RBC Heritage brings some of the best golfers in the world to Hilton Head Island. But it was Joe Rice\u2019s yacht that was the real sight to see.<\/p>\n
Rice\u2019s 100-foot ship, called Rice Quarters, was admired, whispered about and gawked at every year while docked at Harbour Town during Heritage week on Hilton Head Island. It was massive, sleeping 10 in five staterooms, and it usually had the University of South Carolina Gamecocks flag flapping in the wind, Island Packet archives said.<\/p>\n
![\"Joe](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/YACHT.jpg\" "\\"YACHT.jpg\\"")
Joe Rice owns the biggest yacht in Harbour town, Rice Quarters, at the RBC Heritage presented by Boeing April 9-15, 2018. Mandy Matney <\/p>\n
Rice, the legendary Mt. Pleasant attorney who won major cases against asbestos, tobacco and opioid companies, passed away unexpectedly at the age of 72, his Motley Rice law firm announced Thursday.<\/p>\n
A proud South Carolinian, Rice was once described by national defense counsel and legal scholars in \u201cCorporate Legal Times\u201d as one of the five most feared and respected plaintiff\u2019 lawyers in corporate America, according to his biography on Motley Rice\u2019s website.<\/p>\n
His career victories included settlements with defendants in the opioid supply chain, who had to pay more than $51 billion in settlements to communities across the U.S., and with tobacco companies, who in the 1990s he forced into a $250-plus billion settlement where most of the money compensated states for health-related medical costs resulting from tobacco use.<\/p>\n
In 2023, he donated $30 million to the University of South Carolina law school, his alma mater. USC responded by renaming it to the Joseph F. Rice School of Law.<\/p>\n
\u201cJoe Rice was a man whose impressive combination of intellect, character, wisdom, spirit and generosity defined a life that made an outsized impact on the world he inhabited. Such a rare man leaves an imprint that lives on long beyond his lifespan, and this will inevitably be true for Joe,\u201d USC President Michael Amiridis said in a statement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe University of South Carolina was honored to know him as an alumnus, friend, benefactor and one of the greatest Gamecocks of our time.\u201d<\/p>\n
During RBC Heritage, a time when many pretty boats are usually docked in Harbour Town, Rice Quarters stood out, according to Packet archives. Columnist David Lauderdale spent time with him at Heritage over the years.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe is the owner of the 100-foot yacht, the Rice Quarters, that makes everyone touring the Harbour Town Yacht Basin stop, gawk and whisper. This year, it is flying a large tartan flag as the Heritage celebrates is 50th year,\u201d Lauderdale wrote in 2018.<\/a> \u201cThe pile of shoes on the dock outside show that a lot of people drop in to see a family that\u2019s Carolina to the bone. That pile of shoes also proves that Rice believes what he says: the Heritage is \u2018spring break for adults.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"RBC Heritage brings some of the best golfers in the world to Hilton Head Island. But it was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":836608,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,99],"class_list":["post-836607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=836607"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836607\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/836608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=836607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=836607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=836607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}