Mary Bailey, left, puts a handkerchief in the suit pocket of her cousin, Marvin Grovner, 16, as they attend a church service for the 129th anniversary of St. Luke Baptist Church on Sapelo Island, Ga. on Sunday, June 9, 2013. Grovner is one of 47 residents, most of them descendants of West African slaves known as Geechee, who remain on Sapelo Island, the coastal Georgia island where their ancestors were brought to work a plantation in the early 1800s. Isolated over time to the Southeast's barrier islands, the Geechee of Georgia and Florida, otherwise known as Gullah in the Carolinas, have retained their African traditions more than other African American communities in the U.S. Once freed, the slaves were able to acquire land and created settlements on the island, of which only the tiny 464-acre Hog Hammock community still exists. Residents say a sudden tax hike, lack of jobs, and development is endangering one of the last remaining Geechee communities from Florida to North Carolina. (AP Photo/David Goldman) ( Endangered Geechee Photo Essay )