where he lived. He replied, "Brunswick."

Ruckdeschel said she hopped in the car and took off for Brunswick. When she approached the guy in Brunswick, he did the same thing as his brother. He got defensive. So, she said she talked until he broke down and told her what she wanted to know. He lost two dogs with tags that matched the one in her hand. He went on to say that one dog came back six months later with puppies. The other dog never returned. The hunter told her he was on Dover Bluff (immediately across the river from Cumberland Island) when the dogs disappeared. No doubt the alligator was living around the Satilla River area. This story made me think about the saying, if you want to find out if there is an alligator nearby, bark like a dog. Yikes!

In one of many museum cabinets there are shorebird eggs from black skimmers, gulls, oyster catchers and pelicans. Perfectly preserved birds of all kinds are packed in plastic for future research.

The shorebird eggs Ruckdeschel collected hold valuable information for future scientist. They can be used to study DNA, pesticide poisoning, and microplastics research. These birds hold valuable information even in death.

Another of my favorite Ruckdeschel stories was the one about the thresher shark that washed up on the beach. She said only one shark in the ocean has a tail like the thresher shark. “What they do is swim over to a fish and hit them with the tail to kill their prey.” And, she went on to say, “The thresher is a culinary delight. Even though the one I found was ummmm, on the edge, we had to try it. My friend Grayson Powell was here and we cut off a few handsful of meat and took it home. We cooked it up and I tell you it was super good!”

Ruckdeschel said this was the only thresher shark she ever found. "All the fisheries information about them states are from up north, in New England. So, I do not know what this guy was doing here, ya know.”

In an island freshwater pond, Ruckdeschel found a snapping turtle. She said, in the big scheme of things, one snapping turtle does not mean much. But to an ecologist, it means a lot. It shows that a snapping turtle was in the pond at one time and eaten by something else. A gator got it. It is all part of the ecological web of life.

The Cumberland Island Museum is a cross between Ripley’s Believe It or Not museum and a university natural history museum. Some things are truly bizarre; you can hardly believe what you are observing. And other specimens are so beautiful they could only be produced by Mother Nature.

Ruckdeschel told me about an unusual oak tree she found on the island. It was a bluff oak, according to her. After she discovered what it was, she went looking for others. I asked her how long she spent diving down that rabbit hole. She laughed out loud and told me she had been down every rabbit hole on Cumberland Island more than once.

The Cumberland Island Museum collection contains many variations of oysters, whelks, clams, conchs, and scallop shells. There are bear teeth, shark teeth, alligator teeth, turtle mouths, vertebrae, manatee ribs, whale ribs, hog tusks, camel teeth, horse teeth, coon teeth, and more in the collection. The list goes on and on and on.

After two days of recording stories while photographing the Cumberland Island Museum collection, I was exhausted. I remember riding the ferry from Cumberland Island back to the mainland thinking to myself, I have so much work ahead of me but oh how excited I am about it all!

Believe it or not, there are many more stories and photos to share about Carol’s Cumberland Island. Stay tuned in!

Second installment.
First installment.