A Beaufort County woman received SC's top honor. She says she doesn't deserve it.
The scene Fran Nolan remembers the most from her time shepherding her community sea turtle program doesn't involve one of the reptiles at all.
Nolan received a call to help with a dolphin stranded on Harbor Island. She arrived to find it wasn't a dolphin, but a baby pygmy sperm whale.
She stood in chest-deep water more than an hour before a state wildlife official arrived. The whale eventually had to be euthanized, having been separated after its mother was stranded on Edisto.
"To me, that was one of the neatest things I've done," Nolan said Friday.
But it was her work with Harbor Island's sea turtles that led to family and friends planning to gather in Harbor Island's clubhouse as Nolan was awarded the Order of the Palmetto on Friday evening. Friend and fellow turtle volunteer Jan Grimsley spearheaded the effort for Nolan to receive the award, which is South Carolina's highest civilian honor.
Loggerheads crawl from the St. Helena Sound to nest on Harbor Island's beaches each spring and summer. Nolan holds the S.C. Department of Natural Resources permit to head Harbor Island's program and is responsible for documenting the nests and eggs and reporting and dealing with dead or stranded turtles.
She's patrolled Harbor Island's beach as head of the program the past 10 years and volunteered on the turtle team for longer. Nolan, 71, moved to Harbor Island in 2006, and her husband, Dennis, joined her after retiring from University of South Carolina law school two years later.
In addition to the turtle project, the Nolans gave $160,000 to build an education center at the S.C. Aquarium's Sea Turtle Care Center. Fran Nolan has volunteered with Beaufort Arts Council and Historic Beaufort Foundation and is having a 19th-century piano restored to allow for performances at the historic Verdier House on Bay Street.
While in Columbia, Nolan was a longtime board member of Friends of the University of South Carolina School of Music and volunteered with the debate team at Dreher High School and in numerous other roles.
Grimsley collected the necessary endorsements from Nolan's volunteer stops in pursuing the Order of the Palmetto.
Nolan said she resisted the honor when she found out and noted Friday she was one of thousands who volunteer to help sea turtles in the state.
"It's a recognition of the importance of volunteers in the state of South Carolina and in Fran's case, it's for volunteering for decades in various projects — nature, education, the arts," Dennis Nolan said. "So it's well-deserved."
Fran Nolan plans to step down from the turtle project, and Grimsely will succeed her in handling the DNR turtle permit for Harbor Island.
Nolan's work with turtles has included participating in a turtle study the past six years with University of Georgia researcher Brian Shamblin. One egg from each nest is sent to Shamblin, and his research tracks where turtles nest, how often, how many eggs are laid and how many of those are successful, Nolan said.
She learned of the sea turtles' habits and her desire to volunteer while walking her dog on the beach and seeing the tracks leading to and from the water.
"Just seeing the babies come out and make it to the water," Nolan said, reflecting on her favorite memories of the work. "And hopefully one in a 1,000 make it to maturity."
Without nests to monitor from May through October, Fran Nolan will be free to travel more, her husband said.
"I'm sure she's going to do a lot of that," he said. "I'm also sure she's going to find another volunteer activity to occupy her time."
This story was originally published April 20, 2018 at 4:09 PM with the headline "A Beaufort County woman received SC's top honor. She says she doesn't deserve it.."