Criminal Defense Attorney inGlendale, SC

Looking for a unique history lesson at textile mills in South Carolina? The Upstate of South Carolina has a rich history of textile production. Many cities and towns were heavily influenced by the presence of textile mills and the eventual closure of those mills. When the mills were at their prime, Mill Villages boasted homes, schools, baseball teams, and even vacation destinations. You can see evidence of this mill history and mill village life all around the Upstate if you know where to look.

Many previous textile mills in South Carolina are now home to parks where you can explore their history, as well as enjoy some time outdoors. Load up the kids and check out these historic textile mill sites for today’s history lesson and get some sun while you’re at it! It’s so much more fun than learning history in a textbook, right?

Here’s a map of where they are located:

Please respect all current park ordinances when you’re exploring!

Textile Mills in South Carolina: Greenville Area

The foundations of the Pelham Mill sit at what is now Pelham Mill Park. The Pelham Mill changed ownership and name several times, but it began in 1820 as the first textile mill in Greenville and closed in 1935. Fire destroyed the empty mill in 1943.

At the site, you’ll see the bases of two smokestacks, as well as the brick pilings that supported the shafts turning the turbines. You’ll also see the stone dam across the Enoree River. You can view these historical elements by following the paved path to the overlook.

2790 East Phillips Road, Greer

The Taylors Mill is interesting because it dyed fabric and printed patterns onto fabric made at other local textile mills. Construction started on the mill in 1922 and was completed in 1924. Many of the Mill Village houses are still standing in the area around the mill. Taylors Mill closed in 1965. The building was mostly empty for 50 years, but with revitalization efforts is now home to art studios, restaurants, and other local businesses.

You can grab a cup of coffee at Junto Coffee and enjoy the outdoor space beside the mill. You can view trains chugging by the old mill from this spot, as well.

250 Mill Street, Taylors

Construction on the Monaghan Mill began in 1900, and while the plant would change ownership many times, it remained operating until 2001. In its prime, the mill supported a mill village, schools, a baseball team, and even vacation spots in North Carolina for mill workers. You can read more about the extensive history of the Monaghan Mill at the Greenville Textile Heritage Society’s website.

The Monaghan Mill today has been converted into an apartment complex. However, across the street from the Monaghan Mill is the Textile Heritage Park. It features 13 different alcoves with signs sharing historical information about 12 of the area’s textile mills.

Smythe Street, Greenville

Looking for information about Greenville’s Textile Mills? The Greenville Textile Heritage Society‘s website is a wealth of information about the history of mills in the area and life in mill villages.

The downtown Greer area is loaded with evidence of the textile mill era in the upstate. Greer Station began as just a small railroad stop along the Atlanta Charlotte Air Line Railroad in 1873. It consisted of wood-frame buildings and a public square. But in the early 20th century a textile boom occurred. New mills opened, older mills expanded, upgraded, or reopened, and new rail lines came to Greer Station. This brought prosperity and new textile-related business to Greer. As new businesses opened, the wood frame buildings were replaced by brick commercial buildings many of which are still standing in Greer, today. If you’re interested you can use these photos at the South Carolina Department of Archived and History to help you find the historic buildings along Trade Street and throughout Greer Station.

This short Greer Textile Mill documentary from the Greer Heritage Museum has some fun older photos of the mills when they were in operation, along with a bit of information about each mill and what life was like during the time.

Textile Mills in South Carolina: Spartanburg Area

The old Apalache Mill operated from 1837 to 2007. It was one of the first textile mills in the upstate area. The modern mill on site was built in 1888. This mill site is the only mill still standing from the original upstate textile mills. It’s an example of a late 19th-century water-powered mill. The dam beside the mill, which still stands, powered not only the Apalache Mill but also provided the power for the Victor Mill in Downtown Greer.

There is a very small wayside park at the Apalache Mill. The little park is really just a place to pull your vehicle off the road with covered picnic tables, but from there you can view the dam and the mill building, which was recently converted into upscale apartments.

Millhouses from the village still stand in the area around the mill.

Want to know more about Apalache Mill?

2200 Racing Road, Greer

The Glendale Mill started producing cotton in 1835. It went through many expansions and ownership changes, finally closing its doors in 1961. The mill building burned down in 2004. There is an extensive history of the mill with some fabulous photos on Glendale, SC’s Mill Story site.

Today you can view the historic area where Glendale Mill stood and remnants of the old mill building and foundations at Glendale Shoals Preserve. The scenic 13-acre preserve is home to a variety of animals and features the waterfall over the mill’s dam.

Note: We recommend parking by the bridge and not at the pull-off at the bottom of the falls. The trails below the falls currently have a lot of broken glass and debris. The mill ruin area was much cleaner.

Emma Cudd Road, Spartanburg

GLENDALE, Ariz. (AP) — Nick Pappas said tending to natural grass in the middle of the Sonoran Desert requires a little art, a little science and a little intuition.

It also requires a whole lot of modern machinery.

The NFL’s players have made it no secret they prefer playing on natural grass as opposed to synthetic turf. They’ll get their wish in Super Bowl 57 — thanks to Pappas and his small group of field specialists who are getting the surface ready at State Farm Stadium for Sunday’s game between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles.

“For this one, obviously, we’re giving it a little extra care,” said Pappas, who is one of the NFL’s field surface directors. “We’ve got a lot of groundskeepers here for about a month, putting eyes on it, putting hands on it, working on it all day, every day, getting it ready for game day.”

Other news

The home field of the Arizona Cardinals is unique in that the grass is on a giant, rolling track. Every day, the entire field is rolled outside of the retractable roof stadium, where it can get unobstructed access to Arizona’s abundant sunshine. Then it can be rolled back inside for the chilly winter nights.

It’s quite a process: The stadium’s website says the grass is on a “single 40-inch deep tray measuring 234 feet wide and 403 feet long. Rolling on 546 steel wheels which rest on 13 railroad-like tracks, the field travels the 740 feet inside or out of the stadium in approximately 70 minutes at the push of a button.”

Only one of the NFL’s other venues has a similar setup — Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas which is the site of Super Bowl 58 next year.

The Super Bowl’s field looked immaculate on Tuesday morning, with thick, lush grass, the NFL logo painted in the center and team logos in each of the end zones. This particular batch of turf — which has a Bermuda grass base that includes rye grass overseed — started growing at a local sod farm in May 2021.

“It’s a long process to get it as heavy, thick and dense as we’ve been talking about,” Pappas said. “We’ve got to make sure it takes its time, cures and gets ready.”

Some of the NFL’s players — including Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers — have said that they would like for the league to switch to natural grass in all of its venues.

Fourteen of the league’s 30 stadiums still use a version of synthetic turf. The Hellas Matrix Turf used in Dallas, Houston and Los Angeles is widely considered the best. It’s created using a textured and twisted monofilament fiber.

But there’s nothing quite like grass.

“I prefer natural grass,” Kansas City Chiefs coach Andy Reid said in November. “I’ve listened to all the studies, density studies, I’ve seen all the different compounds they’ve put in there. I still like grass.”

So does Pappas, though he’s worked with all kinds of surfaces during his time in turf management. This will be his fourth Super Bowl and he also helped the NFL manage its fields for international games this season played in London, Munich and Mexico City.

The Super Bowl presents some unique challenges, particularly with the extravagant halftime show. This year, nine-time Grammy Award winner Rihanna will take center stage. The yearly mid-game performance is essentially a minor miracle, with operations crews setting up and taking down a made-for-TV concert in about 30 minutes.

That’s a lot of moving parts that could potentially tear up Pappas’ field.

But the field surface director said it’s just part of the NFL’s biggest event, and there are rehearsals so everyone knows what to expect.

“I sleep pretty well, all in all, because of the fact that we’re disciplined,” Pappas said. “We have a large team here. We’re doing everything we can every day.

“We’re doing a lot of testing, getting a lot of data and making data-based decisions on how we’re managing the field.”

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AP Pro Football Writer Mark Long contributed to this report.

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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl and https://twitter.com/AP_NFL

SPARTANBURG, S.C. (WSPA) — An old grocery store has sat vacant for years, and those living nearby have been asking the county for help with no assistance so far.

More than eight acres of land with the dilapidated building has been sitting on Clifton Glendale Road in Spartanburg County for decades.

Joseph Dougherty lives just down the street from what used to be a popular grocery store.

“This was an old BI-LO built around the mid-70s,” Joseph said.

He moved to the area several years ago looking for land and cleaned up another nearby eyesore to make his home.

“We cleaned it up and we built a beautiful home right over here on the corner, three acres,” Dougherty said.

And the abandoned grocery store has been there the entire time.

“It’s an eye sore. It’s an ugly sight. It’s just part of the woodwork now,” Dougherty said.

The county slapped violations on the front of the building, including a recent condemned notice. In Spartanburg County, this means the owner must board the property to keep people out.

“It’s an eyesore for those residents who live out there. People who have invested in their homes, they have to drive by it all the time,” Spartanburg County Council member David Britt said.

He’s on a mission to help the county clean-up.

“That’s why every one of these facilities, I don’t care if it’s a house that has fallen in disrepair, we want to help,” he said.

The online county tax roll lists the owners of the property as an LLC with a P.O. Box out of Fountain Inn. An email was not returned.

“Most of these eye sores and these dilapidated buildings, they’re not owned by people who live in Spartanburg,” Britt said.

Britt said many buildings became this way with the decline of the mill industry in the area.

“Some of the decay that’s happened to industry and businesses and even homes, a lot of people haven’t recovered from what happened in the late 80s and early 90s,” he said.

“It’s hard to believe a building like this would sit for 20 or 30 years and just kind of rotting away,” Dougherty said.

Dougherty says he’s seen county crews around the area, trying to keep it cleaned up, but said the only way for something real to be done is for someone else to take over.

“It can change hands and somebody can do something productive with it,” he said.

The county’s Environmental Enforcement Department said a condemned building can remain that way for up to a year, before further action is taken.

“In the meantime all us people on the east side, we have to look at it until that day comes,” Dougherty said.

If you know of a building that needs attention send the location and details to problemproperty@wspa.com.

The #LightTheWorld initiative of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints invites people all over the world to share their light through 25 days of kindness. One act of kindness might be donating to a charity through a vending machine called a Giving Machine.

The Giving Machines offer a unique way to serve and care for others across the globe, giving donors an opportunity to “select” items such as groceries, fresh water, child vaccines, beds, hygiene kits, farming equipment, medical care, job training, educational supplies, beehives and livestock as charitable donations, the Church News reported. Nearly 125 local and global nonprofits are joining the Church in caring for and serving millions of people in need.

This year, in addition to Giving Machine sites around the United States and internationally, there will be two Giving Machines traveling around Arizona and the Southeast U.S.

Use this handy tracker to know where the closest location is to you and how long the sites will be open until.

Where are the mobile Giving Machines now?

Arizona

Tucson at Park Place Mall until Jan. 1

What is the address of my local Giving Machine location?

The mobile Giving Machine in Arizona will be available in:

The mobile Giving Machine in the Southeast U.S. will be available in:

Here are the Giving Machines locations and closing dates listed by state. Donations will be accepted through the beginning of January 2023.

Arizona

California

Colorado

Hawaii

Missouri

Nevada

New York

Tennessee

Texas

Utah

Washington

Washington. D.C.

Here are the locations and closing dates of the Giving Machines available internationally, listed by country.

Australia

Canada

Guatemala

Mexico

Philippines

More information can be found at LightTheWorld.org. There is also a link for those who want to participate online at LightTheWorld.org/give.

Note: The locations for the Giving Machines in Mexico City, Mexico; Brisbane, Australia; and Washington, D.C., were updated on Nov. 23.

The location for the Seattle, Washington, Giving Machines was updated on Dec. 24.

chris.lavender@shj.com

The Bivings-Converse House is an example of Greek Revival residential architecture that is in danger of deteriorating too much to be saved if restoration work doesn't start soon.

The house at 1 Douglas Street was built in 1836 for Dr. James Bivings and his family. Bivings founded the mill at the site in 1831 and would continue to prosper until a financial downturn in the 1840s. He sold his share of the mill in 1854 and Dexter Converse later became the mill's new owner. Bivings moved his family out of the house into another home in Spartanburg. The house was then occupied by Converse and his family as he helped oversee day-to-day mill operations.

Through the years, other families would call the house their home as the mill thrived and the textile industry prospered. Soon after the mill closed in 1961, the house was left vacant and fell into disrepair.

A chain-linked fence wraps around the house with dense brush covering the grounds where terraced gardens were once planted. The rooms are littered with debris, and vandals have spray painted the walls and spilled paint on the wood floors.

Former state legislator and Spartanburg native Richard Hines purchased the house in 1974 with plans of seeing it restored. He recently toured the house standing on the front porch looking toward Lawson's Fork Creek. The view to the creek is now unobstructed after the mill burned down in 2004. The constant vandalism at the site is a problem, he said.

"When I bought the house it was falling down and dilapidated," Hines said. "The house still has pretty strong bones but the roof needs replacement urgently."

Hines said a foundation was established to raise money to have the house restored and used as a public gathering place. It would cost at least $500,000 to have the roof replaced and to make minor renovations and up to $1 million to have the house completely restored.

"We would like to start raising money in 2019 and have the house restored," he said. "It's an important landmark in Spartanburg County, and it would hurt a lot to lose it."

Hines said he's removed some of the interior doors and mantles for safekeeping. The house features 11 fireplaces. It's granite foundation was carved out of the banks of Lawson's Fork Creek, and the basement is believed to be haunted by ghosts.

The house still features most of the building material from its original construction. Hines said two Victorian bays and wing for the kitchen were added the late 1800s. In the 1970s, there was some discussion for a time about using the house as a school but it never happened.

"At this point the house is still vulnerable," Hines said. "Imagine how pretty it would be if we could restore the house. It would be a real showcase for the county. We could open it for tours, weddings and pubic events."

Hines said he's hopeful the house can be restored through community support.

"The first thing we would do is cut back the brush and secure the place again," he said. "Then we would come up with a restoration plan and develop a budget."

B.G. Stephens, a retired Wofford College professor who grew up in Glendale, hopes to see the house restored to its original condition.

"The house was used for a lot years," Stephens said. "It's an important part of this community. I would hate to see it go and hope somebody can bring it back to life."

The house was added to the National Register of Historic Places in May 1995.