A collection of photography and exploration focusing on Upstate South Carolina and beyond.
It’s one of those blink-and-you’ll-miss-it communities. There are signs for Jalapa on I-26, but unless you know where it is you’ll drive right through and never know you’ve been there. I’ve known about Jalapa for most of my life. My family has a long history both in Newberry and in Laurens, so we’ve passed through … Read More “Seeking Jalapa” »
I was doing some research for a podcast episode on the town of Lando in eastern Chester County, South Carolina when I stumbled on an interesting tidbit that sent me down a rabbit hole. The town of Edgemoor is just north of Lando, and Richburg is to its south. I wanted to find out more … Read More “The End of the World as We Know It, Richburg Edition” »
Next week is MLK Day, when Alan and I do our traditional exploration. This year Alan had a conflict, so we pushed the exploration forward a week. This year we decided to explore the old community of Lando and its iconic school building in Chester County. The school is one of the last remaining buildings … Read More “A Trip to Lando” »
A spiritu fomicationis,Domine, hibera nos.From the lightning and the tempest,O Lord, deliver us.From the scourge of the earthquake,O Lord, deliver us.From plague, famine, and war,O Lord, deliver us. From the place of ground zero,O Lord, deliver us.From the rain of the cobalt,O Lord, deliver us.From the rain of the strontium,O Lord, deliver us.From the fall … Read More “Gimme Shelter” »
One of the ghost towns I’ve wanted to explore is Kingsbury, in Lancaster County, South Carolina. Located on the Catawba River, Kingsbury started out as a ferry town. It appears on the 1825 Lancaster District Map in Robert Mills’s Atlas of South Carolina. In the late 1700s Andrew McIlwaine chartered a ferry across the Catawba … Read More “From Kingsbury to Stoneboro – Rambling in Lancaster County” »
I was browsing through the University of South Carolina’s collection of Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps. These maps are highly detailed maps of towns and cities from the early 20th Century and are excellent for historical research. According to Wikipedia… Sanborn maps are detailed maps of U.S. cities and towns in the 19th and 20th centuries. Originally … Read More “We’ll Always Have Paris” »
As usual, fellow explorer Alan Russell and I planned to a ramble on MLK Day, as we do each year. We brainstormed several options, and decided to head to upper Anderson County to the community of Slabtown. I had actually visited these sites back in 2021 with the intention of writing a blog post about … Read More “Slabtown, Equality, and the Thalian Web – MLK 2025” »
With all the chaos post-Helene I haven’t had much of a chance to get out and explore. I’ve been working on scripts for season 2 of Carolina Ghost Towns, which will include an episode on the ghost town of Shelton in Fairfield County. It had been awhile since I had visited, so I thought it … Read More “Seeking Shelton” »
I needed to do something totally unrelated to dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Helene. For several months Debbie Weeks from the Upstate Cemetery Preservation Alliance has been inviting me to join them on several outings, but the timing just never worked out. This time the planets aligned and I was about to join them. … Read More “Antioch and GPR” »
…or, rather, catfished AFTER a family reunion. Most of my ancestors have stayed right here in South Carolina and lived within a couple of hours drive of where I now live. That makes genealogy a bit easier for me. Especially on my mother’s side you just have to head down to the Greenwood-Abbeville-Edgefield-Saluda area (AKA, … Read More “Catfished at a Family Reunion” »