A production of South Carolina ETV in association with the South Carolina Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism ♪ (male singer) ♪ Oh, I have found the sweetest place ♪ ♪ where people smile and know my name.

♪ ♪ Oh, I have found the sweetest land ♪ ♪ as warm as sun and cool as rain.

♪ ♪ A place so faaarrr... from all we had, ♪ ♪ a place so far from all we've known, ♪ ♪ a quiet place that we can love ♪ ♪ and call our home.

♪♪♪ ♪ ♪ (Joanna Angle) The "News and Courier" of February 12, 1884, offered the opinion that, quote, "there is not elsewhere in the lower part of the state "a more beautiful site for a town.

"Here, one may revel "in all that goes to make Southern life so delicious.

"Nature has been prodigal with her rarest charms.

"There is on every hand an infinitude of variety, and deep drafts of enjoyment intoxicate every sense."

[no audio] A century later, this is still a place of surprising delights too often missed by travelers hurrying past, eager to get somewhere else.

Welcome to Conway and to "Palmetto Places," a series that explores and celebrates South Carolina's small towns and countryside.

I'm Joanna Angle.

The town which became Conway was laid out in 1732 and called Kingston in honor of England's King George II.

The settlement was part of Royal Governor Robert Johnson's plan to begin developing the province with townships.

[no audio] In 1801 the Kingston District was renamed in tribute to Brigadier General Peter Horry, a French Huguenot planter who had commanded the state militia during the Revolution.

Horry District's first resident political power was Robert Conway, a large landowner who succeeded Peter Horry as militia leader and then was elected to the General Assembly.

When the people of Kingston petitioned the legislature to rename the village for their congressman, Benjamin Huger, the request was referred to Robert Conway, who slyly substituted the name Conwayborough.

When that name change became law, the citizens of Horry District were furious and repetitioned, to no avail.

General Conway's political influence ended, but his name endured.

Nearly surrounded by swampland, the inhabitants of this remote wilderness developed a fierce sense of self-sufficiency.

Their physical and social isolation bred a spirit that later prompted the title Independent Republic of Horry.

Conway became the capital.

The early settlers, many from North Carolina, had arrived slowly, taking up small parcels of free land.

Until the mid 1800s, the economy was based on subsistence farming.

Increasingly, the vast pine forests were tapped, and naval stores, including goods such as turpentine, tar, and pitch, emerged as the leading industry.

Thousands of barrels of these products were shipped down the Waccamaw, as were millions of feet of lumber.

In 1887 the railroad came to and through Conway, the rails running right down Main Street.

With an alternate transportation route, isolation was ended, and the timber industry, energized.

Visionary Conway businessman F. G. Burroughs began timbering the great swamp, buying and clearing land, and laying railroad tracks to the sea.

The Conway and Seashore Railroad's oceanside terminus was called New Town until 1900, when Burroughs's wife, Miss Addie, suggested it be named after the evergreen shrub that grew in profusion along the shore.

New Town became Myrtle Beach, and lumber trains started carrying Conway families to vacation among the dunes.

Exhibits at the Horry County Museum recall the days of timber and turpentine.

Stewart Pabst is the assistant director and curator.

(Stewart Pabst) Timber and turpentine-- naval stores production-- really were the first big economic boons for Horry County.

They were the first, really, the first big industries and trade that put Horry County on the map.

It was just a tremendous, efficient use of natural resources in the county, the longleaf pine.

First people that came here found that those resources could provide a cash income.

Before that time, they were subsistence farmers.

They were planting some crops to consume, some corn and oats for animals.

They probably had scrub cattle, some hogs, and maybe sheep.

But for a cash economy, there really wasn't anything, until they discovered that there was value in the timber itself, in the trees themselves.

And, uh, naval stores production, which consisted of tar and turpentine and rosin and pitch, things that were all utilized in the naval industry and used in the production and maintenance of sailing vessels-- tar for caulking of the ships and for sealing rope ends, turpentine for preservation of the wood-- all these things were available from pine trees.

There was a tremendous need and a tremendous market and, of course, readily available, something that a man could do as almost a cottage industry.

The turpentine industry brought people like Franklin Burroughs here, along the Coastal Plain of South Carolina.

It's where he got his start in the industry.

He saw a market available for turpentine products, except that people didn't have a way of shipping them.

And, uh, Burroughs began the Waccamaw Line of steamers.

He began to... to promote, I guess, the industry, finding ways to market the products to make sure they could get out of Horry County and down into Georgetown.

It was a cottage industry.

Two or three people could work several acres.

Burroughs was the first person to actually start purchasing land.

Until that time, it had been rented.

Turpentine workers would go through and work the crop.

They would have annual crops of turpentine from the trees.

As they would move through the trees, the area could be rented and depleted.

Burroughs was the first to start purchasing land.

That's a lot of the ways they acquired so much property.

The industry that followed naval stores production in Horry County, of course, was the lumber and logging industry.

And this beautiful piece of machinery, this beautiful, uh, device here, was used for hauling those massive logs out of the swamps, out of the low areas where they were logged.

Today we see the huge trucks and skidders used to haul logs.

Back then, it was animal and human power that was able to accomplish the same feats.

Huge trees were lifted by these machines and then hauled out by oxen and mules to be taken to the lumber mills, primarily floated down the river.

(Angle) Close as it may be to saltwater, Conway was and is a river town, its main street a stone's throw from the deep, dark Waccamaw that has flowed by for millions of years.

Today the river's beauty and its history are a primary focus of an amazing downtown revitalization.

Greg Martin... (Greg Martin) Back in the early 1980s, like so many towns throughout the country, Conway's downtown began to decline, and we decided that we needed to do something to revitalize our community.

And, of course, everyone considered downtown the heart of Conway.

We looked around at programs that other communities had, uh, undertaken, and we decided that the Main Street program was the one for us.

And the thing that impressed us was that it was a four-point approach to revitalization.

It encompasses organization, design, promotions, and economic restructuring.

And so, with that four-point plan, we began to move forward with our own revitalization efforts in Conway.

That was in the mid '80s, and since that time, during the last 13 years, we've had well over a hundred buildings in downtown Conway renovated, um, with some degree of work on those buildings.

And it's been a dramatic change in Conway.

One thing that I think is important is, if you do things slowly, you're going to do them right.

I believe that's the lesson that we have learned here in Conway.

In addition to the 100 buildings, uh, we've also had well over 300 new jobs created.

So not only are you preserving buildings, but you're creating an economic boost in your community, uh, with this program.

Main Street, the program, uh, is about partnerships, and... in addition to just dealing with the revitalization of buildings and the recruitment of new businesses and, uh, promotions, it's about creating partnerships, and we've had a number of successful ones here in Conway.

A good example, uh, has been the project undertaken to save our theater, which is located on Main Street.

The theater burned in the 1980s, and after it burned, uh, there was a concern, of course, that we might have this empty shell located on Main Street in a very important spot.

So the community organized, and we decided that we would like to save the theater, and the involvement of The Theatre of the Republic came about.

For the last several years, The Theatre of the Republic has been dealing with this... theater restoration.

It's a big success and wonderful for our town.

Another project has been the bridge, the Main Street Bridge project.

This was another partnership.

It involved the highway department, the City of Conway, our local citizens, the Main Street program, and other civic groups.

And it's been a wonderful project.

We were able to have the bridge placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

We did some research and found that the company that placed the lights originally, back in 1937, was still in operation, and so we were able to have the exact duplicate lights reproduced.

Monies to fund this came from donations from families in the community, so it was, again, a successful partnership.

Another project which has been a result of all of this downtown revitalization has been our Riverwalk project.

Perhaps the most successful, the crowning achievement, I guess, for the city, has been the revitalization of our Riverwalk.

It has involved a communitywide effort.

We were, again, able to involve several organizations throughout the area in this, and the result has been that we have, uh, a boardwalk along the river.

We also have seen several of the old warehouses restored and are now used, uh, for such things as a restaurant and government agencies.

The addition of a condominium project and the new Cypress Inn, as well as the city's own tennis center, all of these elements have added to making our riverfront vibrant again.

We're pleased with what we've done so far, but we're also looking forward to the day when the new judicial center for the county is located in the riverfront area, and we think this will, again, add a great deal of interest in, uh, revitalizing the riverfront area.

In any community, downtown is the heart of a community, so it is vitally important to keep that part of your community alive and vibrant, and in Conway, we, fortunately, have been successful in doing that.

[water gurgling] (Angle) Conway City Hall began life as Horry County's second courthouse.

In 1823 the state of South Carolina appropriated $10,000 for its construction and let the contract to Russell Warren, a Georgetown builder who, interestingly, submitted the highest of four bids.

Warren worked from sketches of a design attributed to Robert Mills, then commissioner of Public Works for South Carolina.

Mills thought public buildings should be fireproof.

Thus, the first-floor walls are 30 inches thick.

[no audio] Warren did deliver the completed building more than two months ahead of schedule, in March of 1825.

Conway historian Catherine H. Lewis reflected that, "for the time and place, "it was imposing.

"Its two-story brick splendor dominated a river port village "consisting of 25 or so wooden homes, a few store buildings, and about 100 inhabitants."

The outside stairs leading to the courtroom, the massive columns of the portico, the porch where the court crier appeared to call people to the spectacle of law in action, the enormous, arched downstairs hallway where the county officers worked... all bespoke the law in a region still remote and rough.

This timepiece has become a symbol of Conway.

In 1938 the town's mayor, Dr. Carl L. Busbee, sought a way to show the area farmers that the town appreciated their visits to the Conway Tobacco Market.

Farmers Day became an annual celebration for several years.

There were flags and bunting on buildings, a parade, mule races, band concerts, open-air picture shows, barn dances, and daredevil high-dive exhibitions from the bridge.

The city council appointed a farmer mayor and a council who held a mock court during the afternoon.

Prominent citizens were arrested by farmer policemen.

All who failed to wear appropriate attire-- overalls-- or who had committed other offenses were fined.

The accumulated fines purchased this clock, which stands as a symbol of goodwill between the farm families and townspeople.

The clock tower was constructed of local blackjack cypress.

The clockworks came from Seth Thomas.

[no audio] ♪ [bluegrass music] ♪ Among the many fascinating stores in downtown Conway is the shop of Jennings Chestnut, maker of mandolins and other instruments of music.

(Jennings Chestnut) When my son was about 11, we used to go around a lot of bluegrass music festivals, and he became enthralled with the sound of a mandolin.

And it's unique, uh, in itself, so he wanted to learn to play mandolin.

Well, a good quality instrument back then cost probably $1200.

I didn't have $1200.

A cheap one was difficult to play, hard to note, and made bad sounds.

So I went to a friend's house that owned a Gibson-style, artist's model mandolin.

I took a piece of white poster board, laid the mandolin on it, traced around it, went right home and started cutting out wood.

I had no idea what I was doing.

The first one looked rough, but it sounded okay, so that was really how it got started.

The mandolin got inside of me when I was a child.

Maybe that's where it got inside of my son.

I would listen to the, uh, jukeboxes around the places in downtown Conway, where I was raised, and back then, they played regular string music on the jukeboxes, on the radios, and different places.

And, uh, just the pure, the voice of a mandolin got inside of me.

And, uh, I reckon why I enjoy the building part is, you can control the voice of the instrument just like people's voices are controlled.

Any kind of sound that we hear is simply air hitting our eardrum, so the manner in which this air hits our eardrum is controlled by the generating source.

A guitar is, uh... an instrument made of different kinds of woods that usually has a real large, uh, sound chamber, or body.

Well, a mandolin is a smaller instrument, so it would have a smaller air chamber, or body.

So, as it produces sound by plucking the strings, the sound that we hear from a guitar is a deeper, more resonant tone with good high notes.

♪ [bluegrass music] ♪ ♪ The sound from a mandolin is bright and clear with, uh, kind of crisp bass notes.

♪ [bluegrass music] ♪ ♪ Of course, banjos are made of a lot of metal or combination of metal and wood, so the banjo is a bright, real keen, some people say happy-sounding instrument.

It's hard to feel sad when you hear a banjo because it produces these bright, percussive notes because of the combination of wood and metal.

♪ [bluegrass music] ♪ ♪ ♪ In listening to different instruments that I've built, I can almost tell what era they come from because they each have different characteristics.

It's almost like listening to your child's voice.

You created that voice... that voice is a part of you.

As long as that instrument survives, it'll always be a part of you.

That's how strong the sound is about these mandolins to me.

(voice-over) In the early teens and '20s in the United States-- this particular instrument is American-born, by the way, designed and built in America-- they had mandolin orchestras that played classical music on the mandolin family of instruments.

They had mandolins, mandolas, mandocellos, and mandobasses, and they played in symphony settings.

The instrument began to be played in what we used to call country music, or hill music, or hillbilly music.

Then in the '40s, a type of music was spontaneously created which used this style mandolin, an acoustic guitar, a banjo, an upright bass, and a fiddle.

This music was called bluegrass.

Since then, the music has progressed.

Rock bands have used this instrument.

Country bands have used this instrument.

And it's primarily played in a bluegrass music setting in today's music.

Why this got started is, to me, a mystery.

The sound got inside of me when I was young, just the tone, the speed at which it was played, the voices.

But as far as why I build instruments, it's a challenge.

There's a challenge out there for everybody... uh, fishing, golfing, any other kind of sports, football, uh, baseball, uh, anything that's competitive.

Well, this is not really a competitive thing, but it's a personal, inward challenge that a person goes about.

And each time they build an instrument, if they made a little, I'll call it a personality flaw on the instrument, because maybe it was something that just happened, they'll correct that on the next one.

I reckon it's an ongoing struggle for perfection, even though who knows what perfection is on any instrument?

[birds chirping] (Angle) Much of Conway's charm derives from its oldest citizens, more than 200 ancient live oak trees.

These gnarled and spreading giants are so cherished that the town's streets and sidewalks meander around them.

Protecting the oaks is a Conway tradition dating to the 1880s, when the proposed route for the railroad threatened removal of this massive tree, under which General Wade Hampton had campaigned for governor.

Story tells that on the day this tree was scheduled to be felled, Mary Brookman Beaty stood guard with a loaded shotgun, warning the construction crew to, quote, "touch not a single bough."

Her defiant defense has inspired generations to actively safeguard all trees, especially the live oaks.

Fittingly, Mary Beaty's courage is commemorated by this oak, named for her.

Born in Maine, Brookman came to Horry County as governess to the children of wealthy shipbuilder Henry Buck.

She married Thomas Beaty, son of a prominent Conway family and later legislator and signer of the Ordinance of Secession.

Although Mary came to be regarded as the queen of Conway, her life was filled with tragedy.

All five of her children died in their youth... two from diphtheria, two of drowning, and the only son of an unidentified illness.

The Beaty children and their cousins are buried here in the cemetery of Kingston Presbyterian Church.

The Victorian sculptures which adorn their graves are so exceptional that the National Register of Historic Places, which rarely includes cemeteries, has listed this one.

These are called tabletop tombs because they provide places for urns of flowers.

This depiction of two little girls entwined in each other's arms marks the grave of the Beaty daughters, Cora and Frederica, called Freddie.

Cora perished as she tried to rescue her drowning sister.

In the original plan of the town, this was to have been the town commons.

The present church here, Kingston Presbyterian, was completed in 1858.

Greek Revival in style, it was constructed under the supervision of Otis Eaton, a master shipbuilder.

A church bell was ordered from a New York foundry, but the ship carrying it was lost at sea.

A second bell was en route when the ship bringing it sank.

Miraculously, much of the cargo, including the bell, was recovered.

Now hanging in the steeple, it is dated 1860.

Conway, South Carolina... smiling faces, beautiful places.

[no audio] ♪ Program captioned by: CompuScripts Captioning, Inc. 803.988.8438 ♪ (female singer) ♪ And here we live, ♪ ♪ within this land ♪ ♪ of mountains' edge and ocean's shore.

♪ ♪ A land of strength... a land of grace... ♪ ♪ of men and women gone before.

♪ ♪ So many smiling faces here, ♪ ♪ so many memories still to come.

♪ ♪ Beautiful places we hold dear ♪ ♪ in this our home.

♪ (choir joins) ♪ South Carolina, always near... ♪ ♪ and always hooommmme.... ♪♪♪ ♪