Saturday, June 15, 2019

It IS in Stone!

This week was not so much about birding...I did however round up one new bird for my 5 mile no photo of the Cedar Waxwing (#112)...almost all the birds have young in tow now or are feeding fledglings.  I love this log, it almost always has a wood duck or 2 or even 3 on it! 


Notice the young drake in the middle...I'm trying hard to find a Snowy Egret in my radius so far no luck!  We have been taking some Sunday Drives like this one up to the Lake...


Lake Wateree, 19 square miles, and one of the oldest man made lakes in SC...one of the residents...



And some lovely Buck Eye Butterflies...



On Another day we visited some cemeteries up beyond the area of our county north and east of the lake.  This is on Stoneboro Rd... and by chance spotted this old one just off the highway in the woods near the community of Stoneboro...at least 30 graves are marked by locally gathered field stone...and 3 graves with surname of Duncan have engraved headstones...with death dates of 1857, 1859, & 1862 just prior to the Civil War...We both agree we believe the field stones are marking the graves of slaves...The elder of the family was William Duncan he died in 1862, I found some info about his will he was worth about $24,000 in 1860 census and he died in 1862.  His will was in probate in 1862 and later in 1865 the original was destroyed when Sherman marched through Lancaster! (as stated on the stone)


This is the old community...and we came across a stone with this fairly long history carved on it...there is no town here only a couple big fields..


According to the stone...there was a Granite Quarry nearby originally run by Stewart Heath...the stone cutter for the Quarry was an Italian immigrant,  George Sassi, he created the Confederate Monument that stands in front of the old court house in nearby Lancaster...c-1909 using stone from the Quarry.  I found the list of items deposited in the corner stone to be quite fascinating...you can read about it on that link 


So we drove over there to see it!   Pretty nifty indeed.  Also on the Stoneboro history stone is the name of James D Magill who lived in this area in 1871...he served as a State Representative and later as a Senator...We stopped at the nearby Beaver Creek Cemetery just to take a look around and there he was laid to rest...and marked by this stone. 



We were HUNGRY so we stopped in the Town of Heath Springs for lunch...it is located between Stoneboro and Lancaster. 


864 residents in the 2000 census...and 809 in 2018 and they had a pretty good veggie pizza!


And back in Lancaster we strolled one of the small parks there not far from the old Court House...


There was a wishing fountain,  and a town bird, the English House Sparrow.  


and we also stopped to see the Lancaster and Chester RR Spring Maid Line...still in operation today...there was an ugly power line in the way so I cloned it out 


The L & C RR along with the Central SC RR Mentioned on the Stone both used to stop at the Historic Heath Springs Depot  c-1903 on the National Historic Registry...We left town without getting a photo of the depot here is one that I found online,

File:Heath Springs Depot.jpg


On the second floor of this beautiful Stone building is this amazing RR Museum! 



And we met this town dog Caroline Rose! Yep you guess it she is made of Stone!


All this history recorded in stone makes me think about the way we are currently preserving our records and our history??  On computers! Insanity!!!....we should be writing it on stone!!

It's a GREAT DAY to be in CAROLINA
!


rock quarry we stopped to see in 2012, Westville, SC.

PEACE
Every day is a new Adventure.

16 comments:

  1. What a great day to explore a really old cemetery and an old town. Love the Wood Duck sure are pretty little things. But oh my that pizza sure made my mouth water.

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    1. It was a fun day we had some awesome weather after 3 weeks of rain! A front has been keeping us in the nice breezy 80's but today it got a wee bit hot again. We enjoyed that 10 inch pizza for lunch!

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  2. A great tour and lots of interest. I was just wondering if William Duncan a slave when he died and how he managed to amass wealth of $24000. A few years ago our sparrow population declined rapidly, but they have bounced back now. Museums are always worth wandering around.

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    1. Hi Dave I think Mr. Duncan was the slave owner...all those unnamed burials were probably his property! In his will there was a bequeath of a young negro girl to one of his heirs...pretty sad history one has to keep in mind that 140 yrs ago Africans were bought and sold like farm animals! Pretty horrid! We come across this type history time and time again. Most didn't even have real names and were described in census reports as "black male age 10" etc. Mr Duncan probably had a plantation in the area or a large farm or holding. Not all owners were cruel or without compassion however, that does not forgive the whole situation!

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  3. Hello, Love the wood ducks, they are so pretty. I like exploring the old cemeteries. Your pizza looks delicious, yum! I like the town dog statue. Enjoy your day, wishing you a happy week ahead.

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    1. Hi Eileen...I always love wood ducks I can never see too many! My younger sister has arrived here now and she has taken a great interest in birding, so it's going to be fun sharing the excitement of birding with her.

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  4. It's very interesting to see the history and the old gravestones. You're right about all this history being on computers. I've been writing down a lot of my family history research as well as creating the information online, I think it's a must really!

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    1. Hi Pam! I overheard a lady speaking of some students who can not write in cursive writing because writing skills are not being practiced.

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  5. You have obviously been having a great time from a variety of perspectives, and that veggie pizza looks really good! The log with the Wood Ducks is classic.

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    1. Hi David, that log is a like the favored perch in this pond...sometimes it's wood ducks with anhinga's too..

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  6. Love all the history around places like that. I'm picky about tomatoes on pizza- they have to be super thin slices, not big hunks like that. Otherwise, looks tasty!

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    1. I think the tomato was added after the pizza baked...I love the thin sliced tomato with fresh basil mozzarella and feta! YUM...

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  7. Such lovely photographs and the pizza looks delicious.

    All the best Jan

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    1. Hi Jan, thank you. I don't eat Pizza out very often so it was a treat for me.

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