My Life with Charles Fraser by Hilton Head Island, SC author Charlie Ryan and publisher Pamela Ovens is an important history of the young MBAs of the 1960s AND 1970s that Charles Fraser recruited from Harvard, Yale, Wharton, the University of Chicago, the University of North Carolina, and the University of Pennsylvania. The book records in lively manner their desire to learn and build on the shores of the Atlantic. Forsaking well-worn paths into finance and traditional real estate, they hitched their wagons to the unconventional dreams of Charles Fraser.

Over a period of a year and a half, author Ryan interviewed not only the young MBAs that worked for Fraser, but an assortment of professionals encompassing architecture, literature, entertainment and retail development. In all, 42 individuals who worked with or were closely associated with Fraser told their stories. Those interviewed remember Fraser and their time on Hilton Head as the bedrock of their careers. Those careers changed the face of real estate development and land management in the United States.

The book follows the newly minted MBAs and other close associates of Fraser as they arrived on the shores of an island known by only a few. They embraced Fraser's insistence that man and nature could co-exist, and together they built a new model for seaside resorts‚"‚€‚"a model that was governed by land covenants that preserved beachfront property even as rows of homes with common beach access were built.

Before Charles Fraser came to Beaufort County it was the poorest in the state. Today it is the richest.