Within decades, Savannah became one of the more important ports along the Atlantic seaboard and Tybee played a pivotal role in her history. Anglican, soon-to-be-Methodist, John Wesley said his first American prayers here (sadly, to little effect; within two years, he returned to England). The French fleet came in 1779 to relieve the Siege of Savannah, an unsuccessful attack that led to a sweeping British victory.

Tybee's most famous landmark is its lighthouse, one of the oldest on the East Coast. Its ancestor was constructed of wood in 1736, but the 90-foot structure fell five years later to beach erosion. The second, completed in the next six months, befell the same fate and a third, far enough from shore to avoid the same catastrophic end, rose in 1773.

At the outset of the Civil War, the Union quickly brought a fleet near Tybee and the Confederates at Fort Pulaski burned the wood interior of the lighthouse to prevent the Yankees from using it. To the Confederates' misfortune, the Union easily corrected the damage and turned the light on Fort Pulaski -- a great help in monitoring activity in the fort, which was later reduced by rifled cannon fire from Tybee.

The lighthouse remained in use well into the 20th century. The tower was expanded to a height of 154 feet, with a light that could be seen nearly 20 miles away. Though the modern era brought the replacement of kerosene with electricity, the lighthouse eventually became too old and inefficient for continued use and a new one was erected on Cockspur Island in 1987. However, the Tybee lighthouse was restored and reopened this year, with the brick, mortar and stucco cleaned and repainted, a new electrical system installed and old-fashioned bronze windows put in place of the aluminum ones. The outbuildings, including the lightkeepers' cottages, the kitchen and the fuel storage buildings, are currently undergoing extensive renovation as well.

Between the lighthouse and the beach stands Fort Screven, a late 19th-century structure designed to meet the advanced needs of modern warfare. Carefully heeding the lesson of Fort Pulaski, which was supposed to be impregnable, the architects of Fort Screven created a building that was camouflaged by massive sand dunes and which bristled with long-range guns.

Fort Screven, in service from 1897 to 1947, was the training area and local coastal defense for the Spanish-American War as well as the First and Second world wars. Battery Garland, at the edge of North Beach, is today the Tybee History Museum, holding artifacts and exhibits from pre-Columbian times to the 1990s.

In the battery's labyrinthine passages and rooms, which once held giant guns and powder, you'll see murals depicting the English arrival in Georgia, dioramas that show Spanish priests, scurvy pirates and Euchee Indians. There are Spanish relics such as breastplates, helmets, pistols and doubloons, a pirate's flag, arrowheads and spearpoints, Confederate and Union uniforms and nautical gear, including compasses and spyglasses. You will also see a photographic chronology of Tybee life, including treasures from the days when Savannahians came to the old Tybrisa Resort to dance and have a swim in the warm waters of Georgia's first island.

The Tybee Museum and Lighthouse. North Beach. Open daily. Donations for the lighthouse project are gladly accepted. (912) 786-5801.