If you're looking for plantations, the first place you'd think of would be near Charleston, and the last place would be in the Upcountry, but here in Spartanburg County just off I-26 is one of the finest plantations in the state.

As you stroll down the lanes of cedar trees, oleanders, and dogwood--Sorry, we have no live oaks draped with Spanish moss or magnolias here-- Walnut Grove Plantation unfolds before you.

Tonight we'd like to tell you the story of this plantation and of the lives of the people who lived here.

♪ ♪ ♪ When the Irish immigrant Charles Moore arrived here in the 1760s, he found a wild and untamed land.

It had long been under dispute by the trappers, the settlers, and the Indians.

While in the Lowcountry colonial civilization flourished, this was the frontier, which makes it even more remarkable that here Charles Moore built his home in 1765.

He was granted this land in April of that year by the royal governor William Tryon of North Carolina, because at that time there was a dispute as to which colony this area belonged to.

It's probable that Charles Moore, his wife, Mary, and the eight children had been on this land some time before the land grant was made, as was often the situation in land agreements at that time.

♪ ♪ When he settled here, this was still the wilderness.

The streams and the rivers were filled with muskrat, beaver, and fish.

The fields and the forests held the elk, the buffalo, and the deer, and out there were some less friendly fellows, too, such as the wolves, wildcats, panthers, and bear, and some of them are still there.

In 1756 a treaty had been signed with the Cherokee, but the Indians still protested the white man's claim to the land.

Charles Moore's records say that at times it was impossible to tend the plantation due to Indian hostilities.

Indeed, a man was well-advised to tend his fields with a plow in one hand and a rifle in the other.

Sometimes entire crops were lost due to the inability to cultivate them or harvest them due to Indian hostilities, but in spite of the hardships, Charles Moore settled here.

He raised this house from a hostile forest, and he made it a home.

It's not a fancy house... it's rather straightforward, meeting the tastes and the needs of a rather straightforward lifestyle that was essential in the wilderness.

The main frame of the house is of huge, handcut timbers.

They average 8-by-16 inches thick.

If you look under the house, the foundation logs still have the bark on them just as they did when they were taken from the woods here over two centuries ago.

The house was built by square volume to ensure symmetry.

There apparently was a drawn-out plan for the house, as the beams that make up the frame had been numbered with Roman numerals to ensure proper placement.

Here a visitor can see more clearly the method of construction using these huge timbers.

Unlike many houses of this period in the Upcountry, this one was never chinked with mud.

It was covered with clapboard.

♪ This room is so beautifully furnished that you could feel a family is really living here today.

I'd like you to meet Mrs. Helen Turner, who is chairman of the Walnut Grove Plantation division of the Spartanburg Historical Association.

Mrs. Turner, you and your friends have done a remarkable job of reconstructing and gathering these beautiful antiques, of which the house was built.

>> Thank you.

They've done a good job!

>> It's a marvelous visit here today.

You've told me so many fascinating things, but we don't have time for all of that so let's discuss just a little.

I love this fireplace because you tell me it's original.

>> Yes, it is.

>> The carving was done here in 1760.

It's just amazing.

The fireplace backing is of fieldstone.

Usually we find brick there.

Brick on the sides, and the hearth, a local soapstone, which was cut by-- Could be cut, >> Carved, or sawed.

>> It was deliberately made to fit the fireplace.

>> Yes.

>> Among the many things, which they have given to the place are original antiques from the family.

The Bible box was brought by the Moores from Ireland.

>> Yes.

It's very old, is it not?

<Mrs.

Turner> It's a 100 years older than the house.

>> Bible box...you mean the top of the table.

<Mrs.

Turner> The box on legs... it's movable.

They'd put the Bible and important papers in it, and then they could carry it, with them if they needed to.

<Mary> That was the means of transporting everything of importance.

The clock is interesting.

The case was locally made of local wood.

The interior works came from England or Ireland.

<Mrs.

Turner> Came to Charleston and they'd pick it up when they went after provisions.

<Mary> It's wonderful how they adapted to what they wanted, and luxuries from the old country.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

<Mary> They had the first couch in the area.

Here's the tea table all set up.

I'm fascinated by this spoon has teeth marks where some child bit down too hard...how come?

<Mrs.

Turner> The silver is coin silver.

It's not as hard as the silver today.

<Mary> I see... speaking of their children, one of their sons was a doctor.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes >> Andrew.

<Mrs.

Turner> He rode horseback to Carlisle, Pennsylvania, finished Dickinson College, then studied medicine with Dr. Benjamin Rush, the famous physician.

<Mary> And was the first doctor in Spartanburg County.

<Mrs.

Turner> In the area.

>> In the Upcountry.

Here we have his medical dictionary...

Isn't that something, quite different from the ones today.

<Mrs.

Turner> It sure is!

>> The gentlemen had their pleasures after dinner.

The consumption of wine and alcohol was common.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

>> This looks like a game of checkers.

<Mrs.

Turner> That's a draughtboard, That's the English form of our game of checkers.

It has more squares and more men on the board than our game does.

The cards had no numbers.

<Mary> So you had to count quickly!

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

<Mary> This corner cupboard, Mrs. Turner, is just beautiful.

You told me the doors were a different wood.

<Mrs.

Turner> They're walnut... and the rest is pine.

<Mary> It's beautiful... locally made?

<Mrs.

Turner> In the upper part of the county.

<Mary> Beautiful!

May we go in the bedroom?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes we can ♪ ♪ [footfalls on wooden floor] <Mary> This master bedroom is just beautiful.

I know the groups who come here enjoy hearing stories of every item.

<Mrs.

Turner> They seem to.

<Mary> Tell me about this bed, which has its trundle bed underneath.

>> The foot posts were carved of mahogany in Charleston and brought by wagon when they went for provisions.

The rest is pine.

They called it a Charleston bed because the foot posts came from there.

<Mary> They had a touch of the Lowcountry in the Upcountry?

>> Right.

<Mary> Just beautiful.

This trunk was brought from Ireland by Charles Moore and made from a section of a tree.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes, the Irish pine tree, or deal tree.

It was covered with a skin, has leather hinges, and a lock.

<Mary> In immigrating, he'd put that on his shoulder and carry the Bible box, and off to an unknown life?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

>> They were very brave people <Mary> This mantle is lovely, and all of the items here.

I'm charmed by something I've never seen before, which is the foot warmer for the ladies.

They'd would have coals in a pan.

The heat would come through the perforated metal and warm their feet when they were outside.

How about those two-hour sermons in church?

<Mrs.

Turner> That's good <Mary> The cradle is lovely.

You told me your mother was born here.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes, she was.

>> She was probably rocked in a cradle like this.

The shoes are so endearing.

This is just fun because you told me this is a curling iron.

<Mrs.

Turner> It is.

They'd heat it in the fire.

Just like today they're heated with electricity.

>> It would take as long again to do curly hair as today.

Tell me about this object.

<Mrs.

Turner> This is a tape loom.

It's how they taught little girls to weave.

Once they could weave this tape smoothly, they were allowed to weave on big looms.

<Mary> Little girls weren't allowed a lot of playtime.

Here's a sampler dated 1807, made by a girl 8 or 9 years old.

<Mrs.

Turner> Right.

>> The door is most unusual.

<Mrs.

Turner> This door was found in the attic when the restoration was done.

It has the original paint, buttermilk and indigo.

<Mary> Indigo like you'd dye clothes with?

>> Like you'd dye clothes with.

<Mary> They'd bring this from Charleston and mix it with buttermilk?

<Mrs.

Turner> Well, they grew some indigo here.

>> Really?

So this paint-- indigo and buttermilk-- has lasted since 1765.

<Mrs.

Turner> It certainly has.

>> You tell me that there's a company reproducing this.

<Mrs.

Turner> I understand in Philadelphia.

>> But very expensive.

<Mrs.

Turner> Very.

>> I would love to linger, but Could we go to the dining room?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

♪ >> This dining room is beautiful.

What a lovely table... is this original?

<Mrs.

Turner> No, but it's like the original, and how they knew what kind of table to have they went back to the inventory that was made when the first federal census was taken in 1790.

That's the way they furnished the house when the restoration was done.

>> It's most interesting.

This is the Southern banqueting table, with the drop leaf in the center and two half-rounds at each end.

Is that correct?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

>> You showed me, that the half-rounds had been made into a round table in the nearby changing room.

that I want to look at in just a moment.

As I understand it, the older girls and the baby would eat here with the parents.

<Mrs.

Turner> That's right.

<Mary> Such a beautiful high chair, made to match the master set of the table, with a dowel that could be removed from the arms to scoot in the little fellow and the footrest rises and the little man or lady are comfortable for dinner.

I like that, and here you're ready for a wonderful turkey dinner and it's just lovely.

<Mrs.

Turner> No... that's a goose, because these people were Irish, and the goose was their meat that they liked, the fowl.

They had to learn to eat turkey.

The Indians taught them that.

>> Americans tend to forget that everybody didn't have turkey.

I love these pewter plates.

Were these their ordinary dishes?

>> Those were the Sunday dishes.

<Mary> I see... the metal ones would be more secure than fine china.

<Mrs.

Turner> They didn't break easily.

>> I like that very, very much.

What a beautiful hurricane lamp.

<Mrs.

Turner> That's a wind shade.

They called it a wind shade so the wind would not blow out the candle, The cruet has the same design etched on it as the wind shade >> Oh, yes... are these original pieces?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes... they were given back by the Moore family for the restoration.

>> That is most interesting, but there is a box here that you were telling me about earlier that I think is just fascinating.

Now this would be... <Mrs.

Turner> The whiskey chest.

>> The gentleman's traveling whiskey chest.

<Mrs.

Turner> Traveling whiskey chest.

<Mary> With six quart bottles, handblown glass with gold decoration at the top.

and then six pint bottles, handblown-- you can tell here-- isn't that lovely?

<Mrs.

Turner> That's where we got our saying, "Mind your Ps and Qs," because they cautioned people not to break their quarts and pints of whiskey (laughing) as they handled it in and out of the wagon.

>> For heaven's sake, literally, Ps and Qs!

I love that.

If it's alright with you, I'd like to show our friends a special piece of Southern furniture in the next room.

<Mrs.

Turner> All right, we'll do that.

♪ <Mary> It's this piece of furniture, which I've never seen before in my life.

Would you explain how it was used?

<Mrs.

Turner> This is a sugar chest, a Southern piece.

It has one partition.

The small side was for white sugar cones.

The larger size was for brown sugar cones.

We got our sugar from the West Indies, which was shipped up to Charleston, the sugar was molded hard into these cones, wrapped with indigo paper.

When they finished using a cone, they would save the indigo paper to dye their embroidery yarn.

<Mary> Never wasted a thing.

<Mrs.

Turner> Didn't waste a thing.

They'd cut the cones with sugar nippers, which were a type of scissors.

<Mary> Why the cone shape?

>> That was just the way people in the West Indies formed it.

They had ceramic molds, and they made the sugar into that form.

>> That's just most fascinating We never think that granulated sugar today-- long ago they thought that brown sugar was two-thirds better for you.

>> That's right.

>> You call this room the changing room, and I find that a wonderful term.

By this you mean the hot food would be brought from the kitchen-- which was an exterior building, here, and hung in pots, such as these.

<Mrs.

Turner> Brass pots.

>> Right and then mother or the older girls would change the food from the pots onto the platters.

>> That's right.

<Mary> That's wonderful, and the breadbasket that you just showed me.

They would cook their bread, bake it in the oven, and the kitchen and put these, they called them loaves of bread in the breadbasket.

They would bake the basket full, and when they used it up, they would bake more.

<Mary> One day a week, they'd do nothing but bake.

Were these baskets woven so tightly that the bread would stay fresh, or did they get awfully hard?

<Mrs.

Turner> It would stay fresh, and there would be no dust that could get in the bread.

<Mary> Oh, I see.

May we see the rest of the house?

>> Yes.

♪ This is the old German lock on the door to the upstairs that I was telling you about.

Fascinating.

May I demonstrate?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

>> I'm a mother with a baby and a candle here, So, in order to open the door, I just lean upon it, and I don't have to use the hand as I go upstairs.

Not only is this interesting, the enclosed stairway has double doors, one from the master bedroom, which is most unusual.

Shall we go to the dormitory room?

>> Yes.

♪ ♪ >> This dormitory room is just delightful in its appearance and the reconstruction that you've given it.

As I understand, this was the bedroom for the ten children of Charles and Mary Moore.

The teenage girls were given a partitioned-off bedroom.

as they grew older.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

>> In your reconstruction,you have not only the different types of beds, cradle, trundle bed-- but you have the artifacts they would have used for handcrafts and toys of the children.

The most interesting.

This quilting frame is unusual.

It's narrow enough that the ladies could reach over and quilt their pieces as they would come up.

They must not have wasted a single minute.

<Mrs.

Turner> They didn't, and the quilt was necessary for warmth in the wintertime.

<Mary> You showed me something I'd never seen before about a bed...that's thick.

<Mrs.

Turner> This was called a bed patter.

<Mary> Patter.

>> When they'd get up in the morning, they'd beat the feather bed, which was their mattress, with this stick, from the head to the foot to fluff the feathers up.

After they got the feathers fluffed, they would move the stick back and forth to smooth the cover, so the bed would look good <Mary> And never a wrinkle.

Isn't that something?

This lovely, smallish loom can it still be used?

<Mrs.

Turner> It's still workable.

The ladies never wasted a minute.

They'd be weaving up here, or their handicrafts.

Weaving the cloth for their dresses.

>> Yet looking after the children, because I noticed in one corner, a small potty-chair similar to the one that we have today.

As they minded the children, it seems, they must have instructed them as well.

Here are alphabet blocks quite like we have today.

The herbs, which are drying around the room, were used by the doctor for his medicines and also as seasoning for the food.

Correct?

<Mrs.

Turner>...the ones in here were used as air fresheners.

Oh, so we would have the brightness.

Well, it's just lovely!

In this room, there is a stain on the floor, and that's a wonderful story.

May I tell the story?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes you may.

>> It seems, the American Revolution in this area of the Upcountry was really a civil war, friends were divided against friends according to their opinions.

A Colonel Steadman, a Patriot, had pursued and slain a friend of a gentleman known as Bloody Bill Cunningham, and so Cunningham, leading his Tory forces through this area, found Colonel Steadman here, a very ill man.

He rushed into this room, killed Colonel Steadman, and the bloodstain is still on the floor.

<Mrs.

Turner> It is.

>> It's remarkable.

It's such a nippy day, shall we put our coats on and go outside and see some of the outbuildings?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes, that'd be fine.

♪ ♪ These nine outbuildings here on the plantation, Mrs. Turner are just fascinating!

The tour, where you showed me the tools and the ways in which plantation life was carried on, is most interesting.

The blacksmith shop, the old stable, and that magnificent covered wagon.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes, t hat's like the wagon that the Moores came from Pennsylvania.

They came down the Great Wagon Road with their eight children in such a wagon.

That one came from Winston-Salem.

<Mary> It's beautiful, but the size... we wonder how they did it.

Among the original things left is this wheat house.

What on earth is a wheat house?

>> That's where they stored grain, this is the only building that had a floor in it.

That would keep their grain dry so they could pour wheat, rye, barley, or whatever grain they had on the floor and it would keep it dry so they could make meal.

<Mary> They they'd process it in the building.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes.

>> Next to it is the smokehouse with the hams, reproduced, and up by the edge of the road, a reproduction of the doctor's office.

>> Yes.

>> Where he would be handy to his patient, >> Dr. Andrew Moore, <Mary>...the son of Charles and Mary.

Right, but here we have one of the three original things left from the 1765 plantation.

That's the old well, I believe you told me, it's 50 feet deep, and circular, and lined with fieldstone.

Is there still water in the well?

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes there is.

>> Could I drop the old oaken bucket in?

<Mrs.

Turner> You could drop it in and draw water today.

if you wanted.

>> Fine, but I'm glad you covered it and locked it, so schoolchildren couldn't fall in.

when they come on the tours.

You have the outside fireplaces where cooking and laundry were carried on.

Mrs. Turner, we have behind us one of the few reproductions of the necessary house which I've seen on a plantation.

Here's the kitchen, beautifully appointed with cooking pots and gadgets that they used at the time.

Do you ever have an original meal?

>> No...we don't build a fire because of fire hazard, but we have all the utensils.

<Mary> It's all there and it's fascinating.

Here's one of the walnut trees which gave Walnut Grove Plantation its name.

Are these originals?

<Mrs.

Turner> These are not original.

Walnut trees don't live as long as some of the oak trees like the big white oak, so they have to be replaced periodically.

<Mary> I see... but they're still here, and then the plantation bell, and the third and last of the original buildings... the schoolhouse, the academy.

<Mrs.

Turner> Right, the Springs Academy, yes.

>> They certainly believed in education even though this was the frontier and life was hard.

<Mrs.

Turner> Charles Moore was the first schoolmaster.

He taught his children and then the neighboring children.

Finally, when they had a larger enrollment, the minister in the neighboring church was the schoolmaster.

>> Education and religion went right along.

They didn't waste the use of the building.

It was also the loom house.

<Mrs.

Turner> The weave shop.

>> The weave shop.

They didn't weave while the children were studying arithmetic >> No, they, when the children were studying, it was cloudy, rainy or snowy outside.

They went in to have their lessons and then w hen it was a pretty, sunshiny day, the mother and the big girls would do the weaving and the spinning.

<Mary> They never wasted a moment or an inch of the school building.

<Mrs.

Turner> No, they didn't.

>> Well, just most, most interesting.

♪ As we pass our boxwood gardens, I like to think that these paths were walked by our local Revolutionary War heroine from this plantation.

<Mrs.

Turner> Yes, Kate Barry.

>> Kate Barry had a wonderful career, as a spy and a courier for the Patriot forces of this area.

When her husband was away, she would carry messages to unite, particularly for the Battle of Cowpens, so enough Patriots would be mast together to defeat the British.

Both, she's known as the heroine of the Battle of Cowpens.

Lovely lady.

They had a large family and grew up here on Walnut Grove Plantation.

I believe she planted the first walnut trees.

>> Yes, she did.

The miniature of Kate was given to your association by Amanda Blake, Miss Kitty of "Gunsmoke" fame, who is the sixth-generation descendant of Kate Barry.

♪ It's not unusual to find a restored home of this period in the Lowcountry, but in the Upcountry, this home of Charles Moore stands as a monument to the success of frontier settlers.

The fact that the house remained standing to be restored makes it a historic treasure.

In the words of the official history of the plantation, "The restoration of Walnut Grove Plantation is dedicated "to the men and women, remembered and forever nameless, "who dared and conquered the howling wilderness "that was the South Carolina frontier, and to the generations who will learn from them."

♪ Program captioned by: CompuScripts Captioning, Inc. 803.988.8438 ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪